Observation Rock

The brown circle in the middle of the image is Observation Rock, our destination.  Spray Park in the foreground.

Like I mentioned, I was able to go hiking on Rainier while in Washington. The hike took almost all day and was a great workout. At a couple points I wasn't sure I was going to be able to climb any more snow fields.

The hike started at Mowich Lake (North Western corner of Mt. Rainier National Park).  There is a small ranger's cabin at the lake, we took a right at the cabin up the hill on an unnamed, unmaintained trail.  Climbing up 

and through a saddle pass we headed down into Spray Park.  Following the edge of Spray park we found ourselves climbing again, encountering snowfields.  Before the big climb we filled up our water bottles in a snow melt stream and headed up the snowfields with our ice axes.  The snow was soft on the surface making for good toe holds.  After a tiring climb the base of Observation Rock was in view.  To our surprise this pointy peak is made up of mostly volcanic rock.  Most parts of the mountain don't show much evidence of a volcano, but the solid black and bright red rock found near Observation Rock were a consolation prize on this hike.  At the base of our destination the snow had melted away and we were left to scramble up the loose sand and volcanic boulders.  Once to the top the rocks were more solid and we were able to reach the marker displaying the elevation of our destination.  Because we made such good time, we decided to stay perched for a couple of hours.

We chomped down on these Glacier Lillies,
they would be awesome in a salad.

The view of the, in my opinion, most beautiful mountain only a mile or so away.  Not only did we have front row seats to Rainier, but Mt. St. Helens, Mt. Baker, Glacier Peak, The Olympic Range, and other smaller peaks of the Northern cascades were all in view.  The cloud cover that hovered over the Puget Sound and the Seattle/Tacoma area made our rest at the top almost a Heavenly experience.  The trek down was, like in most hikes of this nature, much faster.  We were off the snowfields in 15 min, back to Spray Park in 30, and on the Spray Park trail back to Mowich Lake in less than an hour.  Total time back to the parking lot was obviously longer than an our.  It actually was strange, once we hit the tree line the trail was very up and down (elevation wise), almost to the point of being annoying.  I felt like I would rather climb up a steep slope all day instead of being teased by small declines in elevation.

Spray Falls was a great place to rest and soak warm sweaty feet.

One of the high points of the trip for me was the spur trail to Spray Falls.  This 1000ft. trail gave great views of a cascade I didn't know existed, but after checking it out I can understand why most people turn around at this point.  A waterfall as beautiful with views of a great mountain close by would be almost too much beauty for some to absorb for someone not used to it.