When I planned this trip, I cross referenced several resources to nail down where we wanted to go and what we wanted to do. Between social media, websites, maps, family recommendations and All Trails, I came up with what I thought was a pretty good and efficient plan that mixed hiking, site seeing, cities and other things. Fortunately, my people are up for anything and happy to tag along.
Our first full day was spent in North Cascades National Park. This is a less visited and very wild part of WA that they named the Alps of the Americas. Mountain ranges stretch as far as the eye can see with remote parts of country that require passes and a plan. We stuck to the more well-traveled paths! driving through the park means winding up steep inclines with views stretching for miles. Our first stop was an overlook of Diablo Lake which is emerald green and turquoise and changed color depending on the time of day. I have never seen water that color!
We continued making our way to Maple Pass Loop. This was one of our bigger hikes at nearly 7 miles and over 2,000 feet of elevation gain. We first started with a shorter side trail to Rainy Lake which was 1 mile out and back and connected to Maple Pass. It was an easy paved trail through tall alpine trees that led to an amazing crystal blue lake with mountains and in the background and three waterfalls pouring down those mountains. We were the only ones there and we were in awe! It was like our brains couldn't quite comprehend what we were seeing. The temps were in the mid 50s, the sun was shining, birds were chirping and it felt like a fairytale. But that was just the beginning.
After getting back to the main trail, we continued through alpine forests with chipmunks scattering around. The first 2 miles was a steep assent up the mountain with switchbacks and rocky steps. It would open up to wide views of the mountain ranges that included the lake we had just visited below. The wildflowers were blooming (part of the reason we chose July) and I loved seeing the purple heather all over the meadows. Slowly we emerged from the tree line up to the rocky portion of the top of the mountain, including some snow patches. Up, up, up we went until finally we summited the top and overlooked mountains as far as the eye could see. Just beautiful! It was so tall we saw a helicopter well below us.
This is where I would like to pause and talk about the actual hiking. My people are in REALLY good shape. I have three runners who are very fit and while I did a ton of walking to get in shape prior to this, I was in no way close to their level. It took me some time and I was a little more out of breath, but I made my way up from the back of our pack. I reminded myself that I was not a D1 runner, number 1 on the cross country team or the guy that trained them both. Ha! I was really glad to have my hiking poles which made me feel a lot more secure, especially in the higher elevations. Plus, my knees needed them! In fact, I picked up a knee wrap for one of my knees a few days later and was thankful for the extra support. Paige had no problems with altitude sickness this time, whew!
We took some time at the top to take in the views and enjoy a snack. Again, we were all in awe of the beauty and couldn't help but think about God's creativity in creation. There were a few other people as well and it was nice to hike with less traffic on the trail. One very friendly Washingtonian even took a picture of the four of us! We continued on the trail, making our way back down a ridge and then eventually down the other side of a mountain, seeing a new lake below. Eventually we followed another 1 mile out and back to that lake shore and then finally ended the hike, clocking in 10 miles total. A few times, I had to make sure Paige hadn't wandered off into the wilderness because she was so enamored with the sites.
Dusty and tired, we drove the scenic bypass through the remainder of the park to the other side and landed in Winthrop, a little town that was designed to look like a western outpost. It was super cute! Patrick booked us in a one room Airbnb. He and the girls ordered some pizza for pickup and we enjoyed a delicious post hike meal of pizza, salad and ice cream. Our eyeballs were heavy and we hit the sack early to catch an early start at our next hike the following day.
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