Summer Sweet

While the globe experienced the hottest July since 1880, the weatherman on my local radio was reporting that only ten days had passed since the beginning of summer when temperatures reached above 70 degrees in Seattle. Blah. And it wasn’t until Labor Day that I experienced my first true sunburn—although I had to hike to a magnificent point of 6750 ft elevation to do such. Two weeks later I’m enjoying a BBQ in the wind and rain at Mukilteo Beach.
But despite Seattle’s somewhat crummy track record for sunny days, I had a pretty awesome summer.

This is me at Lake La Jolla, near Leavenworth. It's frozen. The unexpected snow turned this 10 mile hike into an eight hour adventure. Great company, sunburnt ankles, and beautiful scenery. And a reuben sandwich to top the day off. (^_^)


Here is the Dungeness Crab Spit in Sequim, a 5+ mile long sand bar extending into the Juan De Fuca Strait of the Pacific Ocean. At the very tip of the bar is a light house that we unfortunately didn't make it to because we wanted to catch the ferry before the crazy 4th of July fireworks traffic, (so we were warned).


My friends and I opted out of the Seattle firework show and held our own private showing, complete with blowtorch and mega big Indian reservation explosives - Don't be fooled by the pansy sparklers in hand.


Below is Goat Lake. My companions: 16 year old girls, lots of them! Minus the poor girl who was throwing up nearing the second mile and had to go home, the girls did great! They were much appreciative of my supplies of pringles, chex mix and hi-chews. And after hiking in to find that the guy carrying my dinner had given it to another, I was too.










Late August, my coworker invited me to go for an hour drive and hike up to the Granite Falls ice caves, a short mile hike. Imagine my delight when I saw this:


And this:
















And despite warning signs, we saw the following. Everyone at the bottom of the glacier was pretty freaked out for this crazy person's life.


And the bestest hike of the summer, if not the bestest thing I've ever done in Washington, will have to be a stand alone post, as the pictures are amazing and plentiful. Stay tuned...!