Dumpling Mountain

Map and info placed by the NPS at the start of the trail

    You may remember from a previous post my adventure hiking Mount Dumpling early in the season; The cow parsnip (poison ivy on steroids) towering over my head, and all the wild unpleasantness. In case you've forgotten, back in July, on one of my off days, I attempted the hike with one of the Law Enforcement Rangers (Jim). Dumpling is about the only hike you can do on a single-day trip to Katmai, because it's relatively close to Brooks Camp (whereas the Valley hikes are 20-something miles in before you even GET there) and is only about four and a half miles each way, with an elevation gain of somewhere around 2,300 feet. Nine mile hike round trip. No problem, right?

    

    To get to the trailhead from the Visitor Center, you follow this lovely little trail to the campground. Why is the trail so lovely? Because it's frequently traveled. By bears. Nine times out of ten when I've tried to use that trail to the campground, I've stumbled across bears and had to retreat. I love that trail. 

    Once you make it to the campground, you let yourself in the little electric fence. Back in July, Jim and I made it into the campground, where we surprised a bear who had ALSO made it into the campground. That's my handy reminder that bear fences are DETERRENTS but nothing is bear PROOF. Don't get lazy or complacent just because you've got a little electric fence. That time, after the bear left the campground, our hike was delayed walking the campground perimeter and repairing the section the bear had come through. We'd notified one of the bear techs, but by the time he showed up, we couldn't find the bear anymore (we assumed he'd left). Bears are sneaky like that. 

    In the campground is a very nice sign with a map and everything (that picture above). You let yourself BACK out of the campground on the other side, and start on a deceptively nice jaunt through the woods. The trail is clearly defined, the scenery is lovely, and it's not very steep. 

    This time, I was on duty, and Cheryl was off. I needed to go up to the 1.5 mile mark and replace the sign. Except in the campground, camping is not allowed within a 1.5 mile radius of the Brooks Camp Developed Area, so there are markers letting visitors know where that boundary is. The one up Dumpling Trail had been damaged, so it needed to be replaced. Cheryl volunteered to tag along just for the hike and company, but I was on a mission. We planned to meet up at a certain time and go, but nothing works like that at Katmai ("Katmai Time" is a thing, for real.) and since there's no cell service, and Cheryl didn't have her radio on her off-duty, neither of us could check in with the other. I delayed with other duties as long as I could, and then dejectedly trudged off to make the trip alone. 

    I was about 20 minutes along when I caught some radio traffic asking where I was. Cheryl was on her way, and had asked another Ranger to radio for me. I turned back and met her at the campground. Company! Also, it's always less intimidating to run into bears with two people than it is alone. I will gladly admit that even after several months of meeting bears at every corner every day, I'm still not completely chill about the whole idea. 

    Once you are fully lulled into the idea that this is going to be a nice, easy hike, it changes drastically. Back in July with Jim, this was the point where it not only became a steep uphill climb (I mean, it still is now, that part hasn't changed), but also where the cowparsnip came out in full force. That's the plant that burns your skin, and towers over my head so I feel like Alice in Wonderland when she's talking to the flowers, but in this case the flowers are evil. It was everywhere, and the trail becomes very narrow (despite the fact that bears are rather wide, they tend to make very narrow tracks) and deep, but the overgrowth means you can't really see it, so you're hiking uphill, with your arms over your head to avoid the cowparsnip, stumbling blindly on the track. Also it's a thousand degrees. 

    The September version still had the steep incline, but luckily the gauntlet of poisonous plants had died down, so it was much more pleasant. Probably more for Cheryl than me, since I was in full uniform, so sweating profusely and breathing like a wounded buffalo. Cheryl, the consummate outdoorsy girl, was practically skipping. It's just not fair. 

    About a mile up (gain of 800 feet in elevation) you hit the first and second overlooks. 

Those are the ranger cabins where I live

The bridge and lower river

The Falls Viewing Platforms

       The 1.5 mile marker is almost at the top of the treeline. It levels out a bit, and actually makes for a lovely camping site. If it weren't for having to haul a tent and camping supplies up that first steep mile, I'd gleefully camp right here. The sign was damaged, and so Cheryl and I, armed only with a screwdriver, pocket knives, and an overwhelming enthusiasm, hulked out and ripped the sign and screws from the damaged post and reaffixed it, then planted it in the ground firmly enough to withstand wind and winter, although it is still very susceptible to damage from bears and tourists. Cheryl and I were mightily proud of ourselves, and there was much high-fiving and whooping and hollering over our success. Hey, it might have been a small task, but I'm about as handy as a garden gnome with a plastic spork, and in Cheryl's words "I am proud of any time I am not actively making something worse." It was a win for us. Somehow neither of us took any pictures of our accomplishment, though I could have sworn I did.

    We continued on up. I was now technically off-duty, having run out the clock on my shift, so despite regulations specifying that you either wear all of your uniform or none of it, I proceeded to strip down as much as was seemly (undershirts are highly underrated), and packed anything showing the NPS arrowhead into my backpack. Cheryl and I were now officially tourist hikers. 

    After the 1.5 mile mark, the mountain in fall looks like a fairy land. The pictures don't do it justice, but it's just unreal. Reds, yellows, greens, whites, and other vibrant but almost indescribable colors dot the ground, keeping low to avoid getting too windswept. In the middle of it all, cutting through, is the trail. I took about a hundred photos both on the way there and the way back, trying to capture how spectacular it was, but failing. I've posted a dozen, so enjoy, but not one of them does it justice.

    This whole time, the top of the mountain looms above, so you can keep your eyes on the destination... or so I thought. Turns out towards the top, the trail disappears. No problem, you just keep going "up" and you'll get to the top, right? So that's what we did. 

    

    We got to the top, where this thing was, and looked around for our little "top of the mountain" spike thingy. I know they have a technical name, but you all know what I mean. We looked around for it, only occasionally getting distracted by blueberries, or ptarmigans in their snowpants. 

    Okay, for your educational moment of the day: many animals in Alaska change colors depending on the seasons. Arctic hares, weasels, ptarmigans... all go from their brown summer camouflages to white. The fun part is that ptarmigans turn white from the bottom up, so if you catch them at the right time, it looks like they're wearing snowpants.

Look at the snowpants!

    Here's where we have another gap in the photos, mostly because I was tired and a bit disgruntled when we finally realized we weren't at "the top" yet, and that in fact the summit was a peak over a bit in the distance, and we had more climbing to do. Cheryl blasted some empowering music on her phone in an attempt to motivate me, and she ran, while I trudged up the last couple hundred yards. 

We finally found the spike thingy

     We couldn't spend too much time recovering at the top, because we still had the long walk back, luckily downhill this time. Tired, sweaty, and with Cheryl threatening to shame me to our group of friends about the paltry amount of water I bring on hikes, we began the descent. Everything was fine, until we got back to the first overlook: 

    Right there, in the middle of the trail, way inside of the "no camping" zone, was a tent. Cheryl and I spoke to the man inside, informed him about his mistake, and advised him to keep moving up until he found the wonderfully restored sign at the 1.5 mile mark. I forgot until much later that neither of us was wearing any of our official Ranger gear, so no wonder this guy was clearly uninterested in following our instructions. Since we were off duty and tired, we didn't push it, planning on informing the LE's when we got back within radio-range, and letting them handle it. Not my circus, not my monkeys, right? 

    It would have been a perfect plan, if only there had been some LE's around. Turns out this was a freak event where every single LE was off site. Chaos could reign freely until their return. Since I wasn't interested in dressing back up and hiking up to make sure that guy followed the rules and moved his tent, he could stay there. If a bear trundled up the trail and walked over their tent, or pushed it off the overlook, at least it would fall downhill, and he'd been duly warned.