UPWC Trip Report: Graves Enchanted Twilight Disappearing Trail

“…sooner or later, you were forced to concede that there was really no difference at all between slow and fast; that the Hundred Days Trip and a speed run were simply different facets of the same quest. The essence of both actually had nothing to do with velocity and everything to do with depth – and thus what appeared to be a paradox was, in fact, not a paradox at all. At the heart of both approaches lay the dream of forcing open a doorway to a dimension that would enable you to fully explore what it meant to transcend your limits – to arrive at a destination in time and mind where the dichotomy that separated you from the natural world collapsed, where you and the thing became one.”

Kevin Fedarko, The Emerald Mile

This is the account of my failure to complete the UltraPedestrian Wilderness Challenge Route #1: Graves Creek/Enchanted Valley Loop through the Quinault, Skykomish, and Duckabush watersheds of Olympic National Park. The 55-mile loop featured several miles of wilderness navigation along Six Ridge, connecting to better maintained trails along the North Fork of the Skykomish River, the Duckabush River, through O’Neil Pass, and the Enchanted Valley:

This trip was somewhat ill-fated in the sense that the universe hurled signs of impending doom at me all week. Not being superstitious, I simply ignored them. But these signs kept coming, in the form of logical and illogical imperatives, the most ominous of which was this albino banana slug that crossed my path around Mile 2:

More than an Idle Metaphor

Just to be fair to the slug community, I acknowledge and take full responsibility for my exceptionally late start time of 9:30 AM on Friday, September 4, 2015.

In the end, it wasn’t the worst weather I ever endured, as much as the lightest gear preparation I ever endured. Having said that, I did overpack for the official NOAA forecast, which called for sunny weather with highs in the 70s on Saturday.


I disregarded NOAA’s qualification about a chance of a shower on Friday. But on Friday morning, I did notice cold condensation dripping off the vegetation at the trailhead. It was chilly, damp, and 45 degrees. At the last minute, I lashed extra gear to my pack - gear that I normally pack but seemed excessive for sunny and 70, and that I was too disorganized to leave behind in the garage that morning.

Instead of the victorious loop, I navigated this out-and-back of traverse of the primitive and intermittent trails of upper Six Ridge: Graves Enchanted Twilight Disappearing Trail.

GRAVES CREEK FORD TO SUNDOWN LAKE

I ran into a WTA crew carving up downed logs right below the first ford at Success Creek. They asked where I was headed (Marmot, hopefully, by headlamp), and they incredulously replied that Belview was a more realistic goal (Belview?!? Nooooooo, not Belview!). Or Camp Pleasant (Ummm, thanks for the recommendation). And they duly warned me about Six Ridge: the relentless climbs and descents, up-and-down, up-and-down, and the meadows, oh, the meadows. 

I thanked the crew for their excellent trail intelligence, and their fine workmanship, and without further ado I forded the creek and continued on with delusional aspirations.  The weather drizzled, cleared, drizzled, and rained. The brush kept my raingear soaked. My cellphone was hopelessly fogged over by noon and despite my best attempts, stayed fogged over most of the day. I admired the water flowing through the trail, and the fungus, and disregarded further portents of decay and impending doom:

 

Sunbreak!

Mushroom season

Orange is a color of warning

the Horcrux

SIX RIDGE

At 2:20PM Friday I crossed over Six Ridge Pass from the shady north side of the ridge to the sunny south side. At the time, what I took away from this view was: Sunbreaks!!!

Viewing south from Six Ridge Pass

The camera lens on my cellphone remained fogged over, so for a while I experimented with flare effects.

I really enjoyed tracing the intermittent route along Six Ridge. I felt like I had plenty of time to sort out the route simply relying on trial and error, sweeping the meadows, distinguishing boot-prints from elk-prints, retracing my steps a couple of times, and was thrilled to encounter signs, occasionally, that I was on the right track. 

B is for Belview

The meadows were the most rewarding puzzles. I passed the Belview campsite at 4:40 PM and conceded that Marmot was out of the question. Even Home Sweet Home sounded aggressive, given my late start time. Still, I had a solid 3.5 hours of daylight – and a headlamp – to reach Big Log campsite, or Camp Pleasant, on the North Fork of the Skykomish.

SEVEN STREAM TRAIL

At 5:15 PM I reached the signpost directing me to the Seven Stream Trail that descends off Six Ridge.

Seven Stream >

The Green Trails map uses a solid green line to represent this section of Six Ridge, so I felt excited and confident to reach this trail junction at Elev. 4500 ft.

At the same time, I noticed pockets of hail on the ground - hailstones that weren’t melting. It was time to lose some elevation before dark. 

Look! The sun is shining on the fluffy white cloud!

At 5:30 PM I took my last photograph of the day, of an incoming weather front, just above eye level.  

Shortly after that, I lost the route at a switchback overlooking the burned side of the ridge. I tried descending further and hit a dead end that became steeper and muddier the further I went. I retraced my steps to a cairn, and hurled myself back down the slope in the hope that I would intercept a switchback. This is when the storm caught me. In an instant I was completely drenched with freezing rain and hail, clambering across an over-steepened muddy slope with all four limbs, and I knew right away that there was no way I could keep warm while route-finding, and there was no way I could find the route in the dark.

Chasing after those sunbreaks!

BACK TO BELVIEW

It was also clear that there was no way I could warm up by retracing my steps back to Belview. I arrived there before dark, and struggled to pull out my gear and set up a rainfly. I had a lightweight sleeping bag that wasn’t quite rated for the conditions, but I had packed a fluffy jacket and a lightweight wool shirt, both dry.

Last minute items that I added at the trailhead? Wool hat, heavy-duty wool gloves, a pair of bulky wool socks, and one superdeluxe Therm-A-Rest. At the trailhead Friday morning, I felt especially sheepish about lashing that giant Therm-A-Rest to my pack, but it saved my bacon. Every single item in my pack saved my bacon, because when I stirred Saturday morning, I was still shivering and my hands and feet still felt like blocks of ice. And if I hadn’t packed that inflatable pad, it would have been one long, sleepless night.

SUNRISE AT BELVIEW

I was able to doze on and off, and woke occasionally to the hoots of an owl hunting in the forest below me. There was no sense in getting up before sunrise. I didn’t pack a stove, so there was no water to boil, no oatmeal to decorate. And I needed daylight to navigate my way back to Six Ridge Pass. Gradually, my rainfly began to glow. At 7:11 AM, the sun peeked through the trees at the edge of the campsite:

Good morning, sun! I am so happy to see you!

The minute the sun appeared, it became possible to warm my soaking raingear enough to plaster it back on. Still, it took me over an hour to break camp, jam everything back into to my pack, and finally, a dry pair of socks followed by soggy, wet shoes.

THE FLIP SIDE

I wondered if the route-finding would be easier in reverse. The morning sun angle seemed ideal for highlighting the route through the meadows, and the places where I followed the route seamlessly on Friday seemed more difficult on Saturday, perhaps because I hadn’t studied the route as acutely in every direction. What I really enjoyed was discovering new route-finding cues that became visible in one direction vs. another, and rediscovering those cues as they repeated themselves, sometimes haphazardly, along the way. 

Are you trying to tell me I'm on route? Or off route?

Everything looks different 
in the morning sun

 

I spooked five elk, and over two dozen grouse, but this was the only wildlife I was quick enough to photograph:

One gangly Great Blue Heron at McGravey

 

One last ford opportunity

After fording Success Creek a second time, I met up again with the WTA crew. They were scattered along the trail, focusing on the big problem logs, so I shared my Seven Stream story four times on my way out. The crew was not prepared for Friday’s hailstorm either, or the mis-forecast waves of wet weather on Saturday, and had run into their own unsolvable log puzzles.

The crew was preparing to hike out early, too.

FOR THE RECORD

I logged 32.4 miles and 9,357 feet of elevation gain in 30 hours and 26 minutes. Of that time, I spent just over 13 hours sheltering, and averaged approximately 32 minutes per mile while on the move.

TRANSPORT AND GEAR

• One station wagon, plus eleven gallons of gasoline 
• One 36L Osprey pack, with a 2L Camelbak bladder (not a good fit, but passable)
• One 800 mL water container, for treating water with iodine tablets
• A nuisance-level First Aid kit (not used!)
• Two Green Trails Maps: Mt. Christie, WA No. 166 and Mt. Steel, WA No. 167
• Brunton compass
• Suunto Ambit3 GPS watch
• An iPod 5 cell phone instead of a camera
• One MyCharge 3000 mAh portable charger
• One lightweight sleeping bag
• One deluxe Therm-A-Rest
• One rainfly without the one-person tent

·   

Among the few luxuries I did pack: Tail Toes,
Injinji socks, and a pair of rafting sandals

FOOD AND WATER

• In keeping with my general state of disorganization, lack of preparedness, and inability to leave the office on schedule, I relied heavily on processed foods including prepackaged granola bars, PayDay candy bars, and ungarnished ham and cheese sandwiches. On the other hand, I did cook up two scrambled-egg-and-ham wraps in advance, which tasted pretty damn good on Saturday morning.
• Only 2 liters of tap water…I hardly drank and never felt thirsty, not even after I got home.