Winter in July
Tipsoo Lake, Mount Rainier National Park, Washington
There is no error on the "date taken" on this image, there really was a snowy lake on my hike this past weekend! Snow melt has been very slow in the alpine areas of the Cascades this year and many trails at Mount Rainier National Park are clinging to memories of winter and still have snow, including this one. (After hiking a mile to the northeast up to the Pacific Crest Trail however, it was summer sunshine and wildflowers!) Fortunately I was prepared with my winter hiking gear, which was not the case for most of the people I saw on my return to the lake at the end of my hike, but it seemed a surreal sort of beauty to be admiring a snowy scene in midsummer.
It was even more surreal when everything was shrouded in dense fog in the morning when I started my hike. It felt quite eerie with no one else around. And at that point the lake wasn't even visible. (If you want to see what that "view" looked like, there is a photo of it here: www.flickr.com/gp/192152428@N07/25i21E)
Another reminder that mountain seasons are capricious and flow to their own rhythms, not to those prescribed by the calendar!
Winter in July
Tipsoo Lake, Mount Rainier National Park, Washington
There is no error on the "date taken" on this image, there really was a snowy lake on my hike this past weekend! Snow melt has been very slow in the alpine areas of the Cascades this year and many trails at Mount Rainier National Park are clinging to memories of winter and still have snow, including this one. (After hiking a mile to the northeast up to the Pacific Crest Trail however, it was summer sunshine and wildflowers!) Fortunately I was prepared with my winter hiking gear, which was not the case for most of the people I saw on my return to the lake at the end of my hike, but it seemed a surreal sort of beauty to be admiring a snowy scene in midsummer.
It was even more surreal when everything was shrouded in dense fog in the morning when I started my hike. It felt quite eerie with no one else around. And at that point the lake wasn't even visible. (If you want to see what that "view" looked like, there is a photo of it here: www.flickr.com/gp/192152428@N07/25i21E)
Another reminder that mountain seasons are capricious and flow to their own rhythms, not to those prescribed by the calendar!