Day 2: Friday, July 14 - Devil's Dream to South Puyallup
So we both woke up Friday morning from dreams about real food - me, steak fajitas, Randy, BBQing a pork tenderloin. We decided this wasn't a good sign.
We climbed out of Devil's Dream camp around 10 a.m. Friday and started hiking through meadows with patches of snow. We came across two trail runners who were running the entire trail in three days and were on their last day.
The day's hike was described in the book as a "difficult but scenic six miles." It included going through a meadow called Indian Henry's Hunting Ground, where we got our first view of Mt. Rainier (below). The hunting ground is well known for its lovely meadows of flowers and there is a patrol cabin nearby. We also met Ken from New Jersey, or as I nicknamed him, "Jersey," who was doing the trip solo but for the most part, on the same route/schedule as us. We would meet up with him later in the trip.
Mt. Ararat Summit
We only had six miles to do that day, so Randy spied a small peak near the hunting grounds that he wanted to "grab" - Mt. Ararat. It was a 700-foot climb, mainly up creek beds and melting snow chutes. While the summit wasn't anything spectacular (above) other than finding the "remains" of Noah's Ark, a myth talked about in my book, we had excellent views of Mt. Rainier (right), Mt. Adams (Washington's second tallest peak, below, right) and Mt. St. Helen's (not pictured).
The other interesting adventure of the day was crossing the Tahoma Creek on a very narrow suspension bridge that was extremely high above the creek. The creek below seemed more like a mad rushing river. Randy crawled into the valley to get a closer look at the water and got this picture of the bridge from below (left).
Following that was one of our first really big ascents of the trip, where we gained about 1,500 feet in two miles. It doesn't sound that bad (now at least) but the terrain turned rocky and rough and took a toll on me and the weight on my back. When we hit the ridge and came across a massive view of Mt. Rainier, I had a bit of a breakdown. My body wasn't acclimated to the weight of my pack and I think I was just a little overwhelmed by the enormity of the trip. I had read about people going through this phase of the trip, however, I wasn't expecting it so soon. Randy made me eat something, took some gear out of my pack and carried it for me. It helped and while I felt really bad, I was grateful too. As we moved along on the ridge within the sandy valley, we got our first glimpse of a marmot - a small furry animal that looks like an oversized beaver. That was one of the big hopes on the trip - to see one up close.
This is Rainier's west side, with the Tahoma glacier in full view, to the left (yeah, I know, it's a little off but you get the idea).
After coming out of the sandy valley, we made left turn at the end of Emerald Ridge and came across this knoll and accompanying views ....
We then descended into South Puyallup camp - a huge wilderness camp and the first pit toilet we found that, well, didn't have any walls around it, but it was behind a large rock.
