BUTTERCUP MEADOW

Mrs. Trowbridge loved spending summer days painting in the high meadows. The Olympic Mountains loom in the background. The area that she painted is the high country, near the headwaters of Wild Rose Creek, above the vast Quinault Rain Forest.

You'll notice that the trees look dwarfed and stubby in Mrs. T's painting. In the subalpine zone the trees are dwarfed from lack of oxygen. As you gain altitude, and climb above the tree line you enter the Arctic Alpine zone. At this altitude there are no trees, just rocky terrain and snow fields.

This is one of the most spectacularly beautiful areas in the Olympic Mountains, the high meadowlands between Cameron Pass and Lost Pass. This was perhaps my all-time favorite day in the Olympics. Both of the mountain zones are represented here, the Subalpine zone in the foreground, showing the stunted trees, and the Arctic Alpine zone in the distance, showing the rugged snowy peaks.