Round the Mountain

After traveling all over the PNW, we found some of our favorite moments and views in our own backyard.

Shawn and I set out to circumnavigate on the Timberline Trail at the end of August with our friend Josh. The Timberline Trail is a 42 mile trek around Mt Hood, about a third of which is on the PCT. I have never done a loop trail around a mountain before. I kind of imagined just walking clockwise around the mountain with a similar view to one’s left (trees) and right (top of mountain) and some different landscapes in the distance, but that was, in retrospect, a kinda silly misunderstanding of the size and scope of a 11,000 foot volcano.

The trail itself winds up and down ridges, crosses a dozen or so rivers coming out of glacial melt from the mountain, and dips over and under the timberline as it goes (thus the name). We spent our first night on the shores of the Sandy River close to its source. We realized perhaps late to the game that the Sandy River is named after the fact that it is full of sand being swept from the mountain itself. Go figure. At a close distance, the river is similar in shade to chocolate milk.

On day two, we broke camp and walked a few miles to Ramona Falls, where we stood in the mist of this fairy magic for a while…

We also admired all the PCT hikers as they walked by, identifiable by their speed, the depth of their tan, the near universal use of a sawyer filter and water bottle as filtration device, and the overall ultralite look of their packs. We spent 15% of this trip planning for an imagined PCT thru hike in the future, and imagining how we might plan for and be changed by it.

After spending 4 days with all sides of a mountain, you develop a different and closer relationship with it. Mt Hood is visible from Portland on a clear day, and now when I see it the feelings that come up in my body are different, cozier and more familiar. In these times, our reconnection with the physical world around us is critical. I recommend we all spend some time walking the ridgelines and circumnavigating the buttes, mountains, and hills we find ourselves among.