RHH's photos with the keyword: baker lake

Photographed along the Baker Lake trail in western Washington, these are the flowers of Bunchberry, a common plant in the Pacific Northwest and a relative, only a few inches tall of the flowering dogwood trees that are often grown as ornamentals. It has red berries later in the year that are edible.

These are the flowers, bracts and leaves of Bunchberry, Cornus canadensis, a plant closely related to Dogwood.

Bunchberry is a relative of the flowering dogwood trees many of us are acquainted with but is a plant only a few inches tall, the smallest in that family.

We saw a few native orchids on our recent backpacking excursion, this near our camp at Noisy Creek. The orchid is the Western or Merten's Coralroot. The Coralroots are leafless and without chlorophyll and live in a symbiotic relationship with a fungus (mycoheterotrophic).

The Heart-leaved Twayblade, one of our native orchids, is a tiny plant that would probably not even be noticed unless one was looking for it. This example was photographed along the Baker Lake trail in the North Cascades.

Earlier this week we went on an overnight backpacking trip with our oldest daughter who was visiting from the United Kingdom. We hiked the east bank of Baker Lake about five miles in and set up camp at Noisy Creek and then hiked another four or five miles wilthout packs along the lake. The day we hiked in was beautiful but turned cloudy and rainy in the evening and we packed up and hiked out in the rain the next day. The photos were all taken taken from our campsite, this in the evening as the weather changed.

Taken from our backpacking campsite on the east bank of Baker Lake near Noisy Creek, this was the view north over the lake.

We had spent the day hiking the East Bank trail at Baker Lake and were on our way home in the evening when this was taken from a bridge on the Baker Lake Road. I believe the creek is Park Creek and the view of Mount Baker is from the southeast.

This is Mount Baker from the east bank of Baker Lake. One of our first hikes of the year was along the east bank trail and this was taken from the farthest point to which we hiked before turning back and retracing our steps.

This was photographed on our most recent hike along Baker Lake in the North Cascades. The photo was taken looking straight down at the fungus, not an angle I often use in the field, but in this case it shows the concentric bands of color that characterize this fungus. Nor is the color enhanced, though this is an especially colorful and good example of the species.

This is where we were yesterday. We hiked the east bank of Baker Lake to the point from which this photo was taken and then backtracked. Baker Lake is formed by the Upper Baker Dam which provides flood control and hydroelectric power to the Puget Sound area. It is ten miles long and lies to the south of Mount Baker at about 1000 feet elevation (most of the higher trails are still snowed in). Our hike was typical. We left at 7:30 am and were on the trail at 9:30. We hiked 8-10 miles stopping often for pictures and at noon for lunch. Lunch was cooked over a backpacking stove and consisted of a freeze-dried meal, which we shared, ramen noodles, Starbucks instant coffee, small bottles of wine and chocolate. We were back at the car at 5:30 pm and home by 7:30.