Rebecca M. Douglass, Author

Way back in January (feels like forever--I've been home for over a month! How can I bear it!), I took a little trip down to Sedona, Arizona, to find a bit more sun and daylight. The weather cooperated, mostly, and my friend Jan and I had a good time. Funny thing about Sedona: because I'm not into the New Age aspects of the place, I've tended to avoid it (well, also because that New Age stuff draws a lot of tourists during the season). January proved a reasonable time to go--though there were plenty of tourists around, they weren't overwhelming. And the landscape is sufficiently amazing that it needs no mystical stuff to make it a place to visit. The trip started with an amazing flight south (in part because it wasn't full and I had a whole row to myself!). It was very clear and very calm and the pilot got permission for a close fly-by of Mt. Rainier. How close? Close enough it was almost scary! If there'd been climbers on the mountain, I'm pretty sure I coul...

This is the 3rd and final post from my  backpacking trip into the Absaroka-Beartooth Wilderness last August.  Here's the report on the  first two days   and here's the 2nd report, on days 3 and 4. Day 5: Oly Lake to Rough Lake This day started with another beautiful sunrise.  For those of you who wonder, this is a big part of why I haul a heavy load into the mountains and sleep on the ground--because it's darned hard to see sunrise at a remote lake on a dayhike. Early light reflected in Oly Lake. Sunrise reflections in Oly Lake. Our route leads up that cleft in the rocks across the lake. It was a relief to wake to calm winds and mostly clear skies, because we'd had a pretty impressive storm at bedtime the night before. Little did we know, that was just the warm-up.    We had a short hike before us, though we knew it wouldn't be fast, so we didn't leave camp until 8:15. We were heading up the creek and over the mountain (back across the divide anyway)...