Adventures in Hiking: Eastern Washington Adventure!

So this Memorial Day weekend Eric and I decided to take a longer day and head across the Cascades and check out a desert hike in Central Washington. One location had been recommended to me by a coworker and it was short enough that I found a second hike in the same area so we planned on doing two. And then, even better, I found there was a Petrified Forest State Park on the way too so with that our itinerary was decided on!

This was a trip of epic proportions and I have a LOT of photographs, including the progression of our travel across the Cascades.

We took I-90 through Snoqualmie Pass and the weather in the Puget Sound area was overcast and threatening rain.

The drive through the mountains was impressive. I think it would have been more so if we could actually see peaks!

Up in the pass and about to start heading down again. We had just passed a ski resort.

There was lots of snow on the ground. We were happy, then, to discover that it was suddenly brighter and the trees were thinning out and disappearing.

And we finally reached the Columbia River and the state park!

Our last hike of the day was going to be along that opposite river bank.

We stopped at the Interpretive Center at the Gingko Petrified Forest State Park and learned how massive flooding from a glacial dam 10000 years ago shaped this whole area. The bluffs we were standing on were at one point, under 500 ft of water! Crazy! The center also had transplanted some petroglyphs from the local indians. Because they dammed the Columbia River, the original site of the petroglyphs is now under water.

There is a little yellow pushpin that denotes our location.

Basalt! The entire area was formed from a lava bed and when the huge glacial flood occurred, it washed away a lot of the upper sediment, exposing the basalt underneath. This led to some awesome geologic formations that we got to see on our hikes.

Our hike was just down the highway, past the town of George, Washington (we chuckled). The entire region is a huge agricultural area and we saw fields of spearmint, pears, apples, grass hay, and cherries. We were pleased when we saw the Cherry Trees. It seemed somehow appropriate. But the weather was dry and hazy, I felt like I needed sunglasses and a hat, and we definitely came away with a bit of a sunburn. But it was so nice to be hiking without a lot of extra clothes!

The hike itself is called Ancient Lakes. I suppose the name is appropriate as the whole area used to be a GIANT lake.

The flowers were pretty.

It was also weird to have a relatively flat trail and to be able to see our destination from the beginning, rather than trekking up a forested slope. Definitely a change!

Eric even ended up running into a Rattlesnake that quickly retreated into the brush. Eric leapt about three feet in the air when he heard and saw it. I regret that I could not find it to take a picture....

The water in the depressions of the coulee (these inset fingers from the river) comes not from rainfall, but from irrigation water that drains down and causes the waterfalls.

There were lots of people camping though! It seemed like a nice spot!

Looking back out of the coulee.

There were also horseback riders!

Our second hike was heading back home, in a place called Frenchman Coulee. It was a popular camp spot and also a popular rock climbing spot.

The people in that spot had a 4 foot gap to cross to get to their little platform. I was astounded.

Our hike was going to take us up the bottom of the coulee. Only I missed the turn and though we picked the wrong side of the road so we ended up doing our own thing for about an hour... oh well.