Here's how Gavin spent his day instead of hiking.
Crossing Silver Creek a couple hundred feet from the trailhead. This was the only water available on the route. The waterfall on the left appears to be an old…
Commence the uphill switchbacks. Thankfully there was plenty of shade since it was a little warm down low.
One of only 3 decision points on the hike. We chose the bottom one which led to blueberries and a very steep trail of loose dirt.
We're going there! Actually, no, we're not. That's way too far away. It's Thorp Mountain, with its lookout, which is reachable from the trailhead we started…
The south end of Kachess Lake.
Blueberry snack time. The lightly traveled trail had so many berries.
Once the blueberries ended it was time to crank up the steepness and make an almost vertical shot to the ridge.
Peekaboo I see you Mt. Rainier. It's funny how she just pops up while hiking.
Lake Easton to the left and Kachess Lake to the right with I-90 somewhere in there.
Scragglemonster stump.
Up, up, up we go.
It's a bit hard to see, but the trail ahead is one of the steeper sections. Zoe's facial expression is "What?!? Really?".
Once on the final spine that leads to the ridge the forest opened up and we had some nice views.
Ridgetop, not at the summit yet, snack break looking towards Mt. Stuart and friends.
Once atop the ridge we had an expansive view of Cle Elum Lake.
There were a few of these mysterious areas of almost bare rock. Looks like it'd be a fun skiing/avalanche area in winter.
A much fuller view of Mt. Rainier. We were also able to see Mt. Adams' summit. There wasn't a cloud in the sky all day and visibility was great since it'd…
Way out in the distance to the east we were even able to spot the gigantic windmills.
Mt. Baldy's summit! A very breezy spot as you can see from the poor little tree to the left of Zoe.
