THE first official knapsack trip of The Mountaineers extending over a period of two weeks was participated in by five members, Wilfrid Marlisoll, leader, Olive Rand, Mrs. C. M. Bixby, Grace and Henry Howard. On Saturday night, July 14, we left for Rockdale via the Milwaukee; arriving at 10:10 p. m., we shouldered our packs and traveled up the old track to the Snow Lake trail. Here a hurried camp was made for the rest of the night.

The next day we followed the Snow Lake trail past Snow Lake, 4,100 feet elevation, down to Rock Creek, a tributary to the Middle Fork of the Snoqualmie a distance of seven miles. Monday morning we took a side strip to Goldmeyer Hot Springs. These springs are sulphur dioxide, very hot and strong. The party returned to the Rock Creek Camp and on to Taylor's Ranch, having covered thirteen miles for the day. Here we found our first food cache. The next day was perhaps the hardest of the whole trip; our packs were heavy and the trail steep, a climb of 2,000 feet in nine and a quarter miles being necessary to reach lake Snoqualmie where we found winter conditions while the night before summer had prevailed. The next day we crossed our second snow pass, elevation 3,700 feet, and on down to Lake Dorothy, a short journey of two and three-quarter miles, passing Deer and Bear lakes en route. We found warmer conditions here, and a good camping spot at the south end of the lake, so decided to rest a day or two.

Thursday we spent fishing on the lake - lots of fun but no fish. We explored the lake in a dugout made five years before by the forestry men. As we were all Mountaineers we felt we must do some climbing and Friday, July 20, we made a very pleasant and uneventful ascent of Big Snow, elevation 6,700 feet Saturday morning, much to our regret, we had to leave Lake Dorothy with her beautiful shores and lovely islands and continue on our way. We loaded all our belongings in the dugout and paddled to the lower end of the lake, a distance of more than two miles.

Saturday night brought us after a fourteen-mile journey, to what we called our hobo camp. On the banks of the Skykomish River. This our first touch of civilization and nearly proved disastrous, as one of our party was mistaken for an I.W.W., said to be a perfect type, in fact from the rear view. Our second cache was at Skykomish, therefore dinner was an elaborate affair consisting of canned salmon, fresh potatoes, bread and butter, tea, with canned pineapple for desert; and for breakfast such luxuries as scrambled eggs. On the Skykomish we were at an elevation of 930 feet, the lowest reached on the trip. The next day was a lazy one, spent in a trip to the Money Creek Soda Springs and mine. That night we went to Index by train and started next morning on our second week's outing. The personnel of our crowd was changed slightly, Mrs. Bixby taking the place of Olive Rand.

We had come down the South fork of the Skykomish, now we traveled up the North to Galena, making camp ten miles from Index on Silver Creek. The next day, Tuesday, we started to climb again and after traveling five miles reached an elevation of 3,200 feet at the Good Hope mine, where the night was spent. Wednesday morning, after visiting the mine, we climbed the zigzags to Silver Lake which was almost entirely frozen over, then on over Poodle Dog Pass, elevation 4.500 feet, and down to the town of Monte Cristo. Monte didn't appeal attractive to us, so we kept on down the track for half a mile finding a good camping place on the South fork of the Sauk, after having made but three and one-half miles.

Thursday, with no packs to bother us, we made a side trip into Glacier Basin, visiting the Boston American mines on the way. The weather had been perfect, but just as we were preparing to turn in a shower came up; fortunately it stopped before morning and caused no great discomfort. Our next day's journey was down the railroad to Barlow Pass and into the Stilaguamish valley. Low hanging clouds shut off all views of the peaks, hut with the hope of good weather we turned up Sunlist trail towards Headlee Pass and camped that night about two milts up the trail on the South fork of the Stilaguamish, thus making eleven miles for the day. Here we spent a very wet night and would advise future knapsackers to have more adequate rain protection Saturday, our last day, we walked eight and one-half miles to Silverton where we took the train, and thus ended our two weeks in the open.

We had come from Snoqualmie Pass on foot, carrying all our worldly goods over Snow Lake, Snoqualmie Lake, and Poodle Dog passes down to Monte traveling up and down the intervening river valleys, a distance of one hundred and nine miles, on first-class trails all the way. A great variety of scenery was enjoyed. In a single day climatic conditions ranged from torrid heat to frigid cold. The average pack carried by the women of the party was twenty two pounds. by the men thirty-five. We all used pack boards. A light dunnage bag for holding the pack was found very useful on trail and in camp. We carried but five days' rations at any one time, having four food caches, which made the packing easy. The average distance between camps was eight miles, the longest fourteen. Needless to say, the personal outfit was cut down as low as possible, no extras except underwear and socks; bug nets were found useful.

Our general outfit consisted of a small medicine kit and only the very necessary cooking utensils, a reflector, an axe, pot hooks, food bags and twine for tying crosspieces to uprights, which we found a great improvement over forked sticks. We can not praise the reflector too much; it cooked us many good batches of johnny cake and biscuits, in fact, so good that we never had any left from dinner baking for breakfast as our schedule called for. We would almost say that a party of four needs an eighteen instead of a sixteen inch reflector. The commissary amounted to about two pounds per day per person; for some parties this might he cut down. It is an advantage to have the commissary made up to suit the special tastes of the party, if a small one. A menu was made out giving the weight of each article of food to be used for each meal; this was followed carefully and found to be a most excellent scheme.

The reason for the choice of this route, aside from scenic beauty, was the ease with which food caches could be made. We believe this, together with a very well planned commissary and the fact that we did not attempt to do too much, accounts for our very successful trip and fine vacation.

The entire expense of the two weeks for each person was $16.35, divided as follows: Commissary, $10.38; packing, 75c; railroad fare, $4.25; telegrams and telephone, 52c; cooking outfit, 20c; hotel, 25c. The Snoqualmie, Skykomish, and Glacier Peak quadrangles were used. The members of this outing are proud to have paved the way for future knapsack trips and feel we have proved beyond a doubt that such a trip can he a real pleasure and not just hard work. We sincerely hope a summer knapsack trip of at least two weeks' duration may become an annual event of The Mountaineers.