White Chuck Bench 03-15-20

Keeping health and social distancing for corona virus reasons in mind, I headed out with the adventure dogs to a trail that we very rarely see anyone on.  Living up to expectations - we were the only ones on it the whole time.  Yay!

This trail does not have a singular 'wow feature' but is just a really beautiful hike through the forest up on on a flat forested bench, sometimes above a river.  You get peek a boo views now and then of the river, and of the peaks surrounding, but it's all about the forest - moss, trees, interesting rocks, and streams.

We had done about 6 miles at Paradise Valley Conservation Area the day before for Cedar's 11th birthday - meeting up with people friend, Katie, and pooch friend, Pixel - so I wanted to keep this day around 5 miles.  You can hike much farther on this trail.  I have never hiked all the way to the end.  Apple Watch stats: 4.82 miles and 423 ft of elevation gain.

There were a lot of blow downs on the trail, and one little landslide/slump.  All were fairly easily negotiated by going over, under or around. With small dogs, we often do a combination as they go under and charge ahead while I try to pass the leashes under to myself while scaling the obstacle they passed underneath.

Today I must have been a bit tired of stepping over logs, as one of the last ones I caught my toe on and took a header - scraped both knees and one shin.  Ouch!  Luckily if you're hiking 'walking it off' isn't a problem - it's what you have to do.

All in all - a gorgeous day that we all enjoyed.  Luna decided she had enough hiking about 1/3 mile from the car though, so I carried her the rest of the way while my 11 yr old adventure buddy trotted right along at the end of his leash like he could walk 50 miles.  Gotta love these two!

This last photo is taken in Darrington of White Horse Mt - it is just so gorgeous!  I fall in love every time I drive through there.

Sharpe Park and Tommy Thompson Trail 3-8-20

Today we had double the usual fun!  Our first destination was Sharpe Park on Fidalgo Island.  I had volunteered with a WTA work party on Friday to work on a section of the trail system here, and really loved the park.  I wanted to show Dave what we had worked on, so we loaded up the adventure dogs and off we went.

This trail system has woods, stream, wetlands, and views of the sea!  I expect bald eagles. hang out here, but I didn't see them in this particular spot either day.  We took Porpoise Way to Madrona Trail where we had been working and it was totally amazing how much more work had been done since Friday.

Cool mosses

Then we caught the Sunburst Trail which goes along the hillside above the sea (with only peek-a-boo views now and then).  There was one nice overlooking, but we only stayed a moment and carried on to catch the Sares Head Trail.  Sares Head is a lovely overlook of the Salish Sea and San Juan Islands.

When we got back to the parking lot we were just .3 mi shy of my 2 miles to count it as a hike, so I jogged the dogs back down the hill to a picnic table and back to finish out my distance.  Apple Watch stats for this hike:  2.07 miles, 431 ft of elevation gain.  There are other trails you can take (and actually we did take a spur trail along the pond a ways too).

After wrapping up this little hike, we went to a place neither of us has been - the Tommy Thompson Trail at the Fidalgo Bay Aquatic Reserve.  Yes, we could hear traffic and see refineries, but the trail is a lovely paved walk (we only did the last mile of it - so 2 out and back) that goes out over the water.  We parked at the Fidalgo Bay Resort and walked past a little pond where we saw a lovely pair of green winged teals along with some mallards.

Out on the trail over the water we saw buffleheads, grebes, golden eye and loons among others.

We didn't get rained on, got some great exercise and got to check out some new places - so a great day all around.