Hike number two of the summer: Tom Dick and Harry Mountain via Mirror Lake, a nine-ish mile out-and-back in Mount Hood National Forest. This hike immediately joined Angel’s Rest and Riprap as one of my all-time favorites: so much green, so many wildflowers, and an awe-inducing 360-degree view of five (!) different mountains from the false summit. Because I began so early, I had the summit and my first pass of the false summit completely to myself. A dream.
At the false summit. Mount Jefferson is visible in the background. Out of frame to my left-ish are Mounts Adams, Rainer, and St. Helens. Mount Hood is directly in front of me.
The time of year (early July) and weather (almost completely clear skies, 70-sh degrees at the start, 80-ish degrees by the end) for sure played a big role in how enjoyable this hike was. I’m so grateful I had the flexibility to change my originally planned date to one with a better forecast.
For whatever reason, despite reading the trail’s name and details a billion times on AllTrails and various local hiking blogs, until I came upon the junction to continue to the summit or loop around Mirror Lake, I didn’t realize the lake was an optional part of this hike. I decided to take the loop around the lake and holy fuck I’m so glad I did (I went clockwise).
The lake isn’t visible from the junction, or for the first couple of minutes of walking. And then, there it is.
It literally stopped me in my tracks. “Oh, wow,” I gasped when I spotted it. One of the most beautiful things I’ve ever seen. I feel so fortunate to live so close to such beautiful natural spaces, and to have the ability to explore them.
Unfortunately for me, Mirror Lake is also where the mosquitoes began. From this point on, the trail was full of them. As someone who is eaten alive by mosquitoes whenever they’re around, I have, historically, always doused myself in bug spray before beginning a hike and carried bug spray in my pack, dousing myself again several times along the way. Since moving to Oregon a few years ago, I’ve very rarely encountered mosquitoes in general and never on the trail. Because of this, and because I didn’t see any comments on AllTrails about mosquitoes on this trail, I removed my bug spray from my pack the night before this hike. What a mistake! From the lake on, I spent most of the hike swatting at mosquitoes and was covered in bites by the end. I itched so badly that it woke and kept me up at night for the better part of a week. Disaster.
This is a hike you do for the views, especially those of Mount Hood, which is right there. Personally, I think the views of Hood are equally as dramatic from the false summit and the actual summit.
View of Hood at the false summit:
View of Hood at the actual summit, about half a mile further up trail:
Famously, the summit also features a view of some communications (?) equipment, which deters from the experience for some. Personally, I wasn’t bothered by it; it’s off to the “side” and doesn’t take up much space or obstruct the view of the mountain. The communications equipment at the summit of Mount Defiance, which I hiked several weeks after this trail, is a different story.
The actual summit is roughly 0.6 miles past the false summit. You’ll have to hike and scramble over some rocky and sometimes steep-ish terrain to get there. The video below shows the first stretch of trail from the “back” side of the false summit to the actual summit.
The best overall view—the 360-degree view—is at the false summit. If you reach the false summit and don’t want to (or can’t) continue on for whatever reason—weather, blisters, joints, time, terrain, etc.—you won’t miss much. The video below is the view from the false summit. It’s hard to see in the video but all five mountains—Mounts Adams, Rainer, St. Helens, Jefferson, and Hood—were visible to the naked eye this day.
I learned too late that this hike can be turned into a loop by continuing past the summit and down to the parking lot via Sunrise Trail. I would have loved to do the loop! Even though I had service and could have texted a change in plans to the people who I share my hike details with, I chose to stick to my original plan. I can always do the loop next season.
Overall, this was a great hike on a perfect day. Aside from a brief freak-out about a completely made-up scenario while scrambling my way from the false summit to the actual summit, my mentally ill brain behaved, thank god. I’m so happy to be back out on the trail.
Four weeks ago, I went for a hike. It was my first in nearly three years, after a few very bad episodes of mental illness on several different trails during the 2022 season rattled me so badly that I stopped hiking—a thing I love to do—altogether.
I hiked Angel’s Rest. I chose this trail because I’m familiar with it, it’s not strenuous or long, there’s no exposure, it’s close to home, and I know I have service the entire way (having service was important to me for this first hike back; in case mental illness things started happening, I could easily text/call someone).
I went early on a weekday, pulling into the parking lot just as the sun began to rise. This is the ideal arrival time for me. I’m an early morning person and I prefer to hike alone alone—to go by myself and to be by myself.
Shortly after I arrived, my brain began to bully me and after several minutes I actually drove away. I U-turned right before hitting the interstate on-ramp, headed back to the trailhead parking lot, re-parked my car, and spent the next 45 minutes negotiating with my brain. Once I got my shit together, I texted details about my hike to a friend, double-checked that I was sharing my location with her, and then I started.
This was my third time hiking this trail and my second-favorite experience of it. The first time I hiked it, in late May 2022, it was frigid and barren. I hiked it again two months later, in late July 2022, and it was gorgeous. Breathtaking, even. Everything was in full bloom and it was much more colorful and lush. This time around, it was in between—plenty of greenery, not much other color and not many blooms yet, hence the lack of photos.
Shortly before the false summit, there’s a large boulder the size of a small boulder on the edge of a bend in the trail. It’s my favorite part of the hike. Each time I’ve hiked this trail, I’ve gotten photos of me atop it. I love repetition in memorykeeping; it’s fun to have multiple iterations of the (essentially) same composition and subject.
I’m glad I chose this trail for my first return-from-mental-illness hike. Aside from the first few minutes in the parking lot, my brain behaved and I had a really good time. All of the reasons I picked it—I’m familiar with it, it’s not strenuous or long, there’s no exposure, it’s close to home, and I know I have service the entire way—are what made it a success.
Having a good experience gave me the confidence to try another hike the following week and now, four weeks later, I’ve hiked four more trails—one a week for the last four weeks—and have survived each both physically and mentally unscathed: I haven’t been serial-killed or attacked by wildlife or—and this is the real accomplishment—yeeted myself off a cliff.
I plan to continue hiking once a week for the next three weeks. After that, my high-schooler will be back in school and the rhythm of our days will change. I don’t yet know how hiking will fit into them. I’d like to keep hiking through mid-October. If these two summer months end up being it for my 2025 season, that’s okay. I logged many more miles on the trail this summer than I expected to and I’m so grateful that I did. I’ve missed hiking so badly and I’m beyond happy to be back. I feel more like myself when I’m out there.
Post-hike, I picked up a mini pizza from a pizza place that I loved as a kid (and still love as an adult) and set up shop with it and a library book under the tree out front, where I spent the entire rest of my afternoon and evening. A dream. I love being outside (during nice weather).
After I got home and before I set up outside, I filled in the entry for this hike in my Letterfolk Hike Passport, while the details I wanted to include were still fresh. In keeping with the format I’ve followed for this project so far, I’ll eventually have a photo from the hike professionally printed and staple it to that dot-grid page (the Instax photos will be clipped to inside of the back cover).
The yellow flower-shaped clip is from a pack of Midori P-51 clips, which I’m almost certain I bought at Cargo but may have picked up at Oblation (two local stores I love). You can find these clips in various shapes in a number of online stationery shops.
Hike details
Trail:Angel’s Rest Land:Columbia River Gorge National Scenic Area (Oregon side) Land management:Columbia River Gorge Commission, Friends of the Columbia River Gorge, U.S. Forest Service Distance: 4.5-ish miles Type: Out-and-back; can be looped with Devil’s Rest or Multnomah Falls, Wahkeena Falls, and Larch Mountain Trail Elevation gain: about 1,500 feet Exposure: None-ish (I guess technically there’s a bit at the summit, but it isn’t “forced”—you don’t have to go near it) Sun/shade: Mostly shaded; no shade at the false summit or actual summit and some stretches of trail without shade Water source: Pretty early into the hike there’s one water source; not everyone will find it accessible. If you do bottle water from it, make sure you have purification tablets or a water filter Trail traffic: This is a very popular hike and the trail can get very crowded, especially after mid-morning and on the weekends Weather forecast: Bridal Veil, OR, 97010 Directions from Portland: exit 28 (Bridal Veil) off I-84 East Parking: Paved lot with about 20 spots; no pass, permit, or payment required Bathrooms: None at the trailhead, plenty of places off-trail to pop a squat Cell service: I had full service the entire time (Verizon) Other notes: I think this is a pretty easy trail and very dog- and kid-friendly (if you bring your dog, LEASH THEM!!!). There are some rocky stretches that require you to pay a little extra attention. Since buying them in mid-2022, I always hike in my hiking boots, and I generally recommend hiking in hiking shoes or boots. Unless you’re worried about your ankles and think (or know) the stability from high-tops would be helpful, especially on the rocky portions of trail, you can probably do this one in regular tennis shoes. If you’re worried about your ankles (or knees, for that matter), you might also find trekking poles helpful.
Several years after buying them and then promptly and steadfastly refusing to write in them lest I mess up and ruin them, I’m officially caught up with my Letterfolk Hike Passports. The bad news is, I did indeed mess up the first four entries/spreads in one booklet. The good news is, it didn’t actually ruin anything. I just paper-clipped those pages together and moved on.
The other bad news is, Letterfolk seems to have discontinued their entire Passport product line, which is a major bummer. Memorykeeping can be overwhelming. Because these little booklets were formulaic, simple, and affordable, they were a very accessible way to begin or restart a memorykeeping practice. I’m sad to see them go. (At the time of posting this, there are still a few varieties in stock, for 40% off.) (Maybe the product line is undergoing a redesign and relaunch, not being discontinued???)
Why share how I use this thing when it’s no longer available? I think it’s inspiring to see different approaches to memorykeeping, even when the exact materials are sold out or discontinued. Also, this approach to memorykeeping can be replicated or adapted using a Moleskine Cahier Pocket Journal or Field Notes notebook. Having a look inside my Hike Passports might help you figure out how you want to approach your own DIY version.
I’ve never used a Field Notes notebook, so I can’t attest to their quality. I have used Moleskine Cahiers and I mostly like them. My one complaint is the paper is pretty thin so you need to be careful with what writing utensil you use. Both the Moleskine Cahier Pocket Journals and the Field Notes notebooks measure the same as the Letterfolk Passports (3.5″ x 5.5″); have multiple cover options; offer plain, ruled, graph, and dot-grid paper options; and are priced at $12.95 for a set of three.
Each Hike Passport has room to document 20 hikes. There are also some extra pages in back to put a gear wish list, hike bucket list, and some other stuff.
Each of the 20 documenting spreads has a templated page on the left and a dot-grid page on the right. The templated page on the left has space to document details like the date, trail, location, distance, who you hiked with, the gear you brought, the weather you encountered, types of terrain, snacks you ate, how busy the trail was, how difficult the trail was, how long it took you to complete, etc. On the right, a dot-grid page for you to put whatever you want; I chose to include a photo from each hike. Other, more fun options of things to put here: a park or parking pass, a piece of trail map, a wrapper from a snack or the tag from one piece of gear or another that you bought for the hike, or a leaf or flower from the trail (if that’s legal where you are).
If you DIY your own version of a Letterfolk Passport, you could create a template for whatever theme you choose to document (hikes, date nights, wine tasting, movies, recipes, etc.), print out however many copies you need to fill your notebook, and adhere each template to whichever side of the page you want. Or you could just write whatever you want to remember about each entry on whichever side of the page you want. On the facing page, you could include a photo, sketch a scene from your adventure, journal about whatever you did, or preserve a piece or small collection of ephemera (a movie ticket stub, a coaster, a piece of a menu, a receipt, a photo booth photo strip, etc.).
Here’s a look at a few of my completed (“completed”) pages. I don’t fill out every field for every entry, just the details that I kept track of (or, when working backward, the ones that I remember) and that feel relevant to me for that particular hike. I also don’t worry about including every detail—I save the more thorough write-ups for a private journal. These booklets are just a fun way to quickly get some of the details down. I’ve included a variety of pages below, so you can see the variance in details between entires and how informally I organize my thoughts on the page. It doesn’t have to be perfect!
Unknown trail somewhere in Shenandoah; hiked May 24, 2015. An early birthday hike with my then-partner and two of my kids. And what an adventure (derogatory) it was: I lost my phone when we drove away from the Visitor Center with it on the roof of the car. We had to drive all the way back home (about two and a half hours) to drop the kids with their dad, pull up Find My Phone on my Mac at home (my then-partner had an Android so we couldn’t pull up the app on their phone), print out a map of where it was pinging to, drive all the way back out to Shenandoah (another two-and-a-half hour drive), and carefully traverse the very narrow shoulder of a very winding, highly trafficked road until I found it in the grass, completely unscathed. An actual miracle. Then we drove the final two and a half hours back home.
Upper Whiteoak Falls; hiked July 12, 2015. An anniversary hike. This trail is a gorgeous out-and-back with multiple spots to climb out onto huge rocks in the water (we lunched on some), and an amazing waterfall you can swim beneath at the top/turnaround point. Not at all difficult, very kid- and (leashed) dog-friendly. (The weekend after we did this trail we went back out with the kids, two of whom were under five years old at the time, and they had no trouble with it.)
Old Rag; hiked June 16, 2019. My first “real” hike, my first solo hike, and my first time encountering scramble.
Cedar Run to White Oak Fire Road Loop; attempted January 30, 2020 (did not finish (DNF)). This was…a hike. The blazes on this trail were very poorly marked and with so many leaves on the ground it was difficult to tell if you were even on a trail. I turned back much sooner than planned because it started to snow (not forecasted!) and I was out there alone. Until I wasn’t. Shortly after I turned back, an unleashed, angry dog was running straight for me, its owner nowhere in sight. The dog was extremely aggressive and lunged at me several times, barking and growling and baring its teeth. I ended up having to throw my backpack, sticks, and branches from the ground at it to get it to back the fuck up off me. Its owner eventually caught up and spent what felt like an eternity trying to get hold of the dog’s collar and control it so I could safely keep walking away. LEASH YOUR FUCKING DOGS, PEOPLE!!!
Wahkeena Falls Loop/Multnomah Falls; hiked April 24, 2022. An impromptu hike. I went to see the falls, saw the sign for the loop, and said “fuck it” and set out.
El Paso Tin Mines Trail; hiked May 7, 2022. A hike with my oldest, to celebrate her 17th birthday. It was extremely hot this day, just like every other day in El Paso. We should’ve brought more water (there’s no water sources along the way). Climbing down into and then wandering through the mines was so fucking cool.
Dog Mountain; hiked May 20, 2022. This is a very popular (crowded) trail. If you, like me, are not a social or leisurely hiker, you will find yourself bottlenecked and annoyed many times along the way, even if you go early as fuck on a weekday. Physically, it’s great. It’s the hike equivalent of any workout on the assault or Echo bike—all lungs and legs. The ascent is immediate and unrelenting (making the way back down more of a trail run than a hike), and the views are gorgeous.
Elk Mountain/King’s Mountain Loop; attempted May 28, 2022 (DNF). This hike almost killed me. Literally. It’s the only hard-rated trail I’ve hiked that’s actually hard, and it’s the reason I haven’t been back out on the trail since the end of the 2022 season; I managed only four hikes after this one, two of which I didn’t finish. This trail/experience really fucked me up, mentally.
Angel’s Rest; hiked July 31, 2022. My second time on this trail, this time with two of my kids. Pretty short and easy, and by far the prettiest and lushest trail I’ve hiked. If you find yourself in or near Portland in July or August and looking for a hike, I highly recommend this one.
Hart’s Cove via Upper and Lower Cascade Head; hiked October 1, 2022. My last hike of the 2022 season, and the last time I hiked. I’d tried this same trail a few weeks earlier and had to turn back after about four miles because of enveloping wildfire smoke and a mentally ill brain that kept telling me to jump off the oceanside cliff. I’m glad I went back. I’m glad I got the full hike in before they closed the trail, and even though it was a mentally exhausting experience thanks to my OCD and derealization kicking in again on the most precarious portions of trail. I truly have not been the same out there since Elk’s Mountain/King’s Mountain.
I worked on this project in real time for all of my 2022 hikes so they have the most accurate and complete entries. For all of my pre-2022 hikes, I worked backward, completing each hike’s entry in December 2024. Because of this, some of these hikes don’t have as many details (some of them don’t even have a trail name listed), are missing a stamped date beneath the photo (my date stamp goes back to only 2020; I wrote the dates of my pre 2020-hikes in the space provided at the top on the left-side page), and the numbering of each hike in the top left is fucked up (I started both booklets with “1,” oops). Oh well.
I used the free/basic version of the AllTrails app to measure distance and elevation for most of my hikes beginning in 2020. Stats for hikes prior to 2020—if I listed them at all—are estimates pulled from the hike’s AllTrails page. I included all hikes, even ones I didn’t finish, regardless of the reason. Every hike received its own entry, which means the trails I’ve hiked more than once have more than one entry.
I decorated my current Hike Passport—the one that includes all my 2022 hikes and still has room for a few more—with some stickers. On the inside cover, Owen Wilson saying “WOW,” because of how often I find myself stopping to take in the views around me and, à la Owen Wilson, saying, “WOW” over and over and over. I found this sticker on Etsy. Sadly, it’s no longer available.
On the back, a “THE HIKER” sticker modeled after a tarot card, that I found at Powell’s. That red paperclip is holding additional photos for, and index cards with notes about, some of the hikes.
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Supplies
Letterfolk Hike Passport: This entire product has seemingly been discontinued, sorry! A few other Passports in the collection are still available (and at 40% off!) at the time of posting.
Photos: For my regular Project Life album I print my photos at home (I use a 10-year-old Epson PM-400 that I love and recommend). For projects like this one where the photos are exposed and handled directly, I print my photos through Persnickety Prints. Their website is a little janky. Their quality and service is unmatched. They’ve been my go-to photo printing service for a decade. Unless you truly need your photos immediately, there’s no need to pay for expedited shipping. Standard shipping (their default option) is incredibly fast and, with the exception of literally one time in 10 years that the post office lost the shipment, it’s never taken anywhere near 7-10 days to arrive, not even when I lived on the other side of the country.
Stapler: Ellepi Klivia 97, $25-ish (it comes with a little sleeve of 1,000 staples). If your local paper goods shop or craft store doesn’t carry Ellepi, try Little Otsu or Porchlight, two of my favorite Portland businesses. (Fun fact: Ellepi is a four-person Italian team and they make all of their products by hand.)
For the first time in years and years—and just in time to discover the memorykeeping industry as I previously knew it has all but disappeared—I’ve got a whole bunch of memorykeeping projects in the works. Perf! Here are four that I’m hyperfocused on right now.
Hike Passport
This Hike Passport is from Letterfolk. It is, of course, no longer listed on their website. They do still have the kids version and a handful of other Passports listed, though.
Each pocket-sized booklet has room for 20 entires. The left side of each spread is a little “form” that you fill out with information about the hike—trail name, distance, the day’s weather, any wildlife you saw, who you went with, etc. The right side of each page is blank (well, it’s printed with a dot grid) for you to do with it what you will: make a sketch, journal, affix a photo, etc. I decided to include a photo from each hike with its entry.
I’m waiting for the latest batch of photos to arrive before I share more of this project here. (I print many of my photos at home and order professional-quality ones only for special projects (I use Persnickety Prints).)
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Holiday mini flip album
In the memorykeeping world there’s an annual holiday project that a bunch of people take on. It’s called December Daily (more here and here and here) and it’s brought to us all by memorykeeping OG (and fellow Oregonian!) Ali Edwards (also here and here) and her creative team.
I do not participate in December Daily. I never have. I’ve tried—lots of times. It’s just never worked out. This is partly because I’m not a big holiday person and so generally don’t feel connected to the premise of the project. And it’s partly because my brain struggles real hard to do a daily themed project and not have each day’s “entry” be from that actual day.
(The way most people, including Ali, approach this project is to tell 25 to 31 different stories throughout the month (many people document only through Christmas Day; some through the end of the month), regardless of whether the story they’re documenting happened on the day of the month that corresponds to the number used in the album. My brain does not work like that.)
Still, I love—and I do mean LOVE—looking through everyone else’s December Daily projects. And still, there is one annual holiday tradition I do with my kids that I want to document. This will be that project. I’m very excited to get the photos back and put it all together.
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Museum Passport
Another Letterfolk product. Unlike the Hike Passport, the Museum Passport is still available on their website (for now).
Like with the Hike Passport (and all the others in the collection), each booklet is pocket-sized and has room for 20 entries. The left page of each spread is a little “form” you fill out with details about each entry—the name of the museum, the type of museum, admission cost, favorite pieces, etc. The right page of each spread is blank-ish (printed with a dot grid) for you to do whatever you want there. I chose to include a photo from each visit with its entry.
I’m working backward with this project, which is not my preferred way of approaching a memorykeeping project. It feels easier and less stressful to me to keep up with projects in real time. That isn’t always possible, and that’s okay. I do what I can with what I have and where I’m at.
I finished all the legwork for this project the weekend before Thanksgiving and placed an order the other day for the photos I’ll be including with each entry. I look forward to sharing more of this project here once I’m caught up with it all.
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Yearly memory album
This style of memorykeeping—which is basically a physical Instagram grid with some collage-style elements and techniques added in here and there—is also known as Project Life, modern memorykeeping, and pocket pages-style scrapbooking or memorykeeping. It’s been my go-to memorykeeping approach since I first learned about it circa late 2011/early 2012. In recent years—since 2020, really—I haven’t been as consistent with it as I was in earlier years. The pandemic and the halt to life as we knew it that it brought are only partly to blame. A pre-pandemic major and unexpected life event is also to blame, as are mental illness and the lack of space there is to store my supplies and work on my projects in the apartment I’ve lived in for the last four years.
Nevertheless, she (I!) persisted: I’m pleased to announce that since July of this year I have fully been back on my bullshit and have kept up with documenting the days and weeks and months in this 6″x8″ album. I’d like to share more spreads here on the blog whenever the dreary Oregon sky that dominates this time of year gives me some photo-friendly lighting to work with. Don’t hold your breath.
I’m the opposite of pleased to announce that I’m not sure how I’ll continue this practice (my main memorykeeping practice!) going forward—I’m almost out of room in this album and the brand that sold these albums (and the corresponding page protectors) recently pivoted to selling office stationery (sticky notes, desk calendars, notepads, etc.). It’s a brand “refresh” that I’m not alone in feeling deeply confused and disappointed by. Here’s hoping I can figure out how to keep at this project in 2025 and beyond.
