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| Alpine meadow in "Sunrise Park" |
Me and my twin brother hiked up to Mount Fremont Lookout when I visited in early September. Since he works for the NPS at Mt. Rainier National Park, we were able to reserve the tower for the night. Clouds rolled in the afternoon we hiked up and remained there for the whole night, along with strong winds.
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| Trail to Frozen Lake (the water source for the Sunrise Visitor Center complex), which then connects to the Fremont Lookout trail |
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| The sign for Frozen Lake, the drinking water supply for the Sunrise complex. |
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| Frozen Lake is just to my right, off the photo, and is very low. It's really an alpine pond, fed by precipitation and snow melt. |
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| The fog was thick and limited greatly visibility. |
My brother snapped several photos of me hiking in the clouds!
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| This section of the Fremont Lookout Trail is narrow and dominated by loose rock with a steep slope |
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| I love this photo. My brother appears to be hiking straight into the sky and among the clouds! |
When we arrived at the tower it was foggy, and the view was completely obscured.
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| After sunset |
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| After sunset the top of Mt. Rainier peeked through the clouds for about two minutes. |
The wind and rain picked up during the night, with some a strong sustained wind speed and even more powerful gusts.
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| My twin brother, Jonathan |
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| Jonathan chilling in the tower at night |
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| The tower has cots, some old pieces of furniture, the old fire spotter tool. |
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| inside the tower |
We awoke to a spectacular view of Rainier!!
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| This is the view on the north side of the tower, Grand Park is obscured by clouds |
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| The view started to clear a little bit in the morning |
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| Looking south along the Fremont Trail |
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| Panoramic of the tower |
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| Me on Mt. Fremont in front of Rainier. |
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| With the snow and clouds, Rainier looks spectacular in black and white photos |
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| Panoramic view from Mount Fremont |
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| The sun felt great in the morning |
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| Scrambling among the rocks at elevation |
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| See the white dots along the ridge? It's a herd of mountain goats! |
Awesome views! Sure would love being in that tower to see the stars at night and that fantastic mountain view in the morning.
ReplyDeleteThank you! and thanks for checking out the post. I was really looking forward to seeing the stars that night, and I intended to do star trails. However, we ended up being completely socked in by clouds, there was zero visibility, with very high winds.
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