Today’s hike was inspired by a book I purchased last week at the Darrington district rangers station, the book is titled “Hiking Snohomish County”. This local area hiking manifesto seems to be a great resource “thus far” and it will likely be the “go to” book for the remainder of the 2009 hiking season. The Headlee Pass trail starts just beyond the
Dickerson Mountain hike (blogged about last week) and that trail is just beyond the
Big 4 Ice Caves hike (blogged about two weeks ago). So you might be picking up on a pattern shortly after I picked upon it myself!
Just like the book said, the hike up was scenic, strenuous and required a lot of rock hopping. I felt pretty good about it and applied some forethought from my lesson from last weeks hike. I carried about 5 liters of water (for bogie and I), a package of trail mix and a package of jerky. I got a somewhat early start (11:00) but not as early as I hoped. Even with this in mind, I kept wondering about how I would manage the decent back down this steep rocky terrain.
As you can imagine, the large rock fields you have to traverse can make the task of sticking to the trail challenging. Here is where the little ad hoc rock sculptures come in quite handy. The idea is to make these little decorative mounds of rocks where the trail is and you can use this to stay on course coming and going. This is the most significant use of this technique that I had seen and the first time I had ever contributed. Making these little rock signposts (in between areas of existing ones) was kind of fun and gave me a little break in managing the ascent.
The views going up to the summit were fantastic! Not sure I would say they equaled Dickerson Mountain but a different type of gorgeous view!
Here is where I stopped but I think there may be a bit more trail here. I couldn’t tell by the description of the book but it looked like you could go a bit further for a more panoramic view. It was almost 3PM, I had lost significant zip in my step and there was the long rocky hike back that I mentioned earlier.
It was a good thing I turned around when I did. I lost my footing a few times and fell. Nothing dramatic but I was running out of gas quickly. There is a great little watering hole (almost all the way back) and I couldn’t help taking a couple snaps of bogie enjoying a dip.
Snapped this picture on one large log we had to traverse on the way back. Rain clouds had swooped in quickly about 5PM and it rained on us for about 30 minutes. I was quite ready for the 7+ hour hike to be over with, actually, I think we both were.
The very last footbridge before the trail head. Thank God!
Today’s hike was inspired by a book I purchased last week at the Darrington district rangers station, the book is titled “Hiking Snohomish County”. This local area hiking manifesto seems to be a great resource “thus far” and it will likely be the “go to” book for the remainder of the 2009 hiking season. The Headlee Pass trail starts just beyond the Dickerson Mountain hike (blogged about last week) and that trail is just beyond the Big 4 Ice Caves hike (blogged about two weeks ago). So you might be picking up on a pattern shortly after I picked upon it myself!
Just like the book said, the hike up was scenic, strenuous and required a lot of rock hopping. I felt pretty good about it and applied some forethought from my lesson from last weeks hike. I carried about 5 liters of water (for bogie and I), a package of trail mix and a package of jerky. I got a somewhat early start (11:00) but not as early as I hoped. Even with this in mind, I kept wondering about how I would manage the decent back down this steep rocky terrain. 
As you can imagine, the large rock fields you have to traverse can make the task of sticking to the trail challenging. Here is where the little ad hoc rock sculptures come in quite handy. The idea is to make these little decorative mounds of rocks where the trail is and you can use this to stay on course coming and going. This is the most significant use of this technique that I had seen and the first time I had ever contributed. Making these little rock signposts (in between areas of existing ones) was kind of fun and gave me a little break in managing the ascent. 
The views going up to the summit were fantastic! Not sure I would say they equaled Dickerson Mountain but a different type of gorgeous view!
Here is where I stopped but I think there may be a bit more trail here. I couldn’t tell by the description of the book but it looked like you could go a bit further for a more panoramic view. It was almost 3PM, I had lost significant zip in my step and there was the long rocky hike back that I mentioned earlier. 
It was a good thing I turned around when I did. I lost my footing a few times and fell. Nothing dramatic but I was running out of gas quickly. There is a great little watering hole (almost all the way back) and I couldn’t help taking a couple snaps of bogie enjoying a dip. 
Snapped this picture on one large log we had to traverse on the way back. Rain clouds had swooped in quickly about 5PM and it rained on us for about 30 minutes. I was quite ready for the 7+ hour hike to be over with, actually, I think we both were. 
The very last footbridge before the trail head. Thank God!
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