Powerline Pass
The secret to easy parking at the trail head?
Arrive on a weekday and arrive early!
We left the house before 7 am this morning and found the parking lot:
Virtually empty.
We donned our bikes and off we went.
Why do all these signs lie? The pass was not 5.5 miles.
I biked exactly 4 miles from the parking lot to a random spot on the trail.
I hid Autumn's bike behind some rocks and started tracking my location so I could find the bike.
Sean stayed on his bike and continued ahead of me.
It was pretty cloudy, but not rainy.
I had really hoped the sun would burn off some of this cloud, but we didn't have any such luck.
Despite, the view was cool looking.
A pretty mushroom.
I learned that being behind someone sucks.
There was some mud, some water crossings and well, I got hit in the face more than once with splatter.
Also, if you are a mouth breather, this is the perfect time to practice nose breathing!
Mud, muddy water, mosquitoes flying into your mouth... not cool.
A Ptarmigan (bird).
These flowers were all over this part of the trail.
I'm not sure why, but I had that song stuck in my head...
Clowns to the left of me
Jokers to the right
Here I am
Stuck in the middle with you.
There was not a way to cross this water crossing without getting my feet wet.
There was a trail on either side of it though, so when I arrived here, I saw Sean's bike off to the side and knew he had gone exploring.
My turn.
Before I headed down the side trail though, I noticed a few flowers.
This one was purple except right in the middle where it was a brilliant blue.
It looks like a star.
I suppose aptly named the Star Gentian.
The most brilliant purple flowers; monkshood.
If you followed the stream, it eventually led to a tarn.
From NPS: "Tarns are lakes that form in glacially-carved cirques. They are often dammed by moraines. If they are still associated with moving glaciers, tarns are often full of tiny, glacially-ground sediment that scatter light and can make the water appear colorful."
I wondered what this would look like with the sun out. It looks cool like this, but I wonder...
It felt like looking into the great abyss.
Indian paintbrush.
It is so yellow even without the sun lighting it up.
Jokers and clowns still. HA HA
This flower is called Alpine Spiraea.
Well it's pretty obvious why it's called power line pass.
We took the trail to the left.
When there was color, there was a lot of color.
The grass drooping.
Waiting for the sun to come and dry out the water burdening it's stalks.
The trail really started to change here.
Moss Campion.
I could here the ground squirrels or marmots fussing at me for being there.
The rocks started getting big, more like walls on one side.
My vertigo started acting up.
Yet the most brilliant little lives sprang from the walls of the rock.
How do they do it?
This is the Red-stemmed Saxifrage.
Full of life, full of water, full of color.
What's ahead?
A bunch of snow.
It was kind of steep.
You can see where the trail picks up on the other side of this snow crossing, but Sean and I neither had crampons, spikes, poles, snow/ice ax or pick...
Time to turn around.
If you fell and slid here, you'd get going really fast. Probably, you wouldn't die, but you might break something.
Again?
UGH!
I hate getting turned around like this, but Sean was right, it didn't make sense to make that crossing with no equipment.
I stuffed some cookies in my face and walked in silence for a few minutes and then got over it.
It was still a nice hike even though we didn't make it to the pass, didn't see the pass, couldn't see more than 20 feet in front of our faces.
The flowers didn't seem to mind.
Cloudberry or Rubus chamaemorus .
Focus on the flowers Cherish.
Cheese Powerline.
I think that this might also be a cloudberry.
These flowers were tiny.
Mountain Heather.
Tiny purple flowers.
I think this is the flower: Brook Veronica.
I believe this is dwarf fireweed.
A different view.
More bear scratching.
It's so creepy to think a bear has been right here.
That water crossing.
I thought I found a better place to cross, but....
My feet still got really wet! I was bending down and grabbing on to rocks to make sure I didn't fall down.
I walked back to the tarn one more time.
Sean was already on his bike, but I still needed to walk about another mile.
On the way up to the pass, I saw a tarn, puddle I wanted to check out.
I got soaking wet trying to get to this thing!
But I thought it was worth it!
Cheese!
Another plant I haven't seen before.
This one is called mountain-sorrel.
Maroon and yellow.
I walked back to where I had parked the bike.
I was using my Garmin to figure out where the bike was and I was starting to get nervous that I had already passed the spot.
Thankfully, my watch took my right to it.
While I was retrieving the bike, I saw Sean coming back to look for me (I think).
I called out to him, picked up Autumn's bike and off we went.
4 miles back to the trailhead.
So I did 4 miles on bike, 5 miles on foot and 4 miles on bike.
I really do enjoy this type of exploring.
It really hurts my shoulder though.
I will definitely have to take some pain medications tonight.
Only got a little bit dirty.
We needed to get home so I could shower up and get to my infusion.
Today marks 21 days. Half-way. 21 more days to go.
My temperature is back down today.
They will call me and let me know about my labs.
I can do this.
The Jordan's.
Arrive on a weekday and arrive early!
We left the house before 7 am this morning and found the parking lot:
Virtually empty.
We donned our bikes and off we went.
Why do all these signs lie? The pass was not 5.5 miles.
I biked exactly 4 miles from the parking lot to a random spot on the trail.
I hid Autumn's bike behind some rocks and started tracking my location so I could find the bike.
Sean stayed on his bike and continued ahead of me.
It was pretty cloudy, but not rainy.
I had really hoped the sun would burn off some of this cloud, but we didn't have any such luck.
Despite, the view was cool looking.
A pretty mushroom.
I learned that being behind someone sucks.
There was some mud, some water crossings and well, I got hit in the face more than once with splatter.
Also, if you are a mouth breather, this is the perfect time to practice nose breathing!
Mud, muddy water, mosquitoes flying into your mouth... not cool.
A Ptarmigan (bird).
These flowers were all over this part of the trail.
I'm not sure why, but I had that song stuck in my head...
Clowns to the left of me
Jokers to the right
Here I am
Stuck in the middle with you.
There was not a way to cross this water crossing without getting my feet wet.
There was a trail on either side of it though, so when I arrived here, I saw Sean's bike off to the side and knew he had gone exploring.
My turn.
Before I headed down the side trail though, I noticed a few flowers.
This one was purple except right in the middle where it was a brilliant blue.
It looks like a star.
I suppose aptly named the Star Gentian.
The most brilliant purple flowers; monkshood.
If you followed the stream, it eventually led to a tarn.
From NPS: "Tarns are lakes that form in glacially-carved cirques. They are often dammed by moraines. If they are still associated with moving glaciers, tarns are often full of tiny, glacially-ground sediment that scatter light and can make the water appear colorful."
I wondered what this would look like with the sun out. It looks cool like this, but I wonder...
It felt like looking into the great abyss.
Indian paintbrush.
It is so yellow even without the sun lighting it up.
Jokers and clowns still. HA HA
This flower is called Alpine Spiraea.
Well it's pretty obvious why it's called power line pass.
We took the trail to the left.
When there was color, there was a lot of color.
The grass drooping.
Waiting for the sun to come and dry out the water burdening it's stalks.
The trail really started to change here.
Moss Campion.
I could here the ground squirrels or marmots fussing at me for being there.
The rocks started getting big, more like walls on one side.
My vertigo started acting up.
Yet the most brilliant little lives sprang from the walls of the rock.
How do they do it?
This is the Red-stemmed Saxifrage.
Full of life, full of water, full of color.
What's ahead?
A bunch of snow.
It was kind of steep.
You can see where the trail picks up on the other side of this snow crossing, but Sean and I neither had crampons, spikes, poles, snow/ice ax or pick...
Time to turn around.
If you fell and slid here, you'd get going really fast. Probably, you wouldn't die, but you might break something.
Again?
UGH!
I hate getting turned around like this, but Sean was right, it didn't make sense to make that crossing with no equipment.
I stuffed some cookies in my face and walked in silence for a few minutes and then got over it.
It was still a nice hike even though we didn't make it to the pass, didn't see the pass, couldn't see more than 20 feet in front of our faces.
The flowers didn't seem to mind.
Cloudberry or Rubus chamaemorus .
Focus on the flowers Cherish.
Cheese Powerline.
I think that this might also be a cloudberry.
These flowers were tiny.
Mountain Heather.
Tiny purple flowers.
I think this is the flower: Brook Veronica.
I believe this is dwarf fireweed.
A different view.
More bear scratching.
It's so creepy to think a bear has been right here.
That water crossing.
I thought I found a better place to cross, but....
My feet still got really wet! I was bending down and grabbing on to rocks to make sure I didn't fall down.
I walked back to the tarn one more time.
Sean was already on his bike, but I still needed to walk about another mile.
On the way up to the pass, I saw a tarn, puddle I wanted to check out.
I got soaking wet trying to get to this thing!
But I thought it was worth it!
Cheese!
Another plant I haven't seen before.
This one is called mountain-sorrel.
Maroon and yellow.
I walked back to where I had parked the bike.
I was using my Garmin to figure out where the bike was and I was starting to get nervous that I had already passed the spot.
Thankfully, my watch took my right to it.
While I was retrieving the bike, I saw Sean coming back to look for me (I think).
I called out to him, picked up Autumn's bike and off we went.
4 miles back to the trailhead.
So I did 4 miles on bike, 5 miles on foot and 4 miles on bike.
I really do enjoy this type of exploring.
It really hurts my shoulder though.
I will definitely have to take some pain medications tonight.
Only got a little bit dirty.
We needed to get home so I could shower up and get to my infusion.
Today marks 21 days. Half-way. 21 more days to go.
My temperature is back down today.
They will call me and let me know about my labs.
I can do this.
The Jordan's.
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