The last weekend of July, hubby and I set out to accomplish a “bucket list” item: seeing the alpine wildflowers up at Paradise, at Mt. Rainier.
Having left home long before the crack of dawn, we pulled into the Paradise overflow parking lot at 7:45am. The main visitor center parking lot was already packed, and the overflow lot was filling up fast!
Everyone spilling out of their cars headed hurriedly for the visitor center … braced with steely resolve and determination! It was intense. A feeling of urgency hung in the air. “And why??” was my thought.
It’s only 7:45am … the sun’s just come up … we all got a parking spot. Why on earth is everyone in such a doggone rush??
Everywhere hubby and I looked, trim, athletic people were decked out in fashionable hiking apparel and hiking boots. I started to feel awkward and out of place in my normal everyday shorts and t-shirt, wearing my normal everyday tennis shoes.
It seemed everyone was armed with hiking poles! And everyone had fancy hiking backpacks. Hubby and I, on the other hand, had only brought a bottle of water each. Afterall, it’s just a wildflower hike. It’s not going to be that difficult … right?? (Haha!!)
Hubby and I had not taken a look at any hiking apps or any trail-related info. Afterall, there’s the paper handout map in the brochure rack at the visitor center. We’re good.
So, armed with our paper handout map from the brochure rack, and our bottle of water each, hubby and I set out to discover the wildflowers!
Forget about going up that center main trail where everyone else is heading. Too much drama! Let’s take this quiet side trail where nobody is … the sign says it goes to Myrtle Falls … and I’ve seen photos of Myrtle Falls on the internet! We definitely want to go there!
So off hubby and I headed down our own personal trail to Myrtle Falls. It was delightfully level, and completely undisturbed by humanity’s stress.
After “Oooo’ing” and “Ahhhh’ing” over the falls, we headed on down the trail to discover where it would lead. The air was crisp and the sun was bright. We could see wildflowers stretching far away into the distance up ahead of us. It was so exciting!
We came to a fork in the trail. Which way should we go?? Well, the wildflowers seem to be up that way, so let’s go that way. So off we went … up the trail labeled: “Panorama Point via the Skyline and Golden Gate Trail.”
From that point on our progress was slow, as I kept stopping to take “just one more photo.” The wildflowers were amazing … they were all so different, and each so unique! I marveled in awe at the Creator’s grandeur and beauty on display!
The trail kept climbing high and higher … but hubby and I didn’t really notice the elevation gain because the hike didn’t feel like it was requiring that much effort … since I kept pausing so often to take “just one more photo.”
As you look at the background photo for today, and as you look at this wildflower photo, it is clearly obvious the elevation gain was really steep!
So why didn’t it feel that steep? Why didn’t it feel like a hard exhausting climb?? Because the flowers along the way made the hike so much fun! The journey was such a joy, that the difficulty was diminished.
The higher we climbed, the wildflowers became more sparse, until we found ourselves hiking across snowfields and bare rocky escarpments. Hubby and I suddenly became aware that we only had one water bottle each … and that our backpack full of extra water, and our lunch, was far below in the car.
We had climbed so high that it didn’t make sense to go back now. So, we pressed on … and made it to Panorama Point … where we joined up with the mass of humanity which had hiked up the main route.
As we sat and rested at Panorama Point, we took a look at the paper handout map from the brochure rack at the visitor center … which I had been using as a bug swatter the whole climb up. Much to our shock, the paper handout map listed the trail we had just hiked as being a “Strenuous Trail.” Are you kidding?!? Hubby and I never hike “strenuous” trails. We don’t have the strength for that.
We further read that the trail was 4 miles round-trip with an elevation gain of 1700’. We both laughed out loud! No way!! Did we really just do that?!?
Hubby and I have never done a hike that difficult before. We were amazed at ourselves! If we had actually paid attention to the paper handout map before we started the hike, we probably would not have even attempted the Panorama Point trail in the first place. We would have seen the title “Strenuous Trail” and immediately doubted our ability to do such a hike. But because we didn’t know how difficult the trail was, or what it was labeled, we accomplished the hike!
As we sat there at the Panorama Point lookout with all the trim, athletic people (in their fancy hiking apparel, hiking boots, and hiking poles) I was overwhelmed with immense gratitude that I had the privilege of sitting here and enjoying this view too … a view which everyone else always gets to enjoy … but something I never dreamed I would get to do.
The hike back down the main trail was clogged and congested with throngs of stressed-out humanity, and not nearly as enjoyable. For starters, it was super steep! And there were very few wildflowers. Additionally, it involved a lot of climbing up (or in our case down) long stretches of snowfields. (No wonder everyone had brought hiking poles!)
In life, God has a path He is leading us on. He has a destination He is taking us to. And He doesn’t tell us where He is taking us. We must trust Him and follow by faith.
If God were to tell us beforehand where He is leading us, and what the trail will be like, we would for sure doubt our ability and automatically assume that we couldn’t do it. We would probably not even try.
But God doesn’t tell us. He simply says: “Follow me.” And we follow.
The path gets steep and starts to climb … but God has planted flowers of friendship all along the path. We are so enjoying the friendships and relationships along the journey that we don’t even realize the elevation gain we have just climbed!
Friends are like flowers along the path! Friendships and relationships make our journey of life so much fun and so enjoyable that we wind up being able to accomplish great things which we never thought we could!
Thank you, God, for giving us “flowers along the path”!
