Rob & Rina Come For A Visit

We've been excited to see Rob and Rina for about six months since we somehow convinced them to drive 14 hours to our place and then hike the rest of the Pacific Crest Trail with our friend, Mara.  Mara has been hiking the trail all summer, she started at the California/Oregon border.  The last four days we planned to do with her, which would end on the other side of the border in Canada.  These days would be hard, 15-20 miles each day with lots of ascents and descents.  Of course the plan was to have the two dogs, Maggie and Lucy, do all this with us.  We then would be picked up by Mara's sister in CA and drive 7 hours home (likely arriving at 2 am) and then go to work the next day and Rob and Rina would drive home.  Follow all that? Basically, lots of long, hard days of hiking without any time for recovery.

It isn't surprising then that when the weather forecast turned ugly, really ugly, that we bailed on the above plans.  The forecast was rain and snow for at least 3 days, possible thunder and lightening (did I mention that most of the hiking would be on ridges?) and the high one day was predicted at 42 F.  We shamelessly tucked our tails and let Mara finish the hike with only her boyfriend, Adam.  They survived, but reported 2 days of hiking in snow, cold temperatures and lots of wetness.

So...what'd we do since now we had 4 full days with Rob and Rina and no plans, yet rainy weather at our place too.  Went on day hikes of course.  Click the 'read more' to see the pics!




Saturday- Rich and I climbed a bit at McGlaughlin Canyon with Kathy and Parker.  R&R hung out for a while and then we went for a hike- in the rain of course.

Rob, Marissa, Kathy, Rina, Lucy

Rich belaying.

Miranda

We then went for a lovely, but short hike in a burned forest which can be starkly beautiful.

After the rain it was time for Tavie Tavern in the one horse town of Tonasket. This is Rina, Rich and Rob heading across the street.

Sunday- Rob's Birthday. It was also Lucy's birthday, she turned 3 or 4.  Both of them wanted a hike and a scramble in the rain so we obliged.

There was a hint of sunshine at the trail head to Tiffany Lake.

Rich has love enough for two doggies.

Weather was rolling in, but we were having fun so we kept going.

That's snow on Maggie.
  

So we started thinking the ridgeline maybe wasn't the best place to be...

Here we are contemplating dropping down the other side of the ridge to get to a low trail, but we had to bushwack 400 vertical feet down the mountain-which we did.

At the end of the hike, probably about 8 miles, we found raspberries and the weather cleared up.

That evening we had a feast followed by 'cake' for both Rob and Lucy. (notice Lucy's sandwich)

Cheers!!  It'd come up a few weeks before that I didn't know what Mickey's Malt Liquor was, so Marissa and Parker kindly introduced us.

Monday- Libby Lake Hike.
The next day we went for another day hike.  This was a 5.5 mile hike up to an isolated lake in the mountains.  It started out blustery and threatening, but it never really rained.  The lake was pretty, but cold wind drove us back down fairly quickly.

Abandoned cabin  1/2 mile below lake.  There were 20 year old trees growing out of the sod roof!

Libby Lake.

Tuesday- Our last day with Rob and Rina before they headed home to Salt Lake City.  We decided to do part of the original hike now that the weather was clear.  This was an 11 mile, fairly mellow hike compared to Libby Lake.  It was nice too because it was point to point.  Rich shuttled the car by hitch hiking (and running) a few miles.

The first few miles of the hike were surprisingly lush and green.  We thought we'd accidentally crossed over the the western side of the state for a bit.

We ate the last of Rob's birthday cake at the ridge halfway into our hike, before dropping over the other side.

Not so green and lush up here- I guess we're still in the eastern part of the state.

Then, a UFO came along and hovered over us and tried to suck us up into it's belly. Beam us up, Scottie!

Good thing we'd eaten all that cake, the tractor beam couldn't pick us fatties up!

Afterwards, we ate some yummy mexican food and R&R headed out at 8pm in an effort to get a few hours under their belt that night.

We'll miss you Rob and Rina!!! For all you SLC folks, we'll be there the weekend before Thanksgiving and want to see all of you.