7/11/2010 Posting

What lovely weather we’ve been having! After a slow start to summer, the snow is finally melting off in the upper mountains and we’re enjoying some fine, warm hiking weather.

I spent Saturday working with several other CHS folks on the WTA trail maintenance outing up in the Foss River area by Skykomish. We ended up working on the trail that goes up to Trout and Copper Lakes—a trail I’ve hiked before, but where the beginning of the trail had been seriously washed out several years ago. The WTA is rebuilding the trail to a more stable section and we got to work on leveling out new trail bed. As far as trail maintenance goes, this is pretty hard work—we dug out rocks, sawed out roots and fallen trees, leveled ground, and hauled in new rock for the trail bed. We were beat at the end of the day and all enjoyed an ice cream treat at Zekes on the way back to the Park and Ride.

Hard though the work was, several folks remarked on both the importance of the work and their desire to come back when the trail was complete and admire their handiwork. I know from talking to many course participants that this feeling is very common. Participants who are initially not too excited to get out and wield a polaski or saw can see immediate results after a day of hard work. This is an experience not often gained through the work most of us do for a living. For many of us, it may take months to see progress on a work project. Several of us have worked hard on work projects that end up getting scrapped and never come to fruition. Performing trail maintenance has both an immediate and long-term benefit. You can immediately feel a sense of accomplishment when that fallen tree is finally cleared from the trail. The long-term benefits are many, but the most obvious is contributing to the maintenance of trails that we all enjoy and that will hopefully still be there for all to enjoy after we are long gone.

Thank you for the work you have done or will do in the course of this summer to the maintenance of our trails. Together we will contribute over 60 volunteer days by the time we are done!

July & August Hike Signup

All July hikes are open for signup for more than two hikes. Feel free to take advantage of open spaces we have available in the hikes in your group.

Signup for the Cougar Flat Campout is also going well. There is still space available on the campout and most of the hikes.

If you end up only hiking, not camping this weekend, please be sure to communicate this with your hike leader so that they can arrange meeting times/places with you accordingly. One suggestion is to fill in the note section when you register for the hike that tells if and when you are camping (Friday, Saturday or both nights). But be sure to also email the hike leader and let them know your plans as well so there is no confusion about carpooling. If you are camping, I encourage you to use either the CHS Google Group (http://groups.google.com/group/CHS2010) or the CHS Hikers Facebook page to see if others are interested in carpooling with you so we can cut down on the number of drivers and cars parked at the campground.

August hike descriptions will be coming out early this week. August hike signup will begin on Wednesday, August 21st.

CHS1:

7/12/10—Midweek Hike, Surprise & Glacier Lakes, Jan Davis & Sue Shih (11 miles, 2800’ gain)

7/16—Cougar Flat Campout: Union Creek Photography Hike, Steve Payne (6 miles, 1300’ gain)—no CHS hike credit for this.

7/17—Cougar Flat Campout: Naches Peak/Sourdough Gap/Crystal Lakes, Steve Payne & Heidi Walker (12 miles, 2400’ gain)

7/17—Cougar Flat Campout: Berkeley Park/Grand Park, Shep Griswold (14 miles, 1800’ gain)

7/18—Cougar Flat Campout: Noble Knob, Barbara Folmer & Jan Pecoraro (7 miles, 800’ gain)—no CHS hike credit for this.

7/18—Cougar Flat Campout: Summerland, Heidi Walker (8.5 miles, 2100’ gain)—no CHS hike credit for this.

7/18—Cougar Flat Campout: Mt Fremont Lookout, Steve Payne & Shep Griswold (5.5 miles, 800’ gain)—no CHS hike credit for this.

7/24—Harry’s Ridge/Coldwater Peak/South Coldwater Trail, Steve Payne (8.5 miles, 2300 ft gain) leader)

7/31/10—Navaho Peak, Gregg Pilgreen (13 miles, 4200’ gain). This will also count as a CHS2 hike but will be led at a CHS1 pace.

CHS2:

7/16—Cougar Flat Campout: Union Creek Photography Hike, Steve Payne (6 miles, 1300’ gain)—no CHS hike credit for this.

7/17—Cougar Flat Campout: Indian Bar, Barbara Folmer (14.5 miles, 3700’ gain)

7/17—Cougar Flat Campout: Mt Aix, Kelly Cleman & Matt Cleman (12 miles, 4000’ gain)

7/18—Cougar Flat Campout: Noble Knob, Barbara Folmer & Jan Pecoraro (7 miles, 800’ gain)—no CHS hike credit for this.

7/18—Cougar Flat Campout: Summerland, Heidi Walker (8.5 miles, 2100’ gain)—no CHS hike credit for this.

7/18—Cougar Flat Campout: Mt Fremont Lookout, Steve Payne & Shep Griswold (5.5 miles, 800’ gain)—no CHS hike credit for this.

7/25/10— Leavenworth Area Hiking Weekend: Snow & Nada Lakes, Christine Pratt & Steward Hougan (13.5 miles, 3900’ gain)

7/25/10— Leavenworth Area Hiking Weekend: Lake Stuart & Horseshoe Lake, Michale Kelly (13.5 miles, 3900’ gain)

7/31/10— Navaho Peak, Gregg Pilgreen (13 miles, 4200’ gain). This is a CHS1 level hike will also count as a CHS2 hike--it will be led at a CHS1 pace.

WTA Trail Maintenance Signup

If you haven’t already signed up for one of the several remaining trail maintenance trips with WTA, please do so soon, or you can schedule an outing on a non CHS trail maintenance trip with either WTA or some of the other outdoor organizations. Once you have completed your trail maintenance requirement, please email me to let me know what date you did it on as we keep track of this information for graduation purposes.

CHS Pictures:

If you took any pictures on your hike this weekend, please be sure to forward them to chshiker2008@gmail.com to post them on the picture site for everyone to view. You can access the picture site through the CHS Web Site or directly by going to http://picasaweb.google.com/hiker.chs.

Have a great week and I look forward to hiking with each of you soon. Please contact me if you have any questions.

7/5/2010 Posting

I hope you are all still enjoying your holiday weekend!

I spent a very lovely 4^th of July weekend with several friends and my brother backpacking on the Eagle Creek trail on the Oregon side of the Columbia Gorge. While the weather wasn’t exactly sunny and warm the whole time, the rain only showed up a few times when we were heading into our camp on Friday morning; otherwise we were treated to partly sunny skies and moderate temperatures most of the weekend. We even had pretty good views of Mt Adams and Mt St Helens when we hit the top of Indian Mountain off of the Pacific Crest Trail.

I want to discuss a couple of safety issues on the trail this week. First, for trails where there are several junctions, it’s important to wait at all junctions for the whole group to catch up. This way, you know that everyone has taken the correct trail. Secondly, if for some reason you do miss a junction and are beginning to suspect that you’ve taken the wrong trail, then stop and assess the situation. Take out your map (remember why you bring a map?) and figure out if and where you could’ve possibly gone wrong. Take a look at your surroundings, do they look like what you should be encountering on the trail or if you’re heading back down, do you remember coming through this section? If you conclude that you’re not on the correct trail then head back down and figure out where you’ve gone wrong. Hopefully the rest of the group is waiting there for you. If you’re not sure if you are on the right trail, then wait to see if someone else in your group catches up with you. Do not continue to hike on a trail when all signs are telling you that you are not where you should be.

Also, do not be offended if your hike leader chooses to wait for you while you take a party separation. Hikers have been known to come back on the trail and take off in the wrong direction—leading to hours of frantic searching by the whole group. Your hike leader needs to know where you are and that you are not heading off in the wrong direction. You signed up to hike with a group this summer, so be mindful of responsibility you have when travelling with a group—group safety takes precedence over your autonomy.

Hike Leaders: be sure to give clear, proactive instructions on what your hikers should do at all junctions or if they’ve suspect they’ve gone down the wrong path. Be sure to require that everyone waits at all junctions.

CHS Hikers Facebook Group

You should have received an invitation by now to join the CHS Hikers group on Facebook. Steve has set this up to let us more easily stay in touch with CHS folks both past and present. We hope you find it useful. You will need to set up a Facebook account to access it. Let me know if you didn't get an invitation and we’ll send it out to you. This group is totally private and access is only allowed by invitation. Friends who have access to your Facebook Wall will not be able to see posts to this group.

July Hike Signup

All July hikes will be open for signup for more than two hikes starting on Wednesday, July 7^th. Feel free to take advantage of open spaces we have available in the hikes in your group.

Signup for the Cougar Flat Campout is also going well. There is still space available on the campout and most of the hikes. If you want to come on the campout, be sure to sign up before July 7^th. The Cougar Flat hikes will also open up to non-camping CHS hikers on July 7^th.

If you end up only hiking, not camping this weekend, please be sure to communicate this with your hike leader so that they can arrange meeting times/places with you accordingly. One suggestion is to fill in the note section when you register for the hike that tells if and when you are camping (Friday, Saturday or both nights). But be sure to also email the hike leader and let them know your plans as well so there is no confusion about carpooling. If you are camping, I encourage you to use either the CHS Google Group (http://groups.google.com/group/CHS2010) or the CHS Hikers Facebook page to see if others are interested in carpooling with you so we can cut down on the number of drivers and cars parked at the campground.

CHS1:

7/11/10— Tired Creek to Pollalie Ridge, Barry Kellems (11 miles, 2600’ gain)

7/12/10—Midweek Hike, Surprise & Glacier Lakes, Jan Davis & Sue Shih (11 miles, 2800’ gain)

7/16—Cougar Flat Campout: Union Creek Photography Hike, Steve Payne (6 miles, 1300’ gain)—no CHS hike credit for this.

7/17—Cougar Flat Campout: Naches Peak/Sourdough Gap/Crystal Lakes, Steve Payne & Heidi Walker (12 miles, 2400’ gain)

7/17—Cougar Flat Campout: Berkeley Park/Grand Park, Shep Griswold (14 miles, 1800’ gain)

7/18—Cougar Flat Campout: Noble Knob, Barbara Folmer & Jan Pecoraro (7 miles, 800’ gain)—no CHS hike credit for this.

7/18—Cougar Flat Campout: Summerland, Heidi Walker (8.5 miles, 2100’ gain)—no CHS hike credit for this.

7/18—Cougar Flat Campout: Mt Fremont Lookout, Steve Payne & Shep Griswold (5.5 miles, 800’ gain)—no CHS hike credit for this.

7/31/10— Navaho Peak, Gregg Pilgreen (13 miles, 4200’ gain). This will also count as a CHS2 hike but will be led at a CHS1 pace.

CHS2:

7/10/10— Alpine Lookout via Merrit Lake, Deborah Dickstein & Bill Schecket (12-13 miles, 3200’ gain)

7/10/10— Indian Bar, Marion Bauman & Michale Kelly (14.5 miles, 3700’ gain)

7/16—Cougar Flat Campout: Union Creek Photography Hike, Steve Payne (6 miles, 1300’ gain)—no CHS hike credit for this.

7/17—Cougar Flat Campout: Indian Bar, Barbara Foler (14.5 miles, 3700’ gain)

7/17—Cougar Flat Campout: Mt Aix, Kelly Cleman & Matt Cleman (12 miles, 4000’ gain)

7/18—Cougar Flat Campout: Noble Knob, Barbara Folmer & Jan Pecoraro (7 miles, 800’ gain)—no CHS hike credit for this.

7/18—Cougar Flat Campout: Summerland, Heidi Walker (8.5 miles, 2100’ gain)—no CHS hike credit for this.

7/18—Cougar Flat Campout: Mt Fremont Lookout, Steve Payne & Shep Griswold (5.5 miles, 800’ gain)—no CHS hike credit for this.

7/25/10— Leavenworth Area Hiking Weekend: Snow & Nada Lakes, Christine Pratt & Steward Hougan (13.5 miles, 3900’ gain)

7/25/10— Leavenworth Area Hiking Weekend: Lake Stuart & Horseshoe Lake, Michale Kelly (13.5 miles, 3900’ gain)

7/31/10— Navaho Peak, Gregg Pilgreen (13 miles, 4200’ gain). This is a CHS1 level hike will also count as a CHS2 hike--it will be led at a CHS1 pace.

WTA Trail Maintenance Signup

If you haven’t already signed up for one of the several remaining trail maintenance trips with WTA, please do so soon, or you can schedule an outing on a non CHS trail maintenance trip with either WTA or some of the other outdoor organizations. Once you have completed your trail maintenance requirement, please email me to let me know what date you did it on as we keep track of this information for graduation purposes.

CHS Pictures:

If you took any pictures on your hike this weekend, please be sure to forward them to chshiker2008@gmail.com to post them on the picture site for everyone to view. You can access the picture site through the CHS Web Site or directly by going to http://picasaweb.google.com/hiker.chs.

Have a great week and I look forward to hiking with each of you soon. Please contact me if you have any questions.