Where Yarmiks Roam: Obsidian - August 8-11, 2016

Ahhhhh--The Obsidian Limited Entry Area is one of my favorite places. It has everything - forest trees, lava flows, mountain streams, meadows full of wildflowers, fields of sparkling obsidian shards, cliffs, views of distant mountain peaks, climbing trails that ascend to dizzy heights and one little pond/lake.

This year three of us entered the area and did some exploring. My friend, Jill, decided this year that she was was ready to plunge into the backcountry with no electricity, or toilets, or water from a faucet. She was willing to fend off mosquitoes, suffer aching muscles and cramps, and laugh at chilling wind and rain. She was a champion and completed all the trials like a real pioneer.

Here we are - Jill, Camille, and me at the trailhead.

The first 3.4 miles is a boring and dusty trail through a forest of lodgepole pine.

Then you come to a blocky lava field

where you are amazed that trees can even grow. There are small patches of wildflowers everywhere. If the sun is shining you get really hot. Beyond a mile's worth of lava you come to the White Branch Creek, and this is where the beauty begins.

This is where Camille and I took a misstep last year. Really it was just me. I was too lazy to look at my map, and we turned right instead going left. (That was a confusing mistake, and we, along with Daniel Boone of the olden days, were a bit bewildered for awhile).

Talking the Glacier Lake Trail leads you steeply uphill to Sunshine, a meadow beside Glacier Creek that is filled with wildflowers in late summer. This is where the adventure begins.

It was getting late, and the clouds were lowering into the meadow. I could smell rain, and...... Well, we were getting cold. We found a spot in the trees for the tent

We got to bed before the rain really started to pour, and I spent the night dreaming of ways to keep us dry and warm for the next three days.

Morning broke! The rain had stopped. The clouds were clearing!

First on the day's agenda was to do a day hike through the obsidian fields to Obsidian Falls and to find two geocaches along the way.

There is one geocache in this area. It is a puzzle cache where you have to accumulate information from four different places to figure out the location of the fifth and final location. Three of the puzzling pieces are bronze memorial plaques that are embedded in stone walls.

Here is one photo with two plaques, but they're very difficult to see because the color of the plaques are the same as the stone. I found the third plaque last year.

An additional clue you must submit is a picture of Obsidian Waterfall. Here is the photo I'll submit. Jill and Camille are at the base, and I am at the top

The water forming the waterfall comes from Sister Springs which flows out at the base of the mountain to the left

Next on our agenda was to find Arrowhead Lake which has/had been a mystery for two years. On my two maps I can see them drawn on a plateau just above Sister Springs. And on Google Earth I can see where I think it is; it's hard to tell because google earth shows the area almost entirely under snow. But, yes I knew where it was. Now I just had to figure out how to get there. Based on what I saw on Google earth I was planning on going cross country up a draw by Sister Springs- I'd also read that this was the start of a climbing trail to summit Middle Sister.

At one point I stopped and talked to two men who had maps and looked knowledgeable. They looked at their maps and said , "Oh. It looks like there is a trail up to Arrowhead Lake." Oh my gosh! There was a trail made up of the tiniest dots and located in the fold of the map. And I have that map!! I was just always looking at the map in dim light and had not see it.

So back to our campsite, pack up- Lake Arrowhead, here we come! And we started here

And followed this trail all the way.

Perfect. Small and 'pond like' but it is Arrowhead Lake.

We set up camp

Here are pictures from the cliff's. You can see the PCT where we'd been walking earlier in the day and numerous mountains into the distance

This is Sunshine with Mt Jefferson in the distance and Mt Hood further north in the haze.

Next photo is Sister Spring flowing toward the waterfall

We spent a lot of time on the cliff just looking out to the west. It was hypnotic

The next day we decided to summit Middle Sister. Well, not really. But we did climb up the trail that would have taken us to the summit. We set as our goal to walk until we reached "that little tiny outcropping of rocks, way up there", or until 1:00, or until we became so famished we could no longer continue.