I’m going through images from different seasons, trying to fight off the seasonal winter blues of the Pacific Northwest. These were all from the same springtime hike up Mount Rose in the southeast Olympics. I know they will brighten up my days in a month or two … if I can hold on that long.
One of the things I enjoy about winter in the Olympics is seeing all the moss on the trees being backlit by sunshine. Of course, being Western Washington (let alone rain forest type environment), there aren’t a lot of days in the late fall or winter when you can get a sunny day. This was shot with my Nikon F6 on Tri-X, so I don’t have a color version for you to compare.
But I really enjoy the backlit, glowing green moss outlining each limb of these big leaf maples.
See below for a look at the trail we were hiking.
The mountain in the distance is a part of the Mt Jupiter ridge (but not the summit), which runs between the Dosewallips and Duckabush rivers in the Olympic Mountains. I was hiking up the Dosewallips when I caught this opening through the trees giving a view of the high country. The higher ridges were already showing some signs of snowfall.
The previous post referred to the vine maple as the source of the brightest reds in the lowland Olympics. Here’s a good example (above) as compared to big leaf maple and its yellows (below).
The Dosewallips River drains the central section of the eastern Olympics. The road has been washed out for years and now makes a gentle hike for 6 miles into the Olympic National Park. While Washington State is not known for nice displays of fall colors, this year in the Olympics was particularly good. More yellows than reds … except for vine maples. Here you see mostly big leaf maples and their yellows.
