18 May 2023
In all my excitement in being back in the woods yesterday, I forgot to eat breakfast and lunch. That was probably a good thing after seeing some of the photos people took of me.
The Snoqualmie tribe runs Snoqualmie Park and gift shop and actually owns the Salish Lodge. The falls are a sacred site for the tribe and it’s now a part of their tribal land.
In exploring the area around the lodge, I asked about the wooden bridge across the very busy road next to the lodge. It’s overflow parking for the park. Over 1.5 million people visit the falls every year, second only to Mount Rainier. The desk clerk mentioned that at the upper end of the lot was the apiary for the lodge.
My massage was scheduled for 3 pm so I showed up in the Salish Lodge robe and slippers. After some quiet time in their meditation room, Jennifer took me back for a deep tissue massage. She did a decent job. It’s always interesting to see how different massage therapists perform. I’ve had many different massage therapists over the years with all my trips and each one does it slightly differently. No one seems to do a real deep tissue massage. I think they believe they will hurt you. I can easily tell them to ease up if they do, but they still don’t do real deep tissue.
I chose to eat at The Attic for dinner which keeps bankers hours. I think they want everyone to eat at the restaurant (higher prices). Actually, if you sit near the windows, you have an excellent view of the falls.
I ordered the margarita pizza and a vodka martini. The martini was excellent and the pizza was pretty good except for the lack of basil. That’s kinda the definition of a margarita pizza – the basil – and there was only one tiny flake of basil and it was stuck to the side of the pan, not on the pizza. Again, the food critic!
In any case, I forgot I had reservations for The Dining Room last night. I remembered I made two reservations while planning the trip but I don’t remember booking the third. As I was on my way to view the falls at night, I stopped by the hostess stand and apologized. She was very understanding. I felt even more guilty since there seem to be more guests at the lodge tonight than last night. I even have a couple next door to my room and to the credit of the lodge, you can’t hear anything from one room to the other.
The lodge aims spot lights at the falls at night and I wanted to see what it would look like. The problem is the only camera I’m using this trip is my iPhone. This version allows you to take photos in total darkness and so I had to figure out how to keep from getting “daylight” shots in darkness. I finally figured it out and here’s one result.
As I waited for sunset and nightfall, numerous couples and families came down to the viewing point and I ended up being the photographer for them. It was fun trying to get the families and the falls in the view. One little girl kept turning away back to the falls every time I tried to snap the photo.
I’m still on Fort Lauderdale time which means I got out of bed at 4:30 am (PDT). I was hungry and decided on breakfast around 6:30 but The Dining Room didn’t open until 8. That’s when I decided to hike Franklin Falls.
The falls are near the Snoqualmie pass just off I-90 in the Mount Baker/Snoqualmie National Forest. It was about a 35 minute drive to the trailhead from the lodge. Just as I passed the town (the historic part) of Snoqualmie, I passed a herd of elk grazing in a meadow. I didn’t slow down to photograph the herd. Eh! When you’ve seen one elk, you’ve seen them all.
The parking lot at the trailhead to the falls requires either a Discovery pass (never heard of it) or one of the other passes for national parks and forests. I have the lifetime senior pass but when I went to fill out the form, there was none available. I simply left my senior pass on the dashboard of the car. I’d read where the rangers were very particular about parking and wrote tickets. As fortune would have it, I met a ranger while on my way back down the trail and she said at this time of year, parking wasn’t an issue and what I did was fine.
When I stepped out of the car and grabbed my pack and walking stick, I realized it was cold. The temperature was actually 60F but it felt colder. I got an indication of what was to come in the parking lot for the disabled.
The trail is a round trip of two miles and unlike yesterday, this was all uphill for 1 mile and then all downhill for the turn around. The trail was well traveled and clearly delineated.
There were not a lot of plants blooming but I did run into an old friend.
I’ve found two species of skunk cabbage in my travels over the years and they thrill every time I see them. Skunk cabbage, when it is ready to sprout in the spring, generates enough heat to melt the snow around it and is one of the first blooms of spring.
The trail follows the south fork of the Snoqualmie River. There are numerous cascades along the way.
As I gained elevation, there was more snow on the trail.
The forest was mostly spruce and western red cedar. One tree really stood out.
You really can understand how large this tree is so I put my walking stick next to it to give you some perspective.
To me, this compares with the giant redwoods! I can now understand how you can purchase cedar beams and boards. One tree this size would probably construct and entire house.
I finally got to the falls.
I met an older gentleman (my age, probably) at the base of the falls and we got to talking. He said he thought this was the greatest flow of water he’s seen.
The gentleman told me he comes all the time and he showed me photos of the fall completely frozen in winter. At certain times in the winter, they are completely frozen and he said he’s seen ice climbers on the falls. He recently stopped technical climbing but admitted to still repel occasionally but he didn’t let his wife know he did this. I told him I would keep his secret from his wife.
I had a couple of protein bars and offered him to join me for breakfast but he declined. He did get a photo of me, however.
After he left, I took a few more photos and then headed back. It’s funny how differently the trail looks returning. As I hiked up, I kept an eye out for wildflowers and did find one Western trillium.
I first ran into this plant while in Redwoods National Park. What’s interesting about it is as the day goes on, the bloom turns from white to pink. On the way down, I noticed more and more of these in bloom that I missed on my way up.
I also didn’t notice another flower in bloom on the way up but saw it on the return.
A few years ago, I found the yellow version of this (Caltha palustris) growing in a ditch on my way to connect with a seaplane to Isle Royale National Park. Both are fantastic and the white one is a new species for my list of plants. By my calculations, I now have three new species to add to my list on only two days of hiking.
Maybe I was too focused on bears. The woods have both grizzly and black bears. I sadly didn’t see either (yeah!).
I did see a couple of small waterfalls feeding into the cascades below.
Both on the way up and on the way back I saw cabins. Since this is national forest, I wondered if they were rented out by the U.S. Forest Service. The ranger I met informed me they were all privately owned. I assume they were grandfathered in to be allowed to be in the forest.
I did find one peculiarity on the trail that was a puzzlement.
As I got back down the mountain, I again saw the older gentleman. He was looking at closed sign on the Denny Creek road that intersects the trailhead. He was photographing a sign that had a phone number on it to ask about opening. He then said they planned to keep this closed and one other. What he said next threw me. “At least it’ll keep the illegals out.” What illegals? Hikers? Illegal Mexican immigrants? Aren’t we a little far away from the Mexico/US border? However, we are very close to the Canadian border so perhaps he was interested in keeping out those sly illegal Canadian immigrants.
Overall, I hiked 2.54 miles and gained 387 feet in elevation. What has to be taken into account is the elevation at the falls is 2,580 feet above sea level. People tell me that when you get above 2,000 feet, you begin to feel the effects of the elevation and I started at 2,210 feet. I seemed to have faired well. I didn’t have to have any rest stops on the way up. Also, fortunately, my knees didn’t bother me on the way down. Win! Win!
On the return trip I had a McBreakfast at North Bend, WA. The protein bar didn’t last long.
Tomorrow, I may head to Twin River County Park and do some hiking. They have two waterfalls along the same trail. They can’t possibly be as spectacular as my first two on this trip.
As I sit on my patio typing this, the breeze wafts the aroma of the killer weed. I forget that marijuana is legal in Washington state and people seem to be pretty open about it.
Stay tuned!
This was fascinating and such great pictures! Stephen and I really enjoyed it. FYI, the three videos were all black on my pc. I watched them with Stephen on his Mac and they were great. So if anyone tells you that the videos were black, just tell them to view them on a Mac.
I think the “illegals” your companion wanted to keep out of the forests was Ammon and Cliven Bundy. They are less liked than either Al or Ted Bundy—and that says a lot. I hope to get you some pictures of real waterfalls next week. Until then, keep tight lines on the rappelling ropes and a keen lookout for bear doodie on the trails.
No bear doodie and I looked!