Where the hell did Summer go?

Okay, two weeks of serious rain in August-this is too much even by Northwest standards. We had a winter that lasted until Memorial Day this year-then finally summer came-we even got a few hot days-then this dreary crap! Cold, wet, and gray!

I like this weather in November when I'm plugging away on a manuscript-but not in August when I need to be doing some serious field work-like heading up Evergreen Mountain for my Day Hiking Central Cascades Book. Bad enough the Forest Service probably won't reopen the road until I'm in my grave-if even then-but then to have to bike up a steep logging road over downed trees and around washouts in a down pour. Forget it! I have a good mind to not even put this hike in the book-who knows if it will ever be a day hike again!

Ahh-but that is why I wish to spotlight it-because if I don't the rains and Congress's inability to fund our National Forests properly will render yet another Northwest trail into the annals of history. And that would suck worse than this weather. I'll get there one way or another-and in the meantime-please sun come back and grace us with your warming and bright rays.

(photo-Heather heads over the Badlands in the Alpine Lakes Wilderness WA)