Hiking to Serenity

I’m in a cloud, I’m in a fog bank. I’m on the edge of a glacial boulder worn smooth by eons of rainfall. The big rock juts over lapping wavelets.

I know there’s a mountain lake below me, but I can only see a small margin of blue-green water below. Everything else is fog. Socked in.

I am here because I can’t sit still. It’s seasonal FOMO and it hits hard around the autumn equinox. Once the light starts waning and the edges of the day crisp up into fog and sweatshirt weather, I turn into a dirtbag-lite hiker.

I wasn’t always a shoulder season adventurer. Like many folks, I used to go manic for the long hot days of summer, the smell of hot pine needles underfoot and vistas that stretched deep into the North Cascades. Now I’m a spring and fall hiker. Fewer crowds. Quiter moments.

Like right now.

Lake Serene. It’s an underappreciated place – an if-you-know-you-know place that seems to be a favorite among intermediate hikers. Lesser-known paths are where I like to head these days.

This second growth forest was once where old growth trees were felled for logging – their large stumps line the hiking path. Today this tract of land is preserved through a land trust established in collaboration between Forterra and Snohomish County.

This hike has it all. Starting in the lowlands of alder stands, it traces a maple-lined creek bed before dropping into darkened forest and a creek crossing at the bottom of a waterfall. From there, you can follow a rocky ascent to mountainside views of river valleys and the peaks of Mount Index.

This is what I’ve come for. This is why I can’t sit still in the city. This is my place.

My grandfather was a park ranger stationed not far from here in Gold Bar, Washington. I grew up visiting him in the campground that he managed and spent hours wandering the forests at the edges of the park. I knew the salal and the cedar branches, the woodsmoke under a tarpaulin canopy during a downpour. I knew card games around the fire.

Hiking Lake Serene today I’m getting this on a subconscious level. This is in my blood. If I want my kids to join me out here among the dirt and rocks and trees, it's because this is my inheritance and thus their heritage. I give this gift to them, the gift of natural beauty. They may not see it today, but it's the stuff of core memories.

I’ve started thinking that the act of hiking is a sort of narrative: beginning, middle, end. That’s why hikes make for such good stories – obstacles overcome, views witnesses, times spent with your friends and family. There are high stakes (bad weather systems moving in, a poorly marked trail), peril, glory, goals achieved.

This lake is my story for today. It’s a micro-journey that I will recount over dinner and in bed before I fall asleep. I’m glad that there are places like this left in the world.

Serene places.

When you visit Snohomish County, please tread lightly. This is a wonderous place.