Alta Crystal Resort | Blog

Springtime Waterfall Hikes

2010-05-06T17:37:14+00:00

Waterfall lovers everywhere—rejoice! Spring is your time of year!

Sure, there’s still snow a little higher than we are (and great snowshoeing) but this is the time of year when we pull out our hiking boots and start exploring trails we haven’t walked since the fall.

The waterfalls, in particular, are pretty wonderful right now! Right behind Alta Crystal Resort (a whopping 10-minute walk), you can check out Deep Creek Falls, a gorgeous 15-foot waterfall. Along the way, you’ll probably take picture after picture of Deep Creek (there’s one picture of it at the top of this page) since it literally looks like someone must have planned it to be so beautiful.

You can also hike 3 miles roundtrip to Goat Falls. This hike is listed in The Mountaineers’ Book, “Best Hikes With Kids” and it deserves its kudos! We have a detailed description (with lots of pictures) in another… Continue Reading

An Epic Ski Day At Crystal Mountain

2010-04-08T05:09:00+00:00

We had our most incredible day EVER yesterday at Crystal Mountain.

And since this is our 13th season up here, that’s saying a lot.

Crystal has gotten 6 FEET of snow since these storms started on March 29, and we were skiing in thigh-deep powder all day yesterday. You know those great ski photos where the skier’s face is buried in snow? That was us. And the skiing just got better and better the more exploring we did.

We started out in Green Valley and had some incredible runs through the trees to the left of the groomed section, and down the left side of Grubstake. We were having so much fun that we decided to try Left Angle, but on our way there, we saw that the gates to Northway had been opened. Hallelujah!!! We got first tracks down Paradise Bowl—incredible!!! It was so fabulous we took more… Continue Reading

Easter Sunrise Service 2009

2010-03-09T03:19:36+00:00

You owe it to yourself to come up to Alta Crystal Resort for Easter at least once in your life. Everyone who has stayed with us during Easter talks about it—and how their families still tell stories about the incredible weekend they had. We really hope you can join us this year, although these photos are from previous Easters. (After all, Easter this year doesn’t happen until April 4.)

On Friday night, we kick off the weekend with a cupcake decorating and crafts party. Lots of Easter cupcakes, lots of decorations and all sorts of springtime crafts. We even show the classic, “It’s The Easter Beagle, Charlie Brown”.

On Saturday afternoon, after skiing, we host our annual Easter egg hunt with prizes for everyone. Some years we’ve had snow and some years we haven’t, but it’s always been fun! After dinner, we’ll have our 13th annual Easter bonfire, complete with… Continue Reading

A wonderful week skiing at Crystal Mountain

2010-02-12T17:23:20+00:00

The skiing just keeps getting better and better.

We managed to get out skiing 2 days this week, and 2 days last week—and had some of our best days ever at Crystal Mountain. We know it’s been a mild winter down in town, but Crystal is high enough that the snow just keeps on coming—and it’s marvelous.

The groomers have been great all winter (the grooming crew has been doing an incredible job this season)—but we’ve spent a lot of time off-piste for the past 4 weeks. The snow is soft, the temperatures have been cold, and it seems Crystal has been picking up about a foot of new snow every week.

Last week, we started out on the groomers (Downhill, Upper Ferks, Middle Ferks, Magoo, Rolling Knolls, West Face, Green Valley) for our warm-up and then headed up High Campbell for a few runs down Powder Bowl and over… Continue Reading

Snowshoe Tour At Crystal Mountain

2010-01-28T21:56:35+00:00

We’ve been absent from our blog for a while (having too much fun doing outside things, you know!). But we finally went on Crystal Mountain’s Alpine Wilderness Snowshoe tour a couple of weeks ago, and we wanted to let you know just how wonderful it was!

We first did this tour almost 2 years ago when Crystal was testing the idea with employees and locals. We meant to sign up all last winter, but kept forgetting until it was too late. Our friend, Tena, convinced us to actually schedule it in advance this time (!) and so 4 of us went on January 16.

The first easy step was an easy snowshoe up to the Quicksilver lift for the start of our adventure. After a 15-minute lift ride, we all gathered for our adventure into the South Backcountry. In all, there were 26 of us intrepid adventurers, plus 3 Crystal… Continue Reading

White River Trail from Alta Crystal Resort

2009-10-13T23:23:33+00:00

This is a great year-round trail for hiking, biking, horseback riding, trail running—and, in the winter, we snowshoe here too!

We decided to take the dogs on a quick walk last Sunday afternoon. It was a gorgeous Fall day with clear blue skies and cool temperatures—plus the Fall colors are nearing their peak and we wanted to take some pictures.

The intersection with the White River Trail is just about a 5-minute walk from Alta Crystal Resort. All you have to do is cross the foot bridge over Deep Creek and follow the trail where it says “Horse Traffic”. The trail meanders along the ridge line, and trail runners like it because it’s mostly flat and you can go forever! Part of the trail parallels Highway 410 so you’ll occasionally see cars, but it usually feels incredibly peaceful with mainly trees for company.

The first thing of note… Continue Reading

Dege Peak Hike in Mt. Rainier National Park

2009-09-28T05:27:42+00:00

This is an incredible hike—and we managed to go on the perfect fall day. We must be doing something right!

We have a group of German exchange students who stay with us every other year. They are from Gustrov, near the Baltic Sea, and their sister school is in Yakima. We absolutely love having them stay with us, and have gotten to be friends with their leader and chaperone.

We’ve gone hiking with them many other times, but this was the first time they’ve come early enough in the year for us to go hiking at Sunrise—and it was incredible.

We started off our “tour” with a stop at the Mt. Rainier’s White River Campground so we could take them down to the White River and the site of the 2006 November flood that re-routed the river and destroyed the Glacier Basin trail. We got to walk across the… Continue Reading

Naches Peak Loop Trail in Mt. Rainier National Park

2009-09-27T23:29:04+00:00

August 19, 2009.
We’ve always loved this trail, so even though it was late in the afternoon, we decided to go for it. It was our 15th wedding anniversary, and we thought it was only fitting that we do one of our favorite trails. And, as it turned out, it was a wonderful time to day to go!

We like to start the trail on the Wenatchee National Forest side and hike it clockwise to that we get wonderful views of Mt. Rainier for its last half. To get to this starting point, just follow Highway 410 East until you go under the overpass that says Wenatchee National Forest. There’s a parking area just about 50 yards further on the right. Park there, and then walk back to the start of the trail. (If you’re facing the overpass, the trail starts off to the left.)

We had heard from… Continue Reading

Brunch at Crystal Mountain’s Summit House

2009-08-03T16:51:52+00:00

Some friends were visiting from Hawaii with some other friends of theirs, so we all decided it would be fun to go up to Crystal Mountain for Sunday brunch at the Summit House Bistro. What a fabulous idea it turned out to be!

Their daughter, Isabella, had never been on a chairlift before, so that was a huge part of the attraction for her. And most of them had never seen the view of Mt. Rainier from Crystal Mountain’s summit—which is one of the best views of Mt. Rainier anywhere! And to top it all off, we were all really hungry!

When you get to Crystal, there’s a window open at the Glacier Express Snack Bar, for those who want to buy lift tickets only—or who just need a snack while they visit Crystal. We had reservations, so we were able to just hop on the Chinook Express chair… Continue Reading

SHEEP LAKE

2009-07-15T20:23:32+00:00

A great hike from Chinook Pass, with early season wildflowers.

It was just a few weeks ago that this trail was covered in snow, but it’s now melted out and the wildflowers are gorgeous!

The trail itself starts from Chinook Pass in Mt. Rainier National Park. Actually, you’ll follow Highway 410 under the overpass that signifies you’re leaving the Park,. and then park in the lot on the left side of the road. At the far end of the parking lot (past the toilets), there’s a small sign that says PCNST (for Pacific Crest National Scenic Trail) which marks the start of the trail. In the middle of the parking lot, there’s also a really nice map and interpretive sign that explains the area.

The Sheep Lake trail parallels the highway for the first 1/2 mile or so. The slopes are very exposed, so the early season wildflowers are… Continue Reading

GOAT FALLS

2009-07-13T05:40:14+00:00

A kid-friendly, adult-friendly and dog-friendly hike near Crystal Mountain and Mt. Rainier.

Saturday, July 11th, was a hot day—even in the mountains—so we decided it would be fun to take a hike next to water. The Goat Falls hike has always been one of our favorites, but it’s been largely impassable this spring due to all the trees that fell over the winter. But we had heard from several cabin owners that the trail was clear so we decided to check it out for ourselves, and to take our two dogs. They thought this was a wonderful idea, as you’ll see from these photos.

Goat Falls is an easy 3-mile roundtrip hike from Alta Crystal Resort. It’s listed in The Mountaineers’ “Best Hikes With Kids” and it deserves its listing. This wonderful forest hike meanders past old forest service cabins to a 20-foot year-round waterfall with some great wading spots… Continue Reading

Shadow Lake & Burroughs Mountain

2009-06-29T19:39:14+00:00

A wonderful hike in Mt. Rainier National Park.

Sunrise is now open! The road to the very top opened on Friday, June 26 and the hiking is just marvelous.

We drove up there first thing on Friday so we could scope it out for our guests, and then went hiking with our friends Tena, Yvonne and Eric yesterday. It was a beautiful, clear, warm, sunny day and the hiking could not have been more perfect.

The views of Mt. Rainier from the parking lot are just amazing, so even if you don’t have much time for hiking, it’s still worth the drive. We started off on the Emmons Vista trail—perfect views and we ran into some of our guests with a 2 and 6 year old, so the trail is really easy. Great photo ops!

We then took the trail up to Shadow Lake. There’s still a little bit of… Continue Reading

GREENWATER LAKES HIKE

2009-06-10T15:14:19+00:00

This has always been one of our favorite hikes, and it’s now hikable again! A lot of trees fell last winter, but volunteers have cleared the trail and it’s good to go.

The trailhead is an easy 20-minute drive from here up a paved (!) Forest Service road (FS 70). The hike is great for all ages and we’ve had guests as young as 3 go on it. The first lake is just 1 1/2 miles each way, and the upper lake is a 1/2 mile further each way.

The first part of the trail goes through the forest and is nice and flat. You’ll then start to wind back and forth across the Greenwater River and cross a series of log bridges. Make sure to look at the huge cliffs across the way! You’re rewarded with two beautiful lakes surrounded by peaks. We especially love to take a… Continue Reading