A mild winter and sunny weekends is bringing winter hikers out in droves to the North Bend area. It is especially evident at the very popular, relatively shorter, Rattlesnake Trail hike, which leads visitors up two miles to exposed, steep Rattlesnake Ledge – and its sweeping views of the Snoqualmie Valley, Rattlesnake Lake directly below and Mt. Si,.
North Bend residents living in the area are fairly accustomed to the trail being busy during spring and summer, but the crowds making their way to Rattlesnake during this sunny and mild winter are leaving some residents surprised and a little shocked – especially by what visitors are not taking with them off the mountain.
Over the February 20, 2015 weekend, a hiker filmed the popular destination with a “GoPro Hero 4 Black on the FreeX Skyview” Quad Copter.
The video posted to YouTube on February 24th shows just how busy Rattlesnake Ledge has become – and left me wondering, “How many more people can fit on the Ledge?”
Locals: Please Take it With You
According to residents, multitudes of hikers are also leaving some very noticeable reminders along the busy trail. One resident attempted to document the amount of garbage (doggie “poo bags,” dirty diapers, energy bar wrappers, dirty tissue/paper towels) littered on the busy trail instead of being brought down to garbage cans at the trailhead.
A Wilderness Rim homeowner explained the amount of people heading to Rattlesnake Lake is overflowing the parking lot, with cars parking all the way down Cedar Falls Way (on both roadsides) and now regularly inside the nearby Wilderness Rim neighborhood. Residents say traffic near Rattlesnake is mess on any sunny day now.
See the Rattlesnake Ledge quad copter video capturing just how busy the hiking destination HERE.
The Rattlesnake Ledge Trail and Rattlesnake Mountain Trail are property of Seattle Public Utilities
Comments
Thanks for featuring my video (I’m the one that shot it)! You’re more than welcome to embed the actual video into your article, if you’d like.
This is just ridiculous!! The VERY LEAST you urbanites can do when you journey to these beautiful ‘hinterlands’ is NOT foul them up. Is that too much to ask?? Y’all really make a rural local such as myself angry with your careless actions. NONE of you deserve to be a part of this when you do that.
I live in the city but our human race has gone to crap. They have no respect for nature, our planet or eachother. I tell my kids the old saying, “if you take it in, you take it out.’
hi teresa
It breaks my heart to see the overcrowding of this beautiful area. Not to mention the disgusting waste left in their wake. Maybe Seattle Public Utilies will come to realize it may be best to set up a reservation only policy or figure a way to limit access.
I know this isn’t realistic, but I would like to require registration (with ID) for people before they go up the mountain. Seattle Public should install and monitor video cameras throughout the day. When someone leaves trash behind, replay it for them when they come back down in full High Definition Video and fine them. That would take care of some of the trash on the mountain.
DOGs poop and, sorry to say, some of their owners are HALF WITS. The owner gets the idea of bagging their dog’s poop. That is the WITTED half. Then they leave the bag along the trail or toss it into the woods for someone else to pick up. That is the WITLESS HALF. Add to that the other HALF WITS that toss their plastic water bottles in the woods instead of carrying them out…A reasonable solution = No dogs and no recyclable water bottles or better yet no HALF WITS.