This section is dedicated to my own hikes with Dad. Here are a few stories of my time that I was lucky enough to have with him, thanks to The Hutch.

The Saga of Copper Lake

It was 1996, and I was a Junior at Bellingham High School. Dad and I had braved Silesia Creek the year before, and I had done fine. It was time for something a little more extensive. Dad had gone through some photos of his time as a kid, and recalled a hike that my grandpa, uncles, and him had done back in the sixties. Copper Lake held quite a bit of nostalgia for Dad, as he remembered spending time with his family, camping out on the various legs of the journey. Copper Lake meant “family” to him.

In 1996, it would soon come to mean “dumpster fire.” To say that the first attempt to hike into Copper Lake was unsuccessful, would be like saying that housing prices are a little high in San Francisco, or that a Formula 1 car has pretty good acceleration. This hike was Murphy’s Law at work. It started like any other back-country camping trip: waking up before dawn, and loading the truck with our heavy packs, and stashing anything we forgot to pack the night before. There is a persistent question that haunts my brain at that time of day: is this reality, or am I actually still asleep? The answer is “yes.”

After a bucket of coffee on the way to the trailhead, and a corresponding donation to nature’s outhouse, we strapped our packs on, and began. The first part of the trail was fairly uneventful; the elevation was steep, but sustainable. Then the flies came out. Oh God, the flies. They were in our eyes. They were in our mouths. They were in our ears, noses, and hats. Somehow, the insect life of a Cambodian jungle had teleported itself onto the North Cascades range.

This hastened our pace dramatically. Keep walking, and you will be able to avoid swallowing flies for almost 30 steps at a time. Stop for a break, and the Horseman Pestilence will descend upon you. For this reason, we made it to Hannegan Pass in short order. We stopped to take photos, eat lunch, and enjoy the ridgetop wind that scattered the clouds of flies temporarily.

The next leg of this journey into madness took us down the other side of Hannegan Pass into the Chilliwack river valley that would have been beautiful and stunning if seen on television. In real life, it was filled with a stunning amount of biting flies. Dad and I now knew that the flies from the switchbacks on the trail were but the scouting force for the true legion that lived within this valley. Once again, we hiked at a furious pace, relishing the elevation gain, as it took us farther away from that ungodly swarm.

It wasn’t until we made it to Copper Ridge that we saw The Sign. With one simple message it destroyed our hopes, and sent us into the abyss of despair. This message, in bold brown letters, read “Camping permits required.” I was allowed one blissful moment of ignorance, before Dad said “Hm…I didn’t know we needed camping permits.”

Now, Dad had always been a rule follower. In fact, that was one of the lessons he taught me; always pay for what you use. Make sure to do the right thing, and be honorable in your actions. In this instance, I think he could have gotten away with bending the rules a little bit. He did not share that sentiment. We reversed course, and began to make our way back down into the Valley of the Flies, as I had come to call it. At this point, we had done about 4000 feet in cumulative elevation and 13 miles, so we were running low on water. Thankfully, we did bring our own water purifier, and there was a lovely, fly-infested stream from which to draw. Dad clamped the purifier onto one of our water bottles, and…nothing. After fussing with it for what seemed an eternity, we concluded that it was broken. As we were contemplating the prospects of drinking unpurified fly-water, we spied a tent. Some unfortunate couple had decided to camp right in the middle of the Valley of the Flies. We begged some iodine tablets from these people, and some other tablets that made the water taste less iodine-y. They unzipped their tent about 2 inches, shoved the tablets out, then rezipped to preserve their coveted fly-free environment. As you can see, there are no more picture. We did not take any. The only thing that mattered to us at this point was escape.

Armed with weird tasting water, and a determination to get the hell out of there, we mounted the switchbacks with gusto, and made it back to Hannegan Pass. Once again the flies propelled our pace, and coming back over the other side of the switchbacks, we took a lengthy break. When this hike occurred, I was not what you would call, “in shape.” I was a band geek. I ate pizza and Mt. Dew for as many meals as I could. It was probably for this reason, along with the iodine and mystery-chemical water, and dehydration, that I commenced vomiting over the side of the switchback. I was a bit delirious, but I swear I remember a group of cub scouts coming up the trail ahead of us. If so, then I’m sorry for puking on you.

At this moment Dad did something that sticks in my memory to this day: he took my backpack on top of his, and walked out of the forest to the truck, so that I could make it out. After I spoke with him later, he was not quite sure how he did that. This image is the hardest memory I have to reconcile with the image of Dad in the last few months of his life in the care facility. A mountain of impossible strength eroded away by an accident at the cellular level. But I digress. Eventually we made it out, and drove the Mt. Baker highway home, stopping at a convenience store for the best tasting Gatorade I have ever had. It was lemon-lime flavored. Over the span of 6 years, Copper Lake taunted us with its clouds of flies, and cheeky permit regulations. It was our White Whale…one day, we would return.

Shortly after that attempt, Dad encountered his first instance of melanoma. It was stage 5. He was given a 39% chance of survival, and he was on the last option for treatment: the clinical trials. He was able to get on a clinical trial for Interferon at Fred Hutch, and miraculously the treatment worked. He was declared cancer-free, and his strength was beginning to build back up. During this time, I would go to Central Washington University for a year as a music major, take a year off, then go to the University of Washington, graduate with an English degree, and become engaged to my first wife. Dad would beat that first attack of cancer, get back to work, and make several big discoveries as a geologist working for a gold mining company.

In 2002, Dad gave me a call. It was time. Copper Lake called, and we would answer. This time was different. We had a camping permit. We had two water purifiers in case one of them broke. We had backup iodine tablets in case both of them broke. We did this in late September instead of August, waiting for the flies to settle down. I had actually trained for it, eating foods such as vegetables and lean meat, and working out at this thing called a gym. It was go time.

The beginning of the hike was much like our previous attempt; dark and unawake. On the way up, I could actually keep up with Dad. The crazy thing about being in shape, is that you are carrying less weight up the mountain. This was an epiphany to me, as we climbed the first 4000 feet to Hannegan Pass.

We tackled these switchbacks with the tenacity of warriors returning to avenge a defeat. Spirits were high, and we crested Hannegan pass on schedule. This was such a wonderful moment, that I put that picture as the landing page for this website.

We had not yet begun to fight. We entered and exited the Valley of the Flies, and climbed to Copper Ridge, where no more flies could touch us. This was a much different experience as you can see below.

From there, we stayed a night at Egg Lake, then climbed up to Copper Mountain, and I got to experience what Dad wanted to show me 6 years ago. The same ranger station still stood from when Dad was a kid. The resident ranger informed us that we could have just purchased a camping permit from the ranger directly when we attempted last time. Well, lessons learned.

From there, we descended to Copper Lake, which was a beautiful, fully stocked lake…we ate many trout, and spent 3 awesome days there. Hiking out was blissfully uneventful on the way out.

These memories are why I do what I do for Fred Hutch; our return trip would never have been possible without their clinical trials. Though the first attempt was somewhat catastrophic in nature, I wouldn’t trade either attempt for anything. I will gratefully hold these memories with me forever…and perhaps someday I will return to the Valley of the Flies.