Newhalem Camping and North Cascades

We just got back from a very fun family camping trip up to North Cascades National Park. Our kids love camping, but they seemed exceptionally excited for this trip - I guess because we don't normally go anywhere during this coronavirus quarantine.

We planned this trip only about a week in advance, so we ended up getting the only site that was available in our time frame. But we loved it! We stayed at Newhalem Creek Campground, at site #129 off of Loop A. It was a walk-in site, but we loved it because we got away from the cars and most of the people. We felt pretty isolated, which was nice. J and I both said that we might want to keep staying at walk-in sites in the future, for that reason. When we go back, we think we'd also like to try site #121 off of Loop A too, because that one is right next to the Skagit River (and #124 seemed like a decent option by the river too). I think we might like this campsite better than the Colonial Creek campgrounds, because there aren't as many people.

There was a bird that must live in the trees near our campsite, because it kept singing for most of the mornings and evenings that we were there. We never could see it, but its song was very long and distinctive with a lot of trills, staccato notes, and ascending/descending scales. We kept trying to figure out what it was without success, and I finally downloaded an app on my phone to help with identification. It is a Pacific Wren, and its call is so pretty! You can listen to it here.

Violet found a cedar throne. Lucy also commandeered the cedar pile and would use the rotting wood pile to hold her stick staffs upright

We got to go on several hikes, and some of them were right in our campground area. On our first day we went to the Rock Shelter trail to see an ancient native shelter. This trail is also within walking distance of the Trail of the Cedars Nature Trail, and the signs were informative and interesting (although some were outdated). We liked seeing the power station, too. Here are some of the things we learned:

• How to identify Oregon Grape, with its serrated leaves and waxy blue berries
• Hemlock trees have droopy tops, their needles are irregularly spaced, and the pine cones are on the ends of the branches
• Vine maples have smaller leaves and are more shrub-like than the big leaf maple trees. The vine maples provide a smaller tree canopy (maybe 20-30 feet high) over the big leaf maples that help to form a higher canopy for the forest
• The heartwood of a cedar tree can rot, but the tree can stay alive because the sapwood core around the heartwood is resistant to rot (due to the acid in the sap). The phloem is one of the other rings around the sapwood. This diagram is similar to the one that we saw on the trail.

The Trail of the Cedars goes along the Skagit River and is right by a bridge that leads into Newhalem

Trail of the Cedars Hike

We also noticed these white, almost translucent-looking plants growing around our campsite. I actually had just seen them the day before when I took the kids on a hike up the Whittaker trail in our Issaquah (see picture below). The kids and I commented about how the plants looked like "ghost flowers," and it turns out that the plants are known as "ghost plants" (also called "corpse plants" or "Indian pipe"). Now that we have spotted them, I wonder if we will see them everywhere in the PNW. I learned that these plants do not need sunlight to grow (weird!), which makes them even more creepy.

We also visited Diablo Lake during our short trip. We took the Diablo Lake Trail only about two miles up, to an overlook of the lake, and then headed back down. But the hike was worth it, and I loved how the terrain was varied across different types of forests and rocks. trail. We took the trail only up about two mil

Diablo Lake overlook from the highway after our hike

Diablo Lake overlook from the highway after our hike

J took several fantastic photos of our trip too, which have been uploaded here.

On our final morning we packed up our campsite and then visited Ladder Creek Falls before heading home. It was neat to walk around one more power station too, and the kids were interested in hearing the electricity buzz from the wires. There were signs mentioning that a light show was held at the falls, but I couldn't figure out if that was still happening (some things in the park were closed due to the coronavirus). It would be fun to return here when the light shows is on in the evening!

Swainson's Thrush Song

This is a summer of hiking, since it is pretty much one of the only activities that we can safely do right now. The kids and I have been going on at least one or two hikes each week, and they usually are willing to go because: 1) they get to leave the house and 2) they earn one minute of screen time for every minute of physical activity.

Earlier this week we hiked on the Shangri-la Trail in Cougar Mountain, and we kept hearing this really unusual ascending bird song. It sounded to me like the sound of a cassette tape was being fast-forwarded. Lucy thought that the bird "sounded like space." It took me quite a while to find the right call, but I finally did. For a good portion of our hike we were listening to the Swainson's Thrush sing:



We want to go back to this network of trails again, because there are a lot of different places to explore and we only visited a few trails in our three-mile loop. And I think we all would like to listen to this unusual bird sing again!

Bird Song Video

Our neighborhood doesn't have all of the birds in this video, but I think this will be a helpful resource as the kids and I work to differentiate between different bird calls:

Killdeer Birds in the Neighborhood

For my birthday, my sister E gave me a pair of binoculars to help aid our birdwatching as we go on neighborhood walks. The kids have liked using the binoculars, too, and I think it has made our quarantine experience a little more varied. During our morning walk yesterday morning, we noticed some birds with distinctive peeps that were running around in the housing development that is under construction at the bottom of our hill. It clearly looked like a mother bird was trying to out to her baby.

Then today we saw the same mother bird again, but she started to act really strange. She crept down, puffed out her tail feathers to look larger and revel russet-colored rump feathers underneath. For a moment, we thought she was going to come toward us! We kept walking, and it became apparent that she was trying to keep us away from her babies that were walking further down the road.

We figured out that these birds are called Killdeer, and they actually have a very distinctive sound (see video clip below). Our book describes the call as: kill-dee, kill-dee, kill-deer, but I don't really hear that.

This video of the mother bird defending her nest is a little similar to what we experienced this morning:

Neighborhood Walks, Runs and Rides in Quarantine

We have been going out for walks at least once, if not twice a day to try and relieve some of the cabin fever of staying at home. The kids and I always take Violet for a walk around 9:00 am, before we start on their schoolwork. Lately, we have been hearing a lot of the same bird calls around our neighborhood, often with a call-and response of two or more birds singing the same song. We've heard it so much that we've memorized it, and we've even been able to spot the birds singing too. With a little detective work, we figured out that we are hearing the white-crowned sparrow, which pulses a repetitive tone that sounds like "seeee me, pretty, pretty, pretty meee."

I hope as we continue to listen to bird calls during our neighborhood walks that we'll be able to distinguish them. We bought a bird guide that sits near our windowsill, so we can identify the birds that come to our birdfeeders.

I've been trying to expand my running and biking routes in the neighborhood, so I can explore new streets and see something different. Last weekend I took a bike ride above Kennydale Elementary. And now that the Eastside Rail trail is closed for non-essential use, I've needed to be even more creative. Yesterday I took a four mile run and went to-and-from Hazelwood Elementary (except my going up the very steep hill at more of a sluggish jog than a run).

The spring flowers and trees have kept my spirits up as I've been outside. I am sad that I haven't been able to see the cherry blossoms at UW or the Skagit Valley tulips this season, but I'm trying to appreciate what flowers are available around me.

This is the magnolia tree in my neighbor's yard, just two houses away. It needs pruning and isn't quite as elegant as the magnolia on my work campus, but it still has been a delight to see (even from Lucy's bedroom window).

This white tree on is around the block from us, on a street that parallels our own. We often pass it on walks with Violet, and it has been one of my favorite things to see, with its exuberant white blossoms.

The trails are closed, but the closest thing we have been able to enjoy is this path lined with wood chips in the neighborhood just west of ours, near the water.

This is the tree that I saw on my run to Hazelwood Elementary, just near the school. I felt really happy on this run, because I had just finished a Zoom chat with my college friends and Ben Brinton, so we could wish Ben a happy birthday. I hadn't chatted with Ben for over a decade, so it was really nice to see him.

I took this picture today on our Easter walk. We drove to a neighborhood near The Summit in Bellevue, to try and get a nice view of the area. We ended up parking by a marsh with dozens of croaking frogs, and this cheerful tree was growing in a house not far away. We are a little tired of walking in our same neighborhood every day, so it was especially nice to walk around in a new place.