Rich & Skip's Excellent Adventure 7

[Rich Lambert]

It's been 5 years since the last Excellent Adventure and high time for another one. So, off to Baker Lake! I am the only local I know who has not been to Baker Lake. I don't know why, it just never happened and everyone seems surprised when I tell them that.
It usually goes something like this:
Me: "Nope, never been there."
Them: "Yes you have, you just don't remember"
Me: Nope, never been there."
Them: "I thought I knew you."

We started out in Arlington at 8am and headed for Darington and points north. Somewhere out there we stopped at an old abandoned brick factory in the woods to admire some pretty creative graffiti (forgot to get pictures of that). After Darington, we turned onto Concrete Sauk Valley Rd which was just epic and deserted. I turned on my GoPro for some driving videos, but it took pictures instead. This was not a tech friendly adventure...more on that later.

Brick factory parking


From there we turned onto the North Cascades Hwy and headed west to Baker Lake Road, another deserted epic drive. We stopped at the Baker Lake boat launch for some big mountain pictures of Mt Shuksan and Mt Baker. Both have been visited on previous Excellent Adventures. At the boat launch we ran into a couple tribal members in a boat doing water sampling for something. They explained why they were sampling, but it went over my head. We asked them about a million questions and marveled at all the land locked salmon swimming around the dock. Apparently they have to truck in the fish every year because of the dams.

Mt Baker from the boat launch in front of the dike...now now


Mt Shuksan in the distance with clouds on top


A different boat launch on Baker Lake


After the boat launch we headed for Baker Lake Dam. It's pretty impressive. We drove across the dam, parked on the other side, and walked back. The outflow is a narrow canyon with pea soup colored glacier water flowing through it. There was a big waterfall just across from us too.

Driving across the dam


Waterfall across the valley


Next up, 10 miles of dirt/gravel/rocks/potholes/fallen trees road. That led us to our lunch spot on the Baker River. It was such a cool place, it looked like no one had ever touched it. After lunch Skip broke out his drone. Last time he droned on an Excellent Adventure up by Loup Loup, it did not go well. This time it went fantastic...till it didn't. That thing was amazing! It can fly 5 miles away and come "home" by itself via GPS coordinates. It has a feature that when the battery is low, it will automatically fly "home". If, that is, that feature is turned on...which is wasn't. It went down somewhere up river and we spent 2 hours searching for the very expensive drone. Did I mention the drone is gray and it went down amid a sea of gray river rocks? We did not find it, even with the last known GPS coordinates displayed on Skip's phone.
R.I.P. Droney the drone 2020-2021

Bombing up the dirt road...we would have gone faster, but there was a Jeep Wrangler holding us up


Lunch spot parking


Last known image of Droney


Across from lunch spot


Since we drove to the very end of the road we got to turn around and do it all again! Still epic and still deserted. After that, we hightailed it back to Arlington to top off with some ethanol-free 92 and then home at about 5pm. Today was a beautiful 75 degree sunny fall day, my car ran great, and except for Droney wandering off, it was a very excellent adventure.

[Jeff Higgins]

Most excellent!

[jpnovak]

Passing through Seattle today. Weather was perfect. Glad you got out.

[RSBob]

And your car always started? What did you do or not do?

Your trip was most excellent.

[Hi_Fi_Guy]

Brilliant

[digitaldgp]

Looks like a great time! Thanks for sharing and posting Was looking forward to how the run went, bummer about the drone. But cars look great!

[Rich Lambert]

Originally Posted by RSBob

And your car always started? What did you do or not do?

Your trip was most excellent.

Hi Rick! Oh yeah. Carbs rebuilt by Performance Oriented. No more vapor lock.

[RSBob]

Originally Posted by Rich Lambert

Hi Rick! Oh yeah. Carbs rebuilt by Performance Oriented. No more vapor lock.

Fantastic! But now the mystery is gone. Sigh - now we will need to find someone else to pick on. New blood!

Your trip looked as good as it could get and so happy to see another installment. Great pics of some wonderful cars and scenery. Keep it up.

[Antomero]

Amazing!! Looks like a fun time.. viva air-cooled Porsche!

[al lkosmal]

Most excellent..next trip up to the North country..stop by for a cold one!

[Skip Newsom]

Great write up and photo's Rich!
I can attest to the accuracy of your descriptions, and we were indeed waaay overdue for more air cooled adventures..

I too, like most of you were stunned that Rich was a Baker Lake virgin, no more I say!!

The peak of fall colors have not yet kicked in, another 3-4 weeks and a sunny day up on Baker Lake and River with it's massive Maples, pesky Alder and other deciduous color changers will be even more amazing.

Lucky for us there has been a fire season ending rain come through and the glow of fresh snow at about 6K and up add to the feeling of season change.

Another other point of view...

Rich and his beautiful '66 showing up right on time!


Yee old brick factory, (Fortson mill) with a nice new paved parking for the Whitehorse trail


Following signage, for once




Rich drinking in the glory of Baker, the Lake, the Mountain, the River and it's environs








Baker Lake in the deep distance being fed cold clear H2O

[RSBob]

Keep finding pictures of this guy in Photos…Think I have been hacked.



Can’t be Rich. No cigar.