John Wayne Trail 2014: Day 8

Beautiful morning

The next day was my last day officially on the John Wayne Trail. I would leave it at Rattlesnake lake to head northwest through Seattle. It was another beautiful day. the mountain air started out pretty cool, which made for a refreshing ride. As I continued, rivers shrank to streams.  After what seemed like forever, I came to Lake Keechelus.  I took a small side trail out for a good look at it. Once I got out there, I could see the mountains I was riding through. What a beautiful place! Little did I know that I would be hiking through many of those mountains in about a year with my wife!

Yakima river at the lake

Yakima river farther above the lake

Lots of trees

Hours of this

Keechelus Lake

The mountains are calling

Keechelus Lake looking back East

This probably required a lot of dynamite

So beautiful

As I neared the end of Lake Keechelus, I rode by some pretty cool rock faces, as well as a few outback campsite! Finally I came to Hyak, which has a small trailhead. Here, it felt like I ran into a thousand people. As I said earlier, I never saw a single person on the trail east of the Columbia river. Between Ellensburg and Hyak, I saw one scout group and maybe 5 other people. I passed far more people than that in the dark walking through the Snoqualmie tunnel. And what a tunnel! I walked over two miles in complete darkness with nothing but my headlamp. What an experience! If you live in the area, you must try it sometime!

One of many old train stops

Snoqualmie Pass ahead

This was a cool tunnel

View at the highest point of the trip

Ready for 15 minutes of darkness?

Here comes the sun

People everywhere

The trail was busy on the way down the west side of the mountains. It was also nice and fast. I talked with some bikers about routes but felt that I had a good plan. I sailed down the mountain to Cedar Falls, where I departed, took a break at Rattlesnake Lake, and continued on the Snoqualmie Valley trail to North Bend.

Snoqualmie valley

Pretty little waterfall

Cool converted bridge

I will camp beyond that mountain

Sheer rock wall

Rock climbers

Another view of the valley

Last stop on this railroad

Beautiful place for a rest

Made it to Rattlesnake lake

Leaving the John Wayne Trail

Looking back toward the mountains

In North Bend, I took a short break, had some dinner, and hectically searched for a camping spot. It didn't work out though. It turns out that there are quite a few people in Seattle and they like to go camping. I was told of a campground out in the boonies but that didn't work out. However, I passed a christian conference center on my way. As evening approached, I asked them if I could have a place to camp. They discussed the question amongst themselves and agreed to let me.  So I had a nice sleep on one of their lawns.

Thanks for the camping spot

Campsite in the grass

Nice Sunset