You might remember we do the SCIENCE! thing. Our summer project was collecting samples of big leaf maple trees for Adventure Scientists. Henry and I collected samples on a couple of trips, but that was earlier in the summer. By the end of September most of the leaves were past their prime so we were pretty much done.

But then I got a call from Adventure Scientists. They needed some video of leaves being collected for a short film being made for the Geo For Good conference. Yeah. Sure. We've got some maples in the backyard so I'll get one of the kids to hold the camera while I... oh... professional video? Uh... Sure. I'll meet up with a guy from Google. Two guys? Flying across the country so they can record me doing SCIENCE!? Yeah. I'll do that.

Three days later I met the guys at the local Starbucks in the wee hours of the morning. It's good they were from east of here (New York and Austin) because it was really early for me. The filming started right away with me describing the day in the parking lot and then driving out toward the freeway. (And then coming back to make sure they knew where we were going.)

We arrived at the north end of Lake Cle Elum just as the sun rose. This was the area I was hoping to find some maples so I could make my cinematic debut as Adventure Scientist Extraordinaire. A mile or two up the Forest Service road we found a maple with green leaves on the hill above the road. Perfect for a sample, but a little far away for a worthwhile demonstration.

Although we were there for maple leaves, there was no way I would go into the mountains without also taking a hike. I'd been trying to convince my usual accomplices to stitch together a couple of different trails and tag a collection of peaks. I'd been generally unsuccessful because they know me too well. But these two guys from Google? Suckers!

We drove up one of the sportiest roads I've been on in a long time with a minimum of scraping ("It's a rental!") and parked their car there. The four of us transferred to my car and drove to a trailhead about nine miles away. The plan was to hike between the two.

But first... video. Suddenly, I understood how the kids feel every time I pull out the camera.

Oh! This is great! Wait just a minute. Now walk toward me. Whoops. No. Go back. Do it again. Can you stand there and look that way. No. The other way.

Sorry, kids.

We followed the French Cabin Creek Trail up to the source of the West Fork of French Cabin Creek. The trail winds through the woods past blueberry bushes with a few rocky overlooks. With the light of the early morning flooding the forest it was beautiful.

At the junction with the Kachess Ridge Trail we turned south. Treen was in her element. She loped easily ahead, turning back to look at us periodically. We left the trees behind and made our way through meadows surrounded by rock towers. The berries were past, but Treen checked every one of the fire-red bushes as we passed by. Although I was supposed to be the star of the video, the guys seemed far more interested in Treen. Not surprisingly, I also took more pictures of her than the rest of us combined.

We certainly could have stayed on the Kachess Ridge Trail and followed it south along Silver Creek, but that would have wound us up at the cursed trailhead and that wouldn't do. Instead, we took the Silver Creek Tie trail to the east. There were far fewer curses that way. Plus, we'd actually wind up at the rental car.

The trail climbed steeply and soon we were above the trees with views of Mount Rainier to the south. The guys, David and Andrew, not exactly inured to the allure of the Mountain, gaped at the partial view. Impress the out-of-towners: Check.

A little more climbing and we were on the shoulder of West Peak. It was only a quarter mile away and 300 feet higher, but it was not a simple walk up as I had thought. Instead, it would be a scramble. And not an easy scramble. It would be an airy, dog-unfriendly scramble so... nah. There were two more peaks on our route so we dropped down a steep, duffy trail on the way to South Peak. ("West Peak." "South Peak." "North Peak." Somebody was clearly out of names.)

To say this descent was "steep" is a little bit misleading. It was nearly vertical. Treen, of course, sprinted down and back up and then down again while the rest of us slipped down through the duff and mud. And at the bottom? Back up to regain the ridge between West Peak and South Peak. On the map it looks like you can walk right along the edge of the cliff, but that's not where the trail goes and trails are one of those "durable surfaces" you're supposed to stick to if you want to leave no trace. Darn trails.

Just before we reached South Peak we ran into the Domerie Peak Trail. It was right about here we realized we had made a wee tactical error. Remember how we had parked one car at the first trailhead and then driven to the second trailhead? Imagine if we had left the keys for the car we were soon to arrive at in the car we had left a few hours earlier. Not so good. Thankfully, I had cell service and a friend only 30 minutes away in Cle Elum. KC saved our butts big time.

But we weren't off the trail yet! We still had to pass below North Peak and brave the trail torn up by motorcycles. To be fair, they were the ones that had rehabilitated the Domerie Peak trail so I suppose they are justified in tearing it up. Still, I'm grateful we hadn't started from this side. I don't think we would have continued up to North Peak let alone made it to the other trailhead given the angle of the slope and the lousy tread.

So how many maples did we see on the hike? A bunch! Were any of them actually big leaf maples eligible for collection? No. But... there were a bunch down at the head of Lake Cle Elum so we stopped there for a final bit of collection and filming.

This would turn out to be Treen's last "big" hike. She showed no symptoms of the cancer raging inside her and enjoyed herself as she always did in the mountains. Somewhere deep in the bowels of Google's video production pipeline there's a boatload of video of me and Treen. I can hardly wait to see what becomes of it so I can again see Treen's tail wagging as she leads the way up the trail. And don't worry. When that video is released you know you'll find it here.