Your job on Saturday will be to find Madrone Peak using the directions from the following story:
Achilles and I headed out for a hike at kennedy Creek. My goal was to walk to the top of one of the hills via logging roads. The road begins pretty much level and then slowly goes up. After a mile or so, the first large hill came into view and I began to look for logging roads to the left which would lead me to the top. I decided to pass Road 2705 thinking there was a different road to the top - I was wrong, but this led to the discovery of Madrone Peak.
The road continued to climb upward as I passed a slight overhang of pillow lava on the left. It appeared from scat on the ground a bear had passed through this area over the past couple of days. I guess the old saying, "Does a bear crap in the woods?" is not true. A bear craps in the middle of the road and some unlucky person steps in it. This bear had been eating blackberries and judging from the contents of the scat, a bear can never own blackberries, a bear can only rent them.
I came to a point where a triangle was formed by two roads coming off the main road - one on the right and one on the left. I decided to follow this road and it quickly became more steep as it wound up the hillside.
(This is where you begin to walk and continue to walk until you return to this point)I begin to realize this road will not take me to the hill I was aiming for today. We startle a deer as we round a curve. The deer spots Achilles and thinks, "A wolf!" and bounds off. Achilles thinks, "Wow what a large cat!" and begins to chase the deer until it heads for the brush and he looses interest.
As I near the top of the hill I discover I need to make a choice. The road continues relatively flat straight ahead, but a left hand turn appears to go to the top of this hill. A couple of switch backs later and a scramble over some columnar basalt, and I am looking out over Oyster Bay to the east with a view of Mt. Washington on my left. A higher peak blocks the view on my right.
The view is cool, but what I'm standing on is more fascinating. It is composed of of pillow basalt covered by a thick layer of moss forming rounded knobs. Right now it is dry, but when the fall rains come it will green up and grow. Because the soil is thin only a few spindly stunted fir trees struggle to survive. Pleased with this environment several Madrone seem to be doing more than just surviving. I named this peak Madrone, discarding the other possible name of Rounded Mossy Knob Hill.
Descending I begin to wonder why the top of the hill was exposed basalt. The last ice age had deposited a layer of gravel and glacial debris over this entire part of the state. Why would the hill be naked rock? Did the glacier not extend this high? Looking at the side of the logging road it was obvious from the gouges the bulldozers had dug that there was a thick layer of gravel. Towards the top, however, there was a mixture of basalt and gravel. Off in the distance, I noticed a large granite boulder deposited during the last ice age. Known as erratics these boulders became trapped in the glaciers and then transported hundreds of miles from their origins. Putting all these clues together I surmised that there probably was a glacial debris deposit on the hill, but rain over the years had washed the gravel down the steep slopes of the hill. Disclaimer: I am not a geologist, but I know how to rock - well I think I remember.
Returning down the 1000' we had climbed was very quick and uneventful except Achilles was trying to carry a four foot long stick in his mouth and kept sneaking up and smacking me behind my knees.
Tuesday or Weds. details and the rules of exploration -
