Eatonville: Little Mashel River Falls and Lower Falls Hike

My mom saw some posts on Instagram of some waterfalls near Eatonville and wanted to go hike out to them.  She gave me the job of finding out where they were and do some research on them.  One day while I was at grandma’s house using her WiFi, we still don’t have internet at our house yet, I checked a few hiking websites and the Visit Rainier site to see where to park and how long we would be walking to get to these places mom wanted to go.  There were two ways of getting there, the short way via Alder Cut Off (quarter of a mile if that) or the long way through the Pack Forest on Hwy 7 (5-ish miles roundtrip.)

The weather finally was decent, we’ve had some very poor July weather, and the temperature was in the upper 70’s to low 80’s.  We all dressed for the occasion.  Ben couldn’t come with us because he already committed to helping one of his friends with some wrestling stuff in Tenino. 

We got up around 9:30 and got ready for our day.  I tried to have most of my hiking stuff ready the night before so I didn’t have to scramble in the morning.  We had some cereal and bananas for breakfast.  Ben left around 10:30 as did I after I got everything I needed into the Escape.  I told him to have fun.  I headed out to Rainier and hoped that mom and dad were semi ready to go.

As I thought, they were still getting ready.  Oh well, it gave me some time to use the bathroom and sit for a bit.  Dad was playing around with the back deck by flipping over the worn out ones to the backsides, which weren’t that bad looking, so we wouldn’t die each time we tried to put the animals to bed or make dinner on the bbq.  At this point everyone was waiting for everyone.  We took the Escape because I didn’t want to take everything out of it to put it into another car.  Plus I needed gas.  We piled everyone inside with their stuff and some lunch and drove into Yelm for some gas at the Arco.

We were on our way to Eatonville.  In the last five years I’ve been to Eatonville a lot…between the fastpitch games when I coached, geocaching, driving through to Yakima and hanging out with Shauna, it’s gotta be close to 30 times or so.  When we got up the hill into Eatonville traffic got horrible.  We had to wait at the main intersection in town for a while.  I got to thinking to myself, I hope where we’re going is the right place.  Fingers crossed.

We started up the hill out of town and remembered that there was a cache at the Bud Blancher Trail I gotta go get for the Mount Rainier series.  This one was part of the third series that published July 1^st.  I will save that for the way back.  When we left Rainier, I had put the parking coordinates into the Nuvi so we wouldn’t miss the pullout it spoke about online.   The pullout was in sight and I’ve always seen vehicles here in the past and have always wondered why they were parked there.  Now I know after all these years.

We found a place to park.  I put my socks and hiking shoes on.  I told everyone to hide their valuables just in case.  They ate some of their food before we were ready to go.  We really weren’t sure where we were supposed to go so we followed a group of people to the middle trail.  Sure enough, the short trail led us to a hill that you had to use a rope to get down.  This reminded mom and I of the last hill we did together several years ago in Dupont when we were going after the pirate barge cache which is now archived. 

We all got down the rope to the trestle in one piece.  We laughed at mom as she came down just because we could and she made a fuss about it.  We took a few pictures and then meandered our way next to the river to the first waterfall, the Little Mashel River Falls, a 92 foot veiling horsetail falls. 

When we arrived, there were two ways to get down to the falls, down the rocks next to the falls or around down a small trail that took you to the river on the other side.  I took the rocks and mom and dad walked the trail down.  I took a few pictures with my phone of the falls until they arrived.  We spent at least 20 minutes here and finalized it with a selfie.

After that we walked along the river back towards the trestle.  We really didn’t have anything else planned while we were here.  All the other hikes from this area were day hikes ranging from 4.5-5 miles round trip.  We saw TomTom Falls was quite a hike from where we were.  If we were to do that we would have to research and to plan to do it.  We wandered around for a while and took a gravel road just to see where it went. 

Then we saw a large rock with FALLS and an arrow pointing to a well used trail.  I wonder where this goes.  How far?  What falls?  We took it and followed it.  We went down a very long hill to a fork in the road.  Which one do we take?  We took the one that went further down the hill.  We stopped at the bottom and a lady with two horses passed us.  I swore those horses would slip on those rocks and tumble down the hill but they didn’t.  I was in awe.

Dad worried we’d be gone all day or we would be walking really far without some direction.  So we had to convince him to keep walking.

We followed the trail to another junction but this time there were people resting on a downed log and I asked them how far the falls were (at this point you could hear them) and they said not far, just down this section of trail, it takes you right to it.  We thanked them and headed down.

We saw a sign that said Lower Falls.  I do not remember reading up on any falls in the area called that.  I found out later that this was officially the Lower Little Mashel Falls, which is a 39 foot segmented horsetail falls.  There were quite a few people hanging out down there.  I ate a snack and took a few pictures.  We were probably there for about a half hour or so enjoying the scenery.  We got a selfie before we headed back up the trail and dad made fun of me.

The walk back up was not as bad as I thought it would be.  We had to stop and take a few breaks here and there.  We got back to the trail head, walked the gravel road to the railroad tracks and back over the trestle.  The second part to our hike only took us an hour which wasn’t that bad.  We pulled ourselves up the hill and back to the Escape.  Mom got out our food.  She made sandwiches and I inhaled mine.  I am not a huge fan of sourdough but I ate it anyway.

We rode back down the hill into Eatonville and I stopped at the Bud Blancher Trail to show them the area and the bridge over the river but mostly to stop and get Rainier100 3:  This Bud’s For You (GC6KW0C).  We walked down to the river first and then grabbed the cache on the way back up.  It was getting hot and I was tired.  We did a lot of walking today.

We stopped in Yelm to get blizzards from Dairy Queen because mom insisted.  I got an Oreo cookie, mom got a Butterfinger and dad got an M&M one.  They tried to get me to take them to the store but I wanted to go home and get some stuff done before the work day tomorrow.  I dropped them off at their house and I went home.  Ben had finished the dishes and was washing laundry when I got home.  It was nice to get a shower and be clean.  The rest of the evening I got ready for work the next day.

Next Adventure:  #spottheape2016 and Floating Mayfield Lake

Moving Day!

Well, it took a lot of time, grief and jobs we hated but we finally found a place to live.  It took a few months of searching, not liking a lot of them, more searching, more research on what area we wanted to live and landing a place that we liked and would do for the time being.  It was within reason to work, it wasn’t too far from my parent’s and grandparent’s house and it wasn’t too far from I-5 to go see Ben’s mom in Bonney Lake.  We plan on staying here at least two years or so.

We started the process of this place we found in Lacey over by the Amtrac Train Station off of Yelm Highway via Zillow.  Ben got a hold of a girl named Shelby, which later I found out was the same girl who worked at the casino and had a crush on Ben, who helped us get this place.  She basically put it on hold for us.  Ben walked through it a few weeks ago and then reported his opinions on it while I was in Yakima visiting some friends on my days off.  I’ve only seen the outside of the place so far.

We both filled out their online application and added the $35 fee.  We better get this place or we’re both out $35 bucks and wasted time.  We were approved a few days later and our final walk through was scheduled for Wednesday, July 6^th at 3:30. 

I went to work and Ben had the day off.  We met at noonish at Buffalo Wild Wings for some lunch.  We both had never been here for lunch before so our meals were cheaper…which was great!  Afterwards, we stopped by the Remax in Tumwater to pay our rent, deposit, pet fee and to turn in our renter’s insurance.  We hung out at Tumwater Falls and walked the loop, stopped by Lowe’s to see which washer and dryer we would like to purchase, all to waste some time before we went to the house.  We got there early and waited on the stoop. 

A guy named Lee showed up about 45 min late, but he did inform us he would be late, introduced himself and then we started our final walk through.  The house definitely smelled like rental house (I know this because my family has had a rental house for 20 years, wow it’s already been 20 years?!) the living room was huge, the kitchen had a ton of room, we looked at the three bedrooms, the two bathrooms, the garage and the small but functional back yard with a shed.  We can make this work, look and smell good.

We received the keys, he went over the paperwork with us and he overheard Ben and I having a small side bar conversation about washers and dryers.  He asked us if we were going to purchase one.  We told him yeah, we were thinking of doing it during the weekend.  He said if we do it now, we could use his military discount.  He had to go pick up the new stove anyway…might as well get those and haul them at the same time.  We said sure and off we went.  The washer and dryer only cost us $800 with the $100 discount.  It was sweet.  He even installed them for us.  We thanked him and I headed home to gather and bring over more of my stuff.  When I got back and unloaded, we jumped into Ben’s car and headed down to Rochester to pick up some of his stuff.  We got back late; I immediately got into bed because I had to get up at 5 to go to work. 

The next day I was miserable.  I was so tired I could barely see straight but I stayed awake.  I had an informational interview of the Department of Health to see if I even wanted to work there or not (I had an interview on Friday for a permanent/full time position.  She basically told me to quit my job with the state, go back to school and become a teacher and a coach…easier said than done.  I needed to keep bringing money in because we just moved out into our own place.  I told myself, one thing at a time.  If I stay at L&I for a year (my year anniversary is in September) and become permanent they will pay for my education.  I headed back towards Rainier to get more stuff and shove it in the Escape.  I got back late again and put some stuff away.  Ben got home from his meeting that lasted until about 8 and then we got cleaned up and went to bed as soon as possible, tomorrow was going to be another long day.

I got up around 5 again, got ready for work and did my thing down in the mail room.  At 10:30 I had my one on one with my supervisor and basically I am doing everything right for only being three months in.  She asked me a series of questions on how she could help me be better, if I was challenged enough, my time off, my upcoming training, the status with Kathy and other various topics.  We walked back to the mail room and I basically got ready to leave.  I bypassed the gym and went home to get ready for my interview with the Department of Health.  I ate some food, took a short nap and then put my interview clothes on, did my hair and put a small amount of makeup on.  It was set for 2:30.  I thought it went well but you never know what they are actually looking for.

I headed home and packed up more of my stuff into the Escape.  I still had a lot to do.

Saturday morning we rented a truck from Budget to pick up the couch from Federal Way, get the big heavy stuff from Bonney Lake and finish up getting some of the heavy stuff from my house and grandma’s house…well at least that was the plan.

We picked up the couch first and it took up most of the truck like we thought it would.  We drove out to Bonney Lake, Trish was on her girls’ weekend and Amy was chillin at home.  None of Ben’s stuff was packed so we spent a lot of time there.  We made lunch of tomato soup and grilled cheese and got back to work soon after.  We took Ben’s bed apart, grabbed the speakers, the TV, the leaning dresser of Pisa and other various things we could get packed up quickly and stuffed in the truck. 

We headed out to Rainier to grab my giant things including my dresser, my king sized bed, some boxes of stuff and anything else we thought we could put in there so I didn’t have to put it in the Escape later.  It was getting late so we attempted to go to grandma’s house to get the mini fridge and the BBQ and for some reason my key would not fit into the gate lock.  We were frustrated and tired so we headed back to the house to unload.  Mom and dad met us there to help us unload.

It took us a while to unload everything.  In the meantime I mopped the floor so we could put the couch in the living room right away.  It was starting to look like an actual house on the inside.  I helped Ben bring in the really heavy stuff so we didn’t have to make mom and dad do that stuff.  We unloaded my king sized mattress into the master bedroom, his mattress into the guest bedroom and the couch pieces into the living room.  I was so exhausted and hungry.  We thanked them for helping us. 

On Sunday since we got everything sorta put away for now, it was time to bring Calvin home and I knew he was going to be weird for at least a week with the new change.  He was.  He hid under the blankets in the bed, did not eat for at least five days, he hid in the bathtub and just became isolated to everyone.  By the end of the week he was getting back to normal.

We made a few meals together including Scooby Doo waffles, chicken and rice dishes, spaghetti, chicken tacos, a couple breakfasts including eggs, sausage, cereal and bananas, sandwiches and homemade chicken teriyaki.  As you can tell we like our chicken huh?

Ben ordered a king sized bed frame off of Woot for $350 and it arrived in three pieces on a Sunday and Monday.  Monday night we started putting it together and it took us over 4 hours with some stuff we had to redo.  We didn't get to bed until after midnight and I have to get up at 5....

Tuesday we did the drawers and it took us about 2 hours and we still went to bed later than I wanted to.

On Thursday I started sanding our dining room table.

Our family and friends have donated various items and we even received a few house warming gifts.  We plan on having an actual open house type house warming party eventually and going to host game night in September.

We still have a lot left to do and go through until this feels like a normal home.

Next Adventure:  Eatonville:  Little Mashel River Falls and Lower Falls Hike

4th of July on the 3rd

This is the 4th year we've been going to the lake.  Mom and dad went to visit Erika and have been gone in Nevada for just about a week.  They got back on Saturday late and I wondered if they wanted to go with us.  Both mom and dad ended up going but dad stayed a short amount of time and left soon after. 

We really didn't have that much time to get anything ready so we brought a family sized bag of chips and whatever was in the "4th of July" tub at grandmas house where I've been keeping my stuff in storage.  Mom had all of her stuff with her, Ben made it over to our house before the afternoon and we went and got grandma and the stuff she brought with her.  We drove the 40 minutes or so out to Clear Lake between Eatonville and Graham off of Hwy 161.

I was really hoping for hot weather like we had last year so we could go swimming. It wasn't and we were disappointed.  We got there around 4ish, found a parking spot we could get in and out of later, grabbed our stuff out of the back of the Escape and wandered our way down to the lake house.  We set up our chairs roughly in the same spot we've been putting them for the past few years.  We got all settled in.  We visited with several people to pass the time (or else we would be in the water floating but we weren't), watched the little kids be weird, PJ took loads of people out on the boat for rides or to be pulled on a raft from behind the boat, we played a little HORSE basketball and horse shoes and by then it was time for some food!

There were grilled burgers, hotdogs and someone grilled up some ribs.  I took a burger and a few ribs along with some of the excellent salads, fruit, veggies and chips that were offered.  I would have to come back for dessert.  I was really sad Bev didn't make her lemonade pie this time.  It was always a hit.

It was getting cooler so I made a few trips back up to the Escape and changed into some sweatpants, socks and shoes and brought down my fireworks I've kept in a bin for several years.  I figured it was time to light them up.  I shared with Ben and Sammy and gave some of the less dangerous ones to the random kids to blow up.  We did it on the dock so we knew we wouldn't light anything on fire.  I did have a safety bucket to put the burnt up firework skeletons in and of course the wrappers and plastic bits.

It was getting darker so everyone brought out their dock fireworks.  We had to wait until at least 10 for the barge firework show from the middle of the lake.  I was also disappointed that the weather was so overcast we didn't get to see Mount Rainier in the distance.  Most of the day it was covered up by clouds.  Maybe next year.

Paul or PJ lit our flare indicating that we were ready for the show to begin and also each house on the lake contributes a portion for this firework show to happen.  I am not 100% absolute but I heard the person who puts on the show owns Blackcat Fireworks and lives on the lake.  That's just what I've been told.

At 10 the show began.  I always found it fascinating that we saw the boom but didn't hear it until seconds later just because of the echo.  I am a fan of fireworks and could watch them for hours everyday.  It's amazing on how the colors (let alone the chemistry behind it) and designs could be packed into a tube to precisely go off at a certain time when it's lit.  It was nice to relax and enjoy the show and not have to worry about going to work the next day since we are having it a day early.

When the show was done we cheered and yelled encore!  We didn't get an encore unfortunately.  We got our stuff together, told everyone bye and thanks for having us and we headed towards home. We dropped off grandma first and then we were finally home.  I told Ben good night because he did have to work the next day and he went back to Rochester.  I went to bed shortly after. 

Happy 4th of July everyone!

Next Adventure:  Moving Day!