Spray Park '00,  Mt Rainier National Park,  October 2, 2000     page 3 / 6

The day we hiked was forecast for partial sunshine. We saw the sun a bit in the morning, but not much in the afternoon. Fall was definitely in the air. We estimated that the temperature was hovering in the forties, perhaps cooler at the 6300 foot level we reached. Ice was on the trail in spots where the moisture had "grown" into short columns resembling crystals. Libby and I commented on the great number of these we had seen one morning while camping at Chambers Lakes in the Three Sisters area several years ago with Dad. Quite a bit of ice existed on the most exposed trees as seen in the following image.