A view from Sumas Mountain, the pronunciation of which marks how long you've been in Whatcom County. This isn't the iconic image of the lush, dense forests of the Pacific Northwest, but it is in many ways a more honest representation of recent human history here. Lowland farms in the distance, clear cuts in the foreground. Abandoned mines tucked away in stands of old-growth Douglas Fir on slopes too steep to log; shotgun shells, beer cans, and the detritus of target practice. Expansive views of the Canadian peaks, of the San Juans, of Mt. Baker, of the patchwork of logging and regrowth rolling over the distant hills.
Unlike the Chuckanuts or the trails of the Baker wilderness areas, Sumas isn't on the radar of most hikers here. It is a lonelier and perhaps wilder place, lacking the signed trails and clear land-use ethos of those areas taken out of intensive production and given over to recreational uses. For better or for worse, this is a working landscape, one that shows the price our living extracts from the land.
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