|
Anyone happen to have winter backpacking recs for Washington state? Not interested in dying in an avalanche, would prefer rainy as opposed to snowy, but am not opposed to a snowshoe adventure. I feel like some of the valleys in the Olympics should be good albeit very wet this time of year? Not looking for anything crazy, just getting cabin fever
|
#
?
Jan 21, 2024 18:41
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 28, 2024 02:38 |
|
|
xzzy posted:BWCA has had some nasty fires the past 20 years too and it's only going to get worse as time passes. We're all in this shitshow together. Sadly true. I think we'd move back to Alaska if not for having little kids and nearby family. I miss Alaska so much. But its hard to fly back and forth constantly to tend to aging parents and to have your kids know their cousins and extended family. Maybe when they get older I'll move us all back up there. We finally got some snow so I went out and tested the snowshoes I made my wife. They'll work pretty good even if I notice every flaw!
|
|
#
?
Jan 21, 2024 19:12
|
|
|
Maybe everyone has fires but I'll keep my relatively flat (and uncrowded) trails in the east and leave you all the brown bears thank you very much. Although it seems more of a CAN/AK problem on account of you having killed them all in the lower 48
|
|
#
?
Jan 21, 2024 19:19
|
|
|
Popular trails are crowded, yes. But in just the year I've lived here I've found a dozen trails within two hours that no one ever hikes. They don't have the most jaw dropping vistas or climb the highest peaks but it's never a bad day if you get a forest all to yourself. And yeah I'd love to go back to Alaska too. But jobs (and cost of living) is a forever issue. Colorado was the first place that we found work for both of us so it got the nod.
|
|
#
?
Jan 21, 2024 19:29
|
|
|
Yeah the whole getting a job in Colorado made it a lot easier to move here. They even threw in a relocation package
|
|
#
?
Jan 22, 2024 00:38
|
|
|
liz posted:Please tell me your secrets for making it out of flatlandia. My goal is to make it to Washington hopefully, I cannot live in places where mountains don’t exist anymore. It’s getting too expensive to travel to all the cool places. I'll add my 2¢ I grew up in Michigan where I was camping and hunting with family. My older step sister moved out to Seattle my freshman year of highschool. We visited and I loved it. We hiked Rachel lake in July and there was still snow which blew my mind, and then we white water rafted in Oregon. I was in heaven. I went to college in Chicago and work and stayed 10 years. I really started getting into backpacking and hiking and did trips in Colorado when I realized it's a huge passion of mine and easier to do when you live close to the mountains. I met my wife and got married in Chicago but knew I wanted to live in the West one day. We flew to the few places we would consider living and spent a few days in each. We settled on Seattle. My wife happened to get a job offer in Seattle and they paid for our move so it was a no brainer. We've been in Seattle for the last 8 years. It's home and I'll never leave. It's tough though. The mountain West is expensive and not just the housing, which is some of the highest in North America. Seattle is stupid expensive. Gas is always near the highest price in the nation. Food prices are high. We don't have income tax but every other possible thing is taxed. My vehicle tabs for my 14 year old 4runner are like $230 per year. Sales tax is 10.25% It adds up. Starter homes are $500k but likely closer to $700k now. Condos are maybe as low as $375 or 400k. California has always been $$$. Washington, oregon, Montana, Idaho are all skyrocketing in price and popularity. Utah used to be cheap but it's also going way up and it's so hot in the summer. That said if you can live in a suburb vs downtown, it might be easier to make a reality. All that said, its worth it to me. It checks all of my boxes and I've never been happier. I can be in the mountains in an hour or two. I can ski actual mountains in the winter, peak bag in the summer, paddle board 9 months out of the year. Plus I never have to shovel snow. If you have a solid career and are willing to sacrifice the size of your home for living close to the mountains, I think it's a great tradeoff but that's me. It's different for everybody. I would rather have a bad house here than a mansion in Ohio. You can improve an ugly house but you can't bring mountains to the Midwest. Lots of people try to gatekeep the West/Rockies because it's crowded and expensive but it won't change anything. People are still moving to mountain adjacent places in droves.
|
|
#
?
Jan 22, 2024 02:24
|
|
|
Hitting up the W Trek in Chili in early April. Has anyone here ever done it? Just looking for some general insight as we've already booked our nights (west to east over 3 night/4 days).
|
|
#
?
Jan 22, 2024 18:05
|
|
|
Just landed some reservation spots for the West Coast Trail. Got August 4-11th at first but had to back out cause I forgot to set the party to "2" and then had to go through a bunch of dates but eventually found Sept 22-28th.
|
|
#
?
Jan 22, 2024 20:57
|
|
|
Bloody posted:Anyone happen to have winter backpacking recs for Washington state? Not interested in dying in an avalanche, would prefer rainy as opposed to snowy, but am not opposed to a snowshoe adventure. I feel like some of the valleys in the Olympics should be good albeit very wet this time of year? I can't really attest to the Olympics but I really enjoy the tiger mountain trails when I just want to go out and hike. I always forget this exists but you can glean the status of trails from the washington trails website comments. https://www.wta.org/
|
|
#
?
Jan 23, 2024 15:40
|
|
|
I'm planning a drive from Seattle to the Gorge amphitheater in mid-September. I have five days to make it there and want to do some backpacking along the way. What are some good places? It doesn't need to be directly on the route; a triangle drive is fine. I've never been to Washington or even the PNW, so it'll all be new to me.
|
|
#
?
Jan 27, 2024 22:21
|
|
|
Fitzy Fitz posted:I'm planning a drive from Seattle to the Gorge amphitheater in mid-September. I have five days to make it there and want to do some backpacking along the way. What are some good places? It doesn't need to be directly on the route; a triangle drive is fine. I've never been to Washington or even the PNW, so it'll all be new to me. September is a great time of year but it will entirely depend on fire/smoke at the time. How much mileage and elevation are you looking to do? How many days do you want to backpack? Also I'm assuming you'll have a car at your disposal. There's two, or three possible routes, 4 if you want a long and beautiful drive. 90 is the most direct with a lot of options. 2 is a slight detour north but there's a lot off there as well. You could take 410 to the south and visit Rainier but it's a ways out of the way and a national park so reservations are difficult to obtain. The long way is the North Cascades highway (20). It's the most beautiful drive in the state but it's a long way around. National park for a bit but then a lot of national forest/wilderness. Wta.org is the best resource for Washington hiking. They also have an app, or you can use any of the others (all trails, onX etc). I can give you some better suggestions once you share your parameters. Verman fucked around with this message at 22:50 on Jan 27, 2024 |
|
#
?
Jan 27, 2024 22:41
|
|
|
I'll be renting a car, yeah. It seems like it would make the most sense to come up with a flexible itinerary so that I can adapt if fire excludes one area or another. So I'm perfectly happy to travel several hours east, north, or south. I don't mind reserving sites (very used to recreation.gov). Not looking to do anything extreme because I'll still be adjusting to the elevation and likely visiting more than one site rather than spending the whole time at one. My first choice is national parks and particularly interesting national forests, but anything is cool.
|
|
#
?
Jan 27, 2024 22:55
|
|
|
I suggest highway 20. There's an epic trail every few miles so you can pick anything that seems interesting. There was a fire that hit the Diablo area last summer so stuff in that valley might be closed but it's far from the only option. I guess I90 and US2 has endless trailheads too but the north cascades get my pick for a through route.
|
|
#
?
Jan 27, 2024 23:28
|
|
|
North Cascades was what jumped out at me first. Guess the obvious one is the best one in this case!
|
|
#
?
Jan 27, 2024 23:44
|
|
|
If you don't want to deal with permits and busy trails, go highway 20 and do pasayten wilderness. It's less rugged than the Western North Cascades, slightly more rolling, but vast and beautiful. I did a week long trip and saw 2 people, both on horses. You can hike up to the Canadian border, have an entire lake to yourself, camp fires are allowed unless there's a ban which is a rarity in most western states. Just don't be dumb. Parking is easy, usually free or just get an America the beautiful pass. Devils dome is also an absolutely incredible hike within North Cascades.
|
|
#
?
Jan 28, 2024 07:56
|
|
|
It's not as breathtaking as North Cascades, but Indian Heaven Wilderness is down south closer to the Gorge is quite pretty. More like a high plateau of meadows and lakes rather than stunning views. If you'd like a unique day hike halfway down the state, Mt St Helens is pretty cool. Very exposed (ie zero trees), so plan accordingly if it's hot and sunny. Coldwater Peak is a good day hike that shows off the views (and can easily be shortened with still decent views if you don't have time for a long hike). Edit: to be clear, I wouldn't substitute either of these for the Cascades. But they're options if you have more time or want to see a different part of the state as well.
|
|
#
?
Jan 28, 2024 16:41
|
|
|
There's also goat rocks wilderness east of Rainier which is fantastic and not as crowded as the national parks. I did a nice 5 day trip out there and it was incredible. Hard but incredible. Nothing quite like seeing Rainier, Adams, st Helens and some Oregon peaks at one time.
|
|
#
?
Jan 28, 2024 20:31
|
|
|
My wife and I are looking for a place to spend our anniversary hiking, preferably one spot we can hike from every day. Can anyone make a recommendation for a spot in Germany or Switzerland?
|
|
#
?
Jan 28, 2024 21:20
|
|
|
Ropes4u posted:My wife and I are looking for a place to spend our anniversary hiking, preferably one spot we can hike from every day. Can anyone make a recommendation for a spot in Germany or Switzerland? I mean, Interlaken is beautiful however it was the only place I hiked in Switzerland when I backpacked through shortly after college. Verman fucked around with this message at 22:31 on Jan 28, 2024 |
|
#
?
Jan 28, 2024 21:49
|
|
|
Either country has a thousand spots. You should consider the time of year and what sort of hiking you want to do. Do you want to wander through the forest for a couple hours, walk full days through mountain meadows, or are glacial traverses and peaks above 3000m on the agenda? If it were me and it's in the summer I'd probably pick somewhere in Valais for Switzerland, maybe Val d'Hérens or Saastal. Or you could go somewhere like Haslital in Bern for something a bit more chill with both good valley walks and beautiful but somewhat lower mountains. I can think of at least half a dozen amazing regions in Germany I've hiked: Chiemsee, Frankenjura, Ostsee, Allgäu, the Black Forest, Saarland. You could even reasonably stay in Berlin and take the train to a different hiking area every day within an hour of the city. But it's really season dependent. In the winter I'd either want to take skis or have a more city based trip.
|
|
#
?
Jan 28, 2024 22:14
|
|
|
numberoneposter posted:Just landed some reservation spots for the West Coast Trail. Got August 4-11th at first but had to back out cause I forgot to set the party to "2" and then had to go through a bunch of dates but eventually found Sept 22-28th. Probably will be nice and dry or possibly very wet. With the weather we have been having the past few summers it is impossible to tell.
|
|
#
?
Jan 29, 2024 03:25
|
|
|
Ropes4u posted:My wife and I are looking for a place to spend our anniversary hiking, preferably one spot we can hike from every day. Can anyone make a recommendation for a spot in Germany or Switzerland? Like big scary monsters said, you have a lot of choices. It will also depend on your level of fitness to an extent, going on daily hikes in the Switzerland vs Northern Germany require different levels of fitness. In and around the Alps there are a lot of nice fitness/nature hotels that cater to this, or just find a guest house in some cozy village if spending money on hotels is not your thing.
|
|
#
?
Jan 29, 2024 06:03
|
|
|
Sorry for the semi open ended question we spend most weekends hiking the mountains of Colorado. According to Garmin my wife had around 200,000 feet of climbing last year. I spend most weeks traveling for work so we would like to fly in and hike from one air bnb or hotel every day. I will check out the places mentioned, thank you.
|
|
#
?
Jan 30, 2024 05:20
|
|
|
Dread Head posted:Probably will be nice and dry or possibly very wet. With the weather we have been having the past few summers it is impossible to tell. I did an overnight camp at Sheilds Lake not last summer but the one before. Me and my buddy hiked up, camped on the provincial side as it hasn't been changed over to CRD yet. Any ways we went in October and it was 25 degrees C on the way up. Definitely didn't need all the layers we brought in. But like the next month that's when that women who's body was finally found went missing, in that same area in the same place we started into the trails. poo poo changes real quick here. I've been out at China Beach in the middle of summer and it's been miserably windy.  Shields Lake and Dog on a hot October day.  This was a 6 day portage around the lakes of Powell River, but that's the tent we will be using, no dogs allowed on the West Coast Trail, so more room.  This was during the heat wave. Had to do everything early. The fresh water was so warm it was wild. Such an amazing trip. It's going to be a lot of days on the trail. I'm going to have to actually think about meal planning. Last 2 night trip I did with my buddy we brought in so much food it was ridiculous. First night was fine, marinated steak and buttery mushrooms. Next day we just ate carbs.  The food for the first night was great.  This is from the Mt Albert Edward hike I did this year. The tarp is a game changer.  Up.  Merlin has been to the peak twice.  Ansel Adams. Bit of a photo dump. I'm trying to figure out some easy weekend overnighters from the city. Would do Sheilds lake again for sure. numberoneposter fucked around with this message at 09:08 on Jan 30, 2024 |
|
#
?
Jan 30, 2024 08:56
|
|
|
numberoneposter posted:Yep we won't actually know until the week of. We have done many similar trips, last time I did the Jaun de Fuca it was insanely busy. The on upside to the WCT is that there is a limited amount of people and there is a lot less struggling to find a place to setup your tent.
|
|
#
?
Jan 30, 2024 09:11
|
|
|
That's a good dog.
|
|
#
?
Jan 30, 2024 16:47
|
|
|
    Went up Borrego Palm Canyon a bit. A good amount of water flowing down from Hot Springs Mountain right now and with another storm coming through this week it should be more.
|
|
#
?
Jan 30, 2024 20:08
|
|
|
Are there hot springs on Hot Springs Mountain?
|
|
#
?
Jan 30, 2024 20:34
|
|
|
My instinct tells me no; it's just a Greenland/Iceland scenario 
|
|
#
?
Jan 30, 2024 20:37
|
|
|
There are some hot springs not too far from it at the town Warner Springs, but as far as I know there is not one up top. The oldest fire lookout tower in the Cleveland National Forest is there tho.
|
|
#
?
Jan 30, 2024 21:08
|
|
|
Anyone happen to have experience with northern Nevada in early June? From a look around it appears it'll be hot and dry, but not insanely hot and dry (85F-ish). Doing a road trip and was hoping to spend a day stretching my legs in the ruby mountains, which I think will still be pretty mellow at that time. But I was also thinking of doing a bit of exploration of the black rock desert and am curious when/if it gets nasty. I guess it depends if they get any torrential rains again, definitely not going to be driving out there if there's mud.
|
|
#
?
Feb 1, 2024 18:36
|
|
|
Not exactly there but pretty close, I've been in SE Oregon in mid June and it was downright cold, but I think it was a sort of unusual cold front situation. It also rained. But my understanding is: usually not crazy hot, but, highly variable so be prepared for anything.
|
|
#
?
Feb 1, 2024 19:25
|
|
|
xzzy posted:Anyone happen to have experience with northern Nevada in early June? From a look around it appears it'll be hot and dry, but not insanely hot and dry (85F-ish). I live in Reno and used to get out there quite a bit. It is very mellow. I enjoy my trips out there a lot but I don't have a lot of photos. I did find some work shots from a trip on the east flank of the Ruby's dated June 7 where I am wearing a lined hoodie and rain shell. These are just work photos so nothing special to the siteseer. It was a wet year. In June still had some green.    This series must have been farther east, because they are salt flats of Utah in the background.  
|
|
#
?
Feb 1, 2024 19:49
|
|
|
It's so weird to me seeing that part of the country green. I've had family in Nevada/Idaho/Montana my whole life so I've been through the big towns in those states a number of times, but somehow it's always been in late summer or winter so in my head it's always brown. Catching it when it's green is about as fun as seeing fresh snowfall.
|
|
#
?
Feb 1, 2024 19:57
|
|
|
The rubies are low key one of the coolest places I’ve been Hike the long crest. There’s no water and it’s up and down at high elevation, but the views are worth it. I’ve never anything quite like it
|
|
#
?
Feb 1, 2024 20:07
|
|
|
going to be in the Seattle area last week of May this year, and last time i was in Olympic i was not able to get to the Hoh. Figure I will take 1-2 nights and go check it out. Any recommendations on campsites?
|
|
#
?
Feb 1, 2024 20:10
|
|
|
Northern Nevada might be super hot in early June. I think it was 2021 that we had a nasty heat wave over Utah/Nevada and hiking in that sucked, even at elevation. That said I’m also doing a road trip that way in early June, supposed to be in Lake Tahoe but I figure the mountains there will be covered in snow. Considering doing Star Peak since it’s an ultra prominent peak and would hopefully be less covered in snow
|
|
#
?
Feb 1, 2024 20:26
|
|
|
Hotel Kpro posted:Northern Nevada might be super hot in early June. I think it was 2021 that we had a nasty heat wave over Utah/Nevada and hiking in that sucked, even at elevation. Noted. I'll just keep the black rock desert tour as an option if the forecast looks decent. quote:That said I’m also doing a road trip that way in early June, supposed to be in Lake Tahoe but I figure the mountains there will be covered in snow. Considering doing Star Peak since it’s an ultra prominent peak and would hopefully be less covered in snow I'm headed California-ward too! The plan so far:  Feeling a real need to visit the redwoods before something catastrophic happens to them. Hopefully Alvord Desert is drivable then too, I've been wanting to see it and Steen's mountain for eons.
|
|
#
?
Feb 1, 2024 20:33
|
|
|
xzzy posted:
#7 on your list - I did some highway projects where I was based out of Crescent City, which gets a lot of heat for being rednecky-methy, whatever. But just minutes out of town and you are in Del Norte / Redwoods parks and some great coastline. Great chill dayhikes all up and 101.
|
|
#
?
Feb 1, 2024 20:43
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 28, 2024 02:38 |
|
|
xzzy posted:Noted. I'll just keep the black rock desert tour as an option if the forecast looks decent. lol we’re starting from almost the same spot too. I was planning on doing a southerly trek through Ely before ending up in Tahoe. Your route back past the southern Uintas through Vernal does look like more fun than dealing with I-70 or I-80 though. Plus it goes right past dinosaur National monument. Gotta put my lifetime parks pass to good use
|
|
#
?
Feb 1, 2024 21:02
|
|