Notch Pass — Thursday, Aug. 22, 2019

  For those familiar with WTA work parties on the Notch Pass trail, we have labeled 3 sections of the trail.  Notch 1 is the lower trailhead and leads up to the pass, and is about 2 miles.  Notch 2 starts just across the fire road and goes down about a half mile to the paved road, and you need to go up the road/to the right to get to Notch 3.  Notch 3 only has a 4x4 post with a laminated paper to let you know that it is the Notch trail.  This section is just over a mile, but you get to walk on 3 bridges that WTA crews have built in the last 10 years: No Name Creek, Allen Creek and Townsend Creek, as you connect with the Lower Big Quilcene trail.

  I went down Notch 3 to look at the Townsend Creek bridge handrail damage caused by a tree this past winter.  Only a short section was damaged and the footlog is in good condition. —There will be a WTA crew down there to replace the handrail on 7 September.

  I went the rest of the way to the Lower Big Quilcene trail and also saw a step that had broken.  This will be replaced if we have enough crew and time.

  Some areas need brushing and some areas of tread could be improved, but the trail is in good condition.

  I went up Notch 2, which is where there are small logs across the trail.  All are easy to walk around or under.  This section is in good condition.

  I only went down Notch 1 about .25 mile and there was the top of a small cedar in the corridor, but easy to get around.  This small section is in good condition.

  There were still some red huckleberries.  There were also some interesting mushrooms like a Gomphus floccosus a.k.a “wooly chanterelle” (poisonous), and Hydnellum aurantiacum (I had help with those).  Who knew that some mushrooms have teeth!  And a blue fungi whose color just caught my eyes attention.