Current Location: Skykomish of the Cascades

Photo: The ebony peaks of the Cascade Mountains in the distance are crested with snow under an ashen sky. Nearer are conifers in a variety of shapes and shades, adding gentle shades of green.

    Skykomish, WA is at 47.710048 -121.355695. It is a town of fewer than 200 people, down from "several thousand" in the 1920s. Just 50 miles east of Everett, Washington, it appears Alp-ish, with distant black mountains frosted in white. At ground level, the modest village is mainly a railroad stopping point and a recreational access point to the surrounding mountains. 

    Our tracks followed the meandering Skykomish River, and later the Wallace River. Surounding us, the North Cascades towered far above the rustic log cabins, compact A-frames, and Swiss-style chalets. Much of the landscape is national forest. Rivers rush through pine groves, tumbling over massive boulders and tiny river rocks. Trees of all types loom over mossy banks and clutches of wild flowers in yellow and orange. If we were outside, we would likely hear the bubble and rush of flowing water and smell the soft earthiness. The soil here is a pale pink in places and black in others.

    The town of Skykomish, at one point in the 1980s, became barely habitable because the soil and ground water became so contaminated by oil and heavy metals. Finally, in 2006, the railroad company and the Washington State Department of Ecology began remediation, which involved massive excavations to remove contaminated soil and replaced it with clean soil. Three years later, twenty two of Skykomish's homes and business buildings were temporarily moved and replaced in their original locations, atop fresh soil and new foundations. The town's residents and business owners benefitted from the installation of a new waste water treatment system.

    The Native peoples called Skykomish, which means 'inland people', used that area during the hunting and berry-gathering seasons. As the railroads brought Euro-American settlers to the area, smallpox and other fatal diseases were introduced, and by the time the Skykomish were assigned to the Tulalip Reservation in 1855, their numbers had dwindled significantly.

    The rugged beauty of the area is readily evident now, with trees leafed out and flowers about to burst in berries, but in the height of winter, it must feel remote blanketed in so much snow. I can barely imagine how the place would have looked one hundred, two hundred, five hundred years ago, when the world was less connected and distance meant isolation. The area's wolves, black bears, mule deer and elk must have proliferated, fed by fresh water and abundant vegetation.

    Just a few more miles down the tracks, more signs of civilization began to appear, and less wilderness remained. The isolation and remoteness began to look preferable to the proliferation of people-problems. There's nothing like a big dose of nature to recalibrate your internal compass. And to make you realize just how delicate the balance is between humanity and the rest of the natural world.