Kelly Butte — Sunday, Jul. 16, 2017

Mount Rainier Area > Chinook Pass - Hwy 410

Might be a tad crazy but woke up at 12:30 AM (on purpose) and drove to Kelly Butte trailhead (drove down gravel roads with cliffs and pot holes for miles.. at least it seemed kind of spooky in the middle of the night, but didn't seem quite so bad in the light). Be sure to use the directions on WTA and not follow apple maps. I set my trip mileage so I could track each turn distance)! Put on some headlamps and layered up (it was 40 degrees and windy... where is summer!) and hiked up to the fire Lookout hoping to get some night hiking and spectacular sunrise. The clouds started rolling in thick as we approached the trailhead and drowning out the moon and our hope for a sunrise. We walked the not quite mile of old logging road to the trail and climbed steep switchbacks over rocks with only headlamps for light, feeling the biting cold wind and clouds surrounding us. I was scared to hike at night and also should have been scared of the cliffs we were climbing almost blindly up. I pushed through the fear though and climbed each switch back and I saw lots of wildflowers dancing in my headlamp beam. I was spooked by birds and mice and squirrels and the occasional smell of some other animal near by that we think was a bear (smelled it occasionally on the road from the parking lot and periodically while climbing the hill - that was probably the most unnerving part). Made it to the fire Lookout and it was completely clouded over. We noticed a couple of sleeping bags in the lookout (if that was you, sorry if we woke you when we stopped to enjoy our coffee and "sunrise" aka cold wind and thick clouds) :) Stayed through what should have been sunrise and headed back down, constantly amazed at all the new landscapes we missed on the way up. I noticed a family of mountain goats on a cliff off the trail and I enjoyed watching them for a bit before heading to the car. We saw a man driving in and he mentioned he watched a chocolate brown colored bear walk out from where we had been and walk across the clearing. Maybe that's what we smelled. Spooky but even though we missed the sunrise - it was still an amazing hike and I would come back again. Even with clouds. :)