![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.luterra.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/02\/P1050951.jpg\" "\\"P1050951\\"")
<\/a>Five minutes before sunrise. Crows circling overhead. Willamette Valley filled with fog.<\/p><\/div>\n
<\/a>Clearest view I have seen of Mt. Rainier (left), 184 miles distant, appearing right next to closer (and smaller) Mt. St. Helens on the right.<\/p><\/div>\n
When I got back just after 9 am, my housemates were all still in bed.<\/p>\n
Later on Liz felt like an outdoor adventure, so we decided to head back up the mountain for sunset.\u00a0 By 4 pm, the formerly hard-crusted snow had turned into a wet slush, though still fairly firm.\u00a0 As she doesn’t have skis, we went on snowshoes, roughly following a hiking trail through the woods to the summit.\u00a0 The sun sank into the ocean (actually a layer of clouds just above the water) at 5:28 pm, giving us exactly 10 hours of sunlight today.\u00a0 That’s up from less than 9 hours on the winter solstice, but still a long ways from summer.<\/p>\n
<\/a>Looking into the last rays of sunshine.<\/p><\/div>\n
<\/a>10 seconds to sunset.<\/p><\/div>\n
Lots of other folks had the same idea, and above the upper gate the road is turning into an icy\/slushy mess of ruts made by high-clearance trucks and Jeeps spinning along, getting stuck, and digging themselves out.\u00a0 Some windblown areas are melted down to bare pavement.\u00a0 We will need some fresh snow to rejuvenate the skiing experience.\u00a0 Current forecast has that happening this Wed\/Thurs.<\/p>\n
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I’ve seen many sunsets from Marys Peak and a few sunrises, but never both on the same day.\u00a0 With the return of inversion weather (45-50 and clear up high, 35-40 and foggy in the valley), I set out at 5:30 … Continue reading