The weekend began with some pretty awesome northwest weather on saturday. The sun was out early, without that somewhat common morning clouds, or marine layer that normally greets our mornings. So although it was still a bit cold from the night, you could feel the sun doing its job warming up the air. Saturday i decided that i was going to go and visit the parents in the land of P.O. or port orchard from those of you not from there. I will only really go into the drive to port orchard today as i am sure i will talk about port orchard more in the future.
When i was a kid and drove to and from Port Orchard it always felt different than it does today. One of the many things in my live that has changed as i have gotten older, the once hated and can’t wait to leave area, becomes a place that brings me great happiness and joy. The trees that line the freeway, the hills in the distance, the sound, and the mountains behind them remind you that you are driving into the peninsula. There are no buildings or high rises in the distance, only tree's, ocean and mountains. As a kid, i felt when we left on whatever vacation trip we were heading to that i was being released from my prison, the prison that was port orchard, the prison i ironically thought the tree's put me in which always seemed a million miles away from everything and everyone. I have sense grown to love those same areas those sparsely populated gems that line our freeways, dot our country side and really make up the whole of our world. I know that major citys shape the world that we live in by sheer population, but its the small towns, that really make up this great world of ours, those seldom thought of gems that dot the country, where you can step away from non-stop action of the big city. Where so many people ache to leave as a child, but long for as they get older. I love driving into Port Orchard these days, whether i am taking the freeway over, driving through the trees, deep into the peninsula, or its driving through the industrial complexes of west Seattle, to take a ferry over where i can take a break from the drive, and simply enjoy the many islands that fill the peninsula, drift by. And if you’re lucky enough to be on the ferry when the sun is setting you are graced with a sunset behind a snow draped mountain range, with the sun's setting colors splashed across the Puget sound’s glassy surface. Almost as if the water is on fire.
On Sunday i awoke early to go out and do a power hike, although not really known to me that this was the case. I was planning on joining some friends to go and hike rattlesnake lake, so i wasn’t expecting much. Mainly i say this for one reason, most times i have found when going with other people, they don’t share the same urgency that i tend to implement on a regular basis. I am one of those, OK i am ready, now lets go, and sometimes can be all go and no quit. Which works for me as I have long legs, and tend to take long strides, and walk fast, but not so much for those that can not keep up with this stride. I was expecting with this group, that although we had set up an early meeting time to head up, they would not be ready, as we would have to wait on someone...and then ultimately we would get up to the trail an hour or two after we had initially said to leave. To my surprise although we ended up not going with everyone, the people that were going, were ready to go right at the said time, and we actually left close to that. This was great, as i knew that the trail we were heading to was a pretty popular , not very backcountry trail. This was an understatement as i drove up to the trailhead.
As i arrived at the trailhead for rattlesnake lake, at first i was shocked at the parking...which was three lots deep, with overflow, and side street parking. Having not done this hike as i new this was a popular hike, i was still shocked at the people. The day was a perfect hike day, the sun was out but hidden slightly by a light cloud haze, that would soon burn off as the day wore on. This would mean that it would be nice, but not too hot. For me this was perfect...actually almost a little to nice for me, as i prefer a little bit of rain.
What this weather did mean for my friends that were going to go but didn’t make it, was an excuse to not go, because they saw clouds, which meant rain, which meant, I don’t want to go hiking in the rain. Personally for those people i find that it probably wouldn’t of mattered what the weather was like, as they already had it in their head that they were not going to go. So if it wasn't that excuse it would most likely have been something else. I would say that this upsets me, but i have come to find that this is the nature of a lot of people, even myself included. Its one of those things were you don’t want to say no, but if you don’t say yes then i know that it just won’t happen. If there is any leeway in there, any hesitation, that for some reason, always blossoms to simply not going.
The hike itself was a nonstop trail of people up to the top, which featured a large rock to sit on and look out over the valley, and over rattlesnake lake. Although this was quite an amazing view, the throngs of people that I was sharing this view with, definitely made it feel more like a tourist stop, than hiking in the forest. The problem I find with a trail that is highly populated is that you really get a variety of people heading up to hike. This hike we were joined with a large group of college kids sporting various levels of drunkenness, although I couldn’t tell it it was because of an early party morning, or leftover from a big party night Saturday. This group was loud and disorganized which meant there were lots of people waiting to pass different pockets of this group. Now I encourage anyone to go out and enjoy nature, and I cant talk to much crap about these people, because as long as they aren’t messing up nature, at least they are outside in the forest, under the sun, and not in front of a TV, so you have to give them something for that. Its just that these are not the kinds of groups that I enjoy sharing the trail with. I enjoy the solitude, the personal revelations you can have on a hike, the simple enjoyment of the nature around you. This is harder to do with a lot of people. All in all, it was a good hike up and back, and after the hike was all through I let my puppy beaker run around in the lake chasing after a somewhat amused golden retriever. I feel like my puppy wanted to play but the golden didn’t want anything to do with my dog. Which was quite funny to see my dog jumping around the golden trying to get him to play with him, but completely ignoring my puppy beaker.
Well this was my travel adventure for this weekend, stay tuned for next weekends adventure.
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