We hiked up a mountain (again)

Last weekend, we hiked up Hurricane Hill, just like we did last year. The biggest difference was that this year, there was a lot more snow. I mean a lot more. The pack from last winter was dramatically more than the year before, which I think must be a good thing.

Mt. Baker is just barely visible in the distance:

We saw an Olympic Marmot, which was bigger and more golden than I remembered.

And there was no shortage of deer.

Silas enjoyed making snowballs (and then holding onto them until they melted away).

Hello little cloud.

On the way home, we were waylaid by a bridge opening on the Hood Canal Bridge. This gave me a rare opportunity to get out of the car whilst on the bridge in order to take a picture of the Olympic Mountains.
Thus ended our day trip to the mountains.

Big mountain, little hiker

Last week, we took Silas on his biggest hike to date: The Hurricane Hill Hike in the Olympics.
We brought the backpack carrier but didn't end up needing it. Our little mountain man walked the ENTIRE 6 plus miles, and perhaps not unexpectedly, managed the 1,700 feet elevation gain better than many of the adults we encountered on the trail.

On the way back down the mountain, we ran into many exhausted people who asked if he walked the whole way. "Yes" I said, "and if our 3 year-old can do it, so can you!"
We saw a lot of wildlife, including an overabundance of deer. They were everywhere! Look I spy one now:
And there's another:
This little chipmunk was so tame, she'd run across our hands and nibble our fingers. Even so, we resisted the temptation to drop a few bits of granola bar her way.
I recon that Silas hasn't seen snow since we were in Wisconsin in February of 09, so getting to touch some of the permanent snow was a big deal for him:
Look son, over yonder...
Now that Silas has completed this adventure, we are hoping to get a few more hikes in before fall, including one along the coast.

Hiking Hurricane Ridge

Last Sunday, we ventured up to Hurricane Ridge in the Olympic National Park.
"I'm going on a hike!" he said proudly from his comfy backpack carrier as Drew and I sweated up an in incline in the sun and heat.
While we will probably choose a few more level hikes to take him on so that Silas can walk without fear that he will pull away from us and fall off a cliff, we couldn't resist taking him up to the mountains. I love it up there. We hiked in the Olympic Mountains almost every weekend in the summer back before Silas was born, and we want to get back into a hiking routine. While one is more limited with a toddler, clearly, it's not impossible!

I took a picture of the three of us in this same location two years ago, and it can be found as a picture in this post. I have to say, we look way more hot and tired in this current shot, but I think, just as happy :)
The young buck, who was unaffected by the constant crowd of people gathering around him near the visitor center did not fail to disappoint.
But what Silas undoubtedly was most interested in that day can be heard in the video below. "I don't know what that noise is," he proclaims. On the way home when we asked him what he liked about the hike, he said "the animals." But it wasn't the deer he talked about, it was the crickets. Go figure!