Lake Chelan National Recreation Area
Monday-Wednesday 21-23 August, 2023
Eric's photo of Rainbow Falls. We were in the Cascades, after all.
The fire raged on. Lightning, distant and unseen by us, lit more fires. We drove amidst tall mountains, which would surely have been beautiful in other conditions, seeing them only through a smoky haze. With the hope of improved weather and the intent to carry out at least the first part of our planned visit to North Cascades National Park, we spent the night in Chelan.
At the Riverwalk Inn, Chelan, two states and more than 1,000 miles away from home, deep in the Washington Cascades, this was the featured motel room art.
Were they serious!?!
For those of you who don't immediately recognize this scene, the photo was taken from San Francisco Pier 7, looking southeast toward the western span of the Emperor Norton Bay Bridge. I used to sit on those benches and talk to my now-deceased aunt on my lunch hour.
Let me just say that, as someone who works for a San Francisco law firm, this part of San Francisco, and especially the bane-of-my-existence Bay Bridge, might be exactly the sort of thing I went on vacation to try not to think about. Nestled in the mountains at the southern end of Lake Chelan, surely they could have found a worthy local scene to exhibit.
It may have been ill-advised, but we had been spending so much time sitting on our butts not moving around that we went for a (masked) walk through the haze to pick up dinner from a taco truck. We ate the reasonably good burritos in our postage stamp-sized room at the Riverside Inn, Eric at the desk, me on the bed. Carefully, we reorganized our bags, separating out what to bring on the overnight trip to Stehekin (hiking boots), and what to leave behind in Mather (the electric kettle).
We rose early in the morning to catch an 8:30 ferry. While the forecasts had been for improvement, a smoky pall still hung over the town and the lake.Eric photographed me as I carried the overnight stuff along the deck to the ferry.
The ferry proceeded through this smoky, orange haze.
We learned that Lake Chelan, with a depth of 453 m/1,486 ft, was the third deepest lake in the United States (after Crater Lake and Lake Tahoe).
We could tell that we were surrounded by astounding scenery, perhaps rivaling the fjords in Norway, but we couldn't see it well.
It had become apparent that we would not be able to hike that day. We were supposed to be hiking quite a bit, particularly up long, steep slopes, but it seemed we were doomed to spend the afternoon in our cabin.
A rather nice cabin it was, though, an entire small building all to ourselves, overlooking the lake. Photo by Eric.
The cabin was even more lovely inside. Check on the special cat feature! The wooden bed was so high, it needed a running board. Photo by Eric.
Unlike our room from the previous night, the cabin had plenty of electrical outlets. It even had an electric kettle. The one essential feature that the cabin lacked was an air conditioner. Furthermore, the staff had left a window open. I wasn't sure I'd ever be able to take off my mask, but the fans made the indoor air seem to improve after a while.
I stopped into the lodge store and paid an outrageous price for some ramen noodles for lunch, and a slightly less outrageous price for vouchers for internet access. The vouchers were supposed to be good for 24 hours, but stopped working at 07:00 the next morning, a frustrating ripoff. We visited the obligatory visitor center and watched the obligatory Park Service movie. The rangers promised that conditions were improving, and that they would continue to improve later in the day and overnight.
We took a short interpretive trail to the McKellar Cabin, built by an early homesteader. I posed as a long-suffering pioneer woman in the doorway. Photo by Eric.
We got the typical fried food from the lodge restaurant. The restaurant had a lovely patio overlooking the lake, but smoke conditions were still awful, and a strong wind was raging. We didn't know whether to welcome the wind for blowing the smoke away, or fear it would just stir up more fires. We ate in our cabin, noting that there were definitely worse places to eat. We made a plan to turn in early, so we could get up early and actually enjoy some of the scenery the next day.
While the scent of smoke still hung in the morning air, the particulate count was much reduced, and the view across the lake appeared photo-worthy. So I grabbed my camera, my tripod, and a thermos of tea, and walked down to the water's edge for sunrise photography. I played with the camera as I waited for the sun to rise over the ridge.
Alpenglow over Lake Chelan.
Sunrise on Tupshin Peak.
It all looked so beautiful, and conditions were so much improved, I began to climb out of despair and find hope again. There in a valley of wonder and beauty but lacking the time to go hiking, we took the unusual step of booking a bus tour to Rainbow Falls. It seemed mostly like a canned experience intended for people taking a day trip from Chelan, crammed in as quickly as possible between arriving and departing ferries, but it turned out to exceed expectations. While we were waiting around for the ferry to arrive with the other tour passengers, we spoke to a couple of rangers about conditions further north, where we had originally planned to spend the next couple of days. We had canceled our camping reservation, but what if we could still get up there? Could we visit a new national park, and take an amazing hike there, after all?
The ranger reported the great news that the State had reopened Highway 20 through Ross Lake National Recreation Area. There was one four-mile stretch where the highway was open in only one direction, with traffic led by a pilot car. With so many people having fled the area, she thought our odds of finding an open camping spot, especially mid-week, were reasonably good. But as she was an NPS ranger, she recommended that we speak to a Forest Service ranger on the phone when we got back into signal in Chelan.
We left some of our luggage just sitting there waiting to be loaded onto the ferry when it arrived. The casualness with which people in Stehekin treated backpacks and other luggage was astonishing. It made me realize the tremendous amount of mental and emotional energy that I expend on an ongoing basis to protect my belongings back home in the city.
Steve the bus driver took us in a blue school bus through the wooded little community of Stehekin, telling us about its history, and pointing out such sights the post office, the new one-room schoolhouse, the old one-room schoolhouse, and the community's single stop sign.
With only about 20 minutes to see the falls, I huffed and puffed as quickly as possible up the stairs to get the better view of the upper falls. Unwilling to put an overabundance of faith in my fellow travelers, I carried my laptop in my backpack.
I managed to scramble enough time to take a shot of the lower falls as well.
On the way back to the ferry landing, Steve stopped the bus at the cute Stehekin Pastry Company. We did not have time for made-to-order sandwiches or barista drinks, but we could pick up grab-and-go sandwiches and salads from the deli. Eric grabbed a fairly terrible coffee, but our sandwiches and croissant were decent, and I got a great pumpkin cheesecake muffin while Eric got a chocolate chip cupcake. We snacked on them on the ferry ride back.
Eric photographed a ferry from the dock.
Father and child silhouetted on a dock overlooking Lake Chelan.
The ferry ride back through the beautiful valley was everything we had hoped for the day before. Eric photographed the amazing geology.
He had asked me the day before whether the rock around us was granite, and I had said that since the Cascades were volcanic, I would expect the rock to be igneous, but that I couldn't tell what it was. It sure didn't look like Sierra granite. Basalt? I reviewed a geology book in the gift shop in Stehekin, and it told me that the area was an agglomeration of sedimentary, igneous, and metamorphic rock. The rangers confirmed that the geology was incredibly complex.
Eric took a picture of some of the fascinating rock.
We observed that the west side of the canyon was lush and green. Photo by Eric.
The east side, which would receive more sun, was dry and brown.
The overnight parking for ferry trips was on the opposite side of the road from the ferry landing. I foolishly and stubbornly insisted on carrying all of our stuff back to the overnight parking, rather than waiting at the terminal with the baggage while Eric brought Mather over. The crowded exit from the ferry had brought back years of memories of struggling through rush hours to find enough room for my body, and I didn't want to have to rearrange a whole bunch of things in a crowded place. I tripped on the edge of blacktop pavement. The ankle support of my hiking boots prevented my lower legs from taking any action to break the fall, and I went straight face down like a well-trained clown. I caught myself on my left wrist and knee, but the camera bag, jabbing me in the solar plexus, broke my fall and prevented me from smacking my face into the pavement. I managed not to tear my brand-new pants, but blood streaked down my leg in quite a Hallowe'en fashion. Eric gave me chocolate for the antioxidants. I had to take the time to wash my wounds in the bathroom at the terminal, where they gave me an ice pack. I took four ibuprofen to prevent swelling, but felt that my injuries were mostly only skip deep. Nevertheless, it was a stupid mistake that cost us a bunch of time.
While I was rinsing blood off my leg in the bathroom, Eric phoned the Forest Service. The ranger told him that the forecast was for haze that might interfere with photography but not for conditions that would make it unsafe for hiking. Our odds of finding an open campsite were good, and if we failed, there was a private campground in Marblemount that should have some spaces. We might make it to North Cascades after all! We hit the road.
Map of our Stehekin excursion
On to North Cascades National Park.