Mazama Park via Ridley Creek — Thursday, Aug. 13, 2020

Forest Service Road 38 to Ridley Creek trail was a pretty typical forest road, do-able, with care, in almost any vehicle. Watch for the left fork marked “38” in the first few miles and keep right at the main forks after that. There was only one other car at the trailhead when I arrived on a Thursday morning. Best thing is that I did not encounter a single biting fly or mosquito all day though I can’t promise that to the next hiker as this was the end of our recent cold spell and it was a rather cool day. The foot bridge over Ridley Creek was in place and in fine shape though not for the faint of heart; it is long, narrow and has a thin length of rope to hang onto with a gap in the middle between sections, overlooking a raging torrent of water. The trail is in great condition, thanks to recent trail-work, and only has a few logs to cross over in the lower section. I enjoyed photographing the various wintergreen relatives in bloom as well as saxifrages, orchids, ferns and many others. Old growth hemlocks are impressive along with other mountain conifers and nearing Mazama Park were many huge old Alaska yellow cedars. At one point I was greeted by a family of chestnut backed chickadees who hung upside down a few feet from my face in the cedar branches while they chattered at me. Mostly this was a fairly leisurely uphill stroll with a few steep descents into gullies and back up before reaching the meadows. At Mazama Park the shelter was vacant and I had the grand views of the Sister’s Range and Park Butte to myself as I ate my lunch. This was meant to be my destination but the vertical wildflower meadows above on the trail switchbacks to Bell Pass called to me so I continued up for ever grander views of the Sisters, the Park Butte Lookout and the many flowers; columbine, alpine daisy, alpine asters, spiraea, edible thistle, pink monkeyflower, penstemon and more. The flowers tempted me on up the switchbacks to the junction with Bell Pass and Park Butte trails where I tagged the signpost and turned around after taking in the vistas of Railroad Grade, Cathedral Crags, and a wee bit of Mt Baker’s glaciers peeking through the clouds. The return trip was uneventful. I encountered four other humans and glimpses of another 10 in the distance on this entire day trip. No bugs. No snow. Lots of flowers.