On Memorial Day, May 27th, son Edward and I decided to go hiking. We had a fund-raising breakfast in the morning so could not go far and decided that we would hike in the Chuckanut Mountains south of Bellingham. We decided to start out on the Fragrance Lake Trail, a trail that my wife and I hike earlier this spring, and thought we would hike beyond to the top of and along Chuckanut Ridge.
The day was overcast and threatening rain but the hike up to Fragrance Lake was relatively dry. We found some Coralroots, both Western Spotted and Striped along the trail, though the latter were nearly finished and took the time to photograph them and stopped to take a few photos at the end of a side trail to an overlook as well. The San Juan Islands were visible but only just.
We found only a few other items of interest, among them a centipede that emitted a sweet odor when touched and that we later identified as the Cyanide Millipede which actually emits cyanide to deter predators. It was hard to photograph on the dark trail since it never stopped moving except when curled up. Along with it we photographed some mushrooms and fungi.
By the time we reached the lake it was starting to rain and though we hiked around the lake and up beyond it, we soon gave up since the day was so miserable. Even the day my wife and I hiked the trail it was not as wet as this Memorial Day. My wife and I had hiked in a misty drizzle but this was real rain and we were back at the car by noon and headed for one more stop and home.
The other stop was a shale cliff that Edward had visited with a geology class. There are in the cliff huge fossils of fern fronds, what appears to be whole tree trunk turned to coal and numerous fossils of the leaves from deciduous trees. We took photographs which turned out much better than I expected, admired the fossils and headed for a coffee shop to warm up and for home.
6 comments:
I have not been down to the fossil formations. Perhaps this is a good weekend to get north on Sunday.
If you ever get a chance to visit Stonerose over in Republic, drop in. For a small amount of money and effort you can bring home some fun fossils
I think some of the group from Saturday were going on to Stonerose on Sunday. We'll be out that way this week and perhaps we'll stop. Have a grandson along and he'd enjoy the fossil hunting. Looked it up on the Internet and it sounds like a pretty neat place.
Like the photos, especially the fungi and fossils! ~ Rose
You are suffering from insomnia, aren't you? Hope the baby comes very soon.
Love the photos! I've been to the park and to the fossils. Nice slime mold pic too!
Say, there is supposed to be a native orchid walk at WA park tomorrow with the orchid society and I just read about it and tried to find out whether non-members can attend. It is supposed to start at 10AM. No one responded to my email or phone calls, Do you know anything about it?
Hi Mel,
I'm in charge of the hike tomorrow, more or less. We're going to Goose Rock first and then to Washington Park. We're meeting at the parking lot on the south end of Deception Pass at 9:00 a.m., and you are welcome to attend. If you come bring lunch and you'll either have to have a Discover Pass to park at Deception Pass or be prepared to pay $10.00 for parking. If you want to call me my number is 3603544337 (cell 3605276633).
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