A River Runs Through It

I'm not usually a morning person, but somehow I rarely have a problem getting up when we're on vacation. Maybe it's because I hate the thought of wasting daylight when there is so much to see and do wherever we happen to be traveling. 

This morning was no exception. I walked along the lake in the hopes of getting some good photos. The sky was still a little hazy, but with very little wind, the lake was like a mirror.

Duck, duck... duck

It's 11 miles from the lodge to High Bridge, the boundary of North Cascades National Park. There is a shuttle that runs between the ferry landing and High Bridge, but it's more of a hikers' shuttle and not really for sightseeing. We could have rented bikes, but because I wanted to make sure that we could actually make it into North Cascades NP regardless of the weather, I reserved a Can-Am Defender in advance. 

We picked it up at 10:00AM, and after getting instructions on how to operate the vehicle safely, we were on our way!

Two miles up Stehekin Valley Road, we made our first stop at the Stehekin Pastry Company for breakfast. Everything we had was super tasty! It was all so good that we bought a few more pastries for the road!

Quiche Lorraine, blueberry scone, bacon and swiss croissant, artichoke/tomato quiche

After picking up a cute sweatshirt for myself from the gift shop (C bought a cap, too), we continued driving up the road to High Bridge and the entrance sign to North Cascades NP.

Stehekin River from High Bridge

R made his way down to the river's edge to take this pic 

Sockeye salmon swimming upstream

Changed to my 70-300 mm lens to get this pic

We crossed the bridge and went a little further into the park. Such beautiful scenery!

On our way back, we found a spot just off the road with easy river access...

The color of the water - wow!

Our next stop was Buckner Orchard, which was planted in 1912. The National Park Service manages the orchard along with the Buckner Homestead Heritage Foundation and the Stehekin community. The public is welcome to pick apples free of charge when they're ripe, which is now. Good time to visit!

Varieties grown here are Common Delicious, Winesap, Rome Beauty, and Jonathan

Rainbow Falls was our next destination. From the parking area, it was a short walk to the base of the 312-foot waterfall. Another loop trail with a slight gain in elevation brought us to a different vantage point of the falls.

Upper view of Rainbow Falls

We also took a look around the one-room schoolhouse, which was used by the community from 1921 until the 1988-1989 school year. 

As we drove towards the lodge, we made one last stop at The Garden and bought some fresh red pears, nectarines, and goat cheese. No more worries about having enough to eat!

Bees doing their work

We refueled the Can-Am at the gas pump at the lodge before returning it at 2:00PM. I'm so glad that we rented it to explore the Stehekin Valley! I'm pretty sure that riding a bike for 22 miles would have made me tired and super grumpy.

The rest of our afternoon was spent eating our local finds and enjoying gourmet grilled cheese sandwiches fresh from the propane burner, courtesy of Chef RH. 

Our yummy haul from The Garden

Stehekin Pastry Company redux
top: apple hand pie, blueberry zucchini muffin, blueberry scone
middle: raspberry thumbprint cookie, lemon bar
bottom: gingerbread cookie

To combat carbohydrate overload, we decided to hike south along the Lakeshore Trail and went as far as Hazard Creek (0.5 miles). We turned around at that point because it was close to sunset and we didn't want to be caught too far out on the trail as it got dark.

Another round of Chicken Time Warp in the evening yielded the same results. Yes, C won again - all hail, Queen of the Chickens! Haha!

Afterwards, we headed back outside again to take advantage of the dark sky to gaze at the stars. Amazing how many we could see!

Thankful for another fun day spent with great friends!

Enlarge the pic to see where we went exploring today!