For my final hike of the 4th of July weekend I headed up to Tidbits Mountain. It’s a short hike, but with the hot weather I was fine with that, and in any case I had a three hour drive back to Portland.
There were wildflowers blooming along the trail, including beargrass and rhododendron:
Just before reaching the summit I spotted a whole bunch of beargrass below the trail:
A view of the summit from the trail:
The trail takes you to the base of that rocky knob that is the summit. There are still remnants of the ladder from the lookout days.
The small rocky summit and the foundation remnants from the old lookout:
Looking down the rock face I just climbed up:
By the way, here’s a 1927 photo of the lookout. It’s kind of amazing some of the tiny summits that had lookouts perched on them in the old days!
Views all around on this gorgeous day, although the numerous clearcuts were jarring after the pristine view from Olallie Mountain the day before. 🙁 Mary’s Peak in the Coast Range (it’s amazing how you can see that mountain from so many different places!):
Diamond Peak:
Mount Bachelor (small snowy bump on the left):
The Three Sisters:
Mt. Washington, and at center Carpenter Mountain, where I was on Friday:
Mt. Jefferson and Three Fingered Jack:
Here is what the view looked like in 1934:
It was so pleasant up there that I just hung out for awhile. A few butterflies kept me company.
At one point I was standing there admiring the view and I heard this humming sound. At first I thought it was the distant sound of ATVs, but then I realized it was a hummingbird. I looked around and spotted it just below the summit. Miraculously I got a halfway decent picture. Cool!
I had a lot of fun getting up to some high points in this neck of the woods last weekend and feeling VERY lucky for such amazing weather the whole time. Three clear warm days! In Oregon! On the 4th of July weekend! As I joked on facebook Sunday evening, “Flying pigs will be seen at any moment….” 😀
