Cars were starting to slow down and turn around.
People were out of their cars and walking around and there was really no typical traffic coming from the high road.
I decided to park and check things out.
The road was blocked off across the Avalanche Creek Bridge. Why? You guessed it, an avalanche had closed down the road for some days and maybe weeks to come. Bummer. Again my goal was not met.
So now that happy accident thing.
Since I had most of the day left I made the decision to hike a bit on the Avalanche Trail Loop and take some photos. I had brought my old Nikon F4 35mm film camera with a 300mm zoom lens and my Sony NEX-6 with the standard kit zoom lens that I've taken thousands of photographs with.
At the time I started the hike I had no idea that this would be one of those physically stressful ones.
But after gathering my gear... and I didn't think to bring water as I expected to be back in half an hour, I started toward the trail head.
Then I noticed something interesting in the bushes. These little guys getting ready to escape their nest to start their lives.
I figured that these sort of creepy caterpillars would be something my grand kids might find interesting to see later on in these photos.
And the first wetland crossing along the trail was easy enough and indicated it was ADA compliant and would mean that I'd be back to the van soon.
Hiking further down the trail, things started to get more and more natural without the need for boardwalks but still pretty level and wheelchair accessible but the forest was getting more dense and more interesting along the way and I took photos of things that I found interesting along the trail and creekside too.
Then arriving at the last boardwalk I discover that happy accident that I had not expected. A beautiful active slot canyon where Avalanche Creek was roaring through. It was a beautiful site. I set up my tripod and NEX-6 and started to shoot long exposures.
This trail information sign was at the beginning of the climb and the continuation off of the easy hike of the loop system back to the parking lot. And this was the start of my physically stressful hike, that hike that I didn't plan to take and didn't bring water for...
If you read the legend, it is a two mile hike while gaining 500' in elevation and this doesn't seem like much to start with at the beginning but toward the end on the return trip I was really dehydrated and my ankle was a bit sore from climbing over rocks and roots most of the way. There was nothing on the flat so to speak. It was up and down and then up again all the way to the lake.
There were some folks that had obviously planned well for the hike just ahead of me at the trailhead and I took a few photos for them.
And the two mile hike eventually ended at the lake and it was truly worth the climb. The color of the water was perfect and it was obvious that many had started the hike earlier in the morning.
There was a lone fisherman there and I wasn't sure what he was fishing for in that glacier fed very cold lake.
A mentioned that I brought my Nikon F4 with a long zoom lens and I used it to capture some distant very high waterfalls. I was shooting ISO 400 film that day as I did for my entire trip. Here are some of the photos taken with that rig.
The hike back down was less stressful but much harder on my ankles and feet in general and I took more photos on the trail itself. I was not alone on the hike back as a deer also decided to make the trip just yards away for about a quarter mile or so and I snapped some shots of him.
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