The Joys of Repeat Travel

In Which The Author Sees More Each Time He Visits

When I worked as a park ranger at Arches National Park, a common line I heard from visitors was “Oh, I’ve already hiked that trail. What’s another one I can do.” Although I have made a similar statement, probably too many times, I was also troubled by it. Yes, I, and/or the park visitors, may have hiked the trail but what did we see and what did we miss on our single encounter. How much more would we have observed by walking the trail again? How would it differ in summer versus spring, on a rainy day instead of sunny one, or at night, when few of us venture out?

Over the past several years I have had the good fortune to go on a weekly (mostly) bike ride on the Centennial Trail near Arlington. The ride itself is nothing spectacular. My pal Scott and I cross over a river and a creek, pass through open fields and second growth forest, pedal along a busy road, and hit trail’s end about 7.5 miles north at the Nakashima Farm (another WWII story of this country’s disgraceful treatment of Japanese-Americans). What makes it a wonderful ride are the accumulated observations from riding it well over 100 times.

We ride hand cycles, which means, of course, that we have hugely, massive biceps, triceps, and the lot…Yeah, right! No, it just means go slower than if we used our legs.

Recently, for example, we saw an immature black bear walking down the trail. We knew bears trod the trail because we’d seen—and tried to avoid though it’s harder to do with three wheels—their scat (dark and seedy, sometimes turdiform, sometimes splatty) but this was the first time we encountered a defecator (or perhaps a relative) in person. We were quite pleased that we did not see the young bear’s mother; we suspected she may have been nearby. Other fellow mammals we have seen include coyotes, foxes, deer, a weasel, rabbits, squirrels, horses, and dogs (ranging from ones in strollers to one that seemingly wants to kill us every time we ride by).

We have also been blessed by sounds. Along the wetlands, in spring we hear male Pacific treefrogs advertising their virility and male Red-Winged Blackbirds conk-la-reeing about their territory. The eerie trills of Varied Thrushes regularly grace our ride, along with the catlike, mew call of Spotted Towhees and the spiraling melody of Swainson’s Thrushes. Bald Eagles, Red Tailed Hawks, and Cooper’s Hawks regularly let us (or more likely another animal) know via their calls they are nearby, as do Northern Flickers, pounding a tree in search of insects.

Because we sit so low we have a special opportunity of noticing the ground and what covers it. In addition to the aforementioned bear poop, we have ridden by coyote, horse, dog, and deer feces, garter snakes (only seen on sunny days exploiting the warm pavement), quite a few voles and moles (always dead), and approximately a gazillion slugs. Seasonal trail users, slugs tend to appear in early spring and disappear when dry and warmer weather arrives.

As the weather changes, so does the non-living ground cover. In autumn, yellow to brown leaves quiet the sound of our tires on concrete. Winter brings storm-broken branches and twigs, the rare snowfall, and, one time, the even rarer hair ice. With spring, swamp cabbage explodes in the wetlands, alder catkins litter our route, and cottonwoods release a storm of cotton, which can accumulate so densely on the trail that it appears we are riding on snow. In summer, cut grass borders the trail, easily the most unpleasant seasonal feature, as our low profile allows the grass, and grit, to get in our hair and mouths and down our shirts and everywhere.

Rain or shine or snow, we ride on!

We always slow down as we pass over the confluence of the north and south forks of the Stillaguamish River, wondering which will carry more water. (We have seen flow rates from less than 1,000 cubic feet per second (CFS) to more than 60,000 CFS.) In summer, when the river is low the water is a clear greenish-blue and we can see the gravelly bottom. After a rain, the water turns muddy brown and carries debris that accumulates in a massive logjam, big enough that plants have started to grow on it. Despite the many times we have crossed the river, I still enjoy the anticipation of seeing the ever-changing patterns of eddies, whirlpools, and vortices, as the two forks meet, mingle, and mate.

The confluence of the north and south forks of the Stilly. We start our ride just south of the bridge.

If we had ridden this trail only once or twice, I would have missed this incredible diversity of sight, sound, and smell, and the trail might have seemed boring and lacking in interest. Riding this route regularly over the years though has opened my senses to the trail’s complexity and beauty but I certainly wouldn’t say that I know the Centennial Trail. I do know the sections that always trouble me, where I can coast and enjoy the speed, and have started to get a feel for the seasonal changes but I am still surprised and pleased by what we see, how it constantly varies, and how I continue to discover new aspects of the nature of the place. I look forward to my ride later today.

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If you are interested in two good books that return again and again to the some spot, I recommend The Forest Unseen: A Year’s Watch in Nature by David George Haskell and The Path: A One-Mile Walk Through the Universe by Chet Raymo.

I also just learned of a new podcast about everyday objects that take on significant meaning for people, produced by KUOW (Seattle’s NPR station). The first one focuses on a glittery chador made by performance artist Anida Yoeu Ali to embody her Muslim identity and confront Islamophobia.

If you are in Everett, I will be speaking on July 19 (6pm) about Puget Sound: A Maritime Highway. The talk is based on my book Homewaters and is presented by the Everett Public Library.

Word of the Week - Stillaguamish - According to the website of the Stillaguamish Tribe of Indians, “The name Stoluck-wa-mish or Stillaguamish, has been used since 1850 to refer to our people who lived along the Stillaguamish River and camped along its tributaries. Our ancestors were a party to the Treaty of Point Elliott of 1855, under the spelling Stoluck-wa-mish.” Stoluck-wa-mish, or stuləgʷábš, are the People of the River. Stulekʷ (another way to write the word) means river in Northern Lushootseed.