The Washington State Hiking Podcast

Best Spokane area hikes with Emily Mandagie

• Jennie Thwing Flaming and Craig Romano • Episode 66

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Jennie Flaming:

Jennie, welcome to the Washington State hiking podcast. I'm your host. Jennie Thwing Flaming, and I'm your co host, Craig Romano, Craig and I are happy to have you here. We provide practical and timely, seasonal hiking advice for hikers, trail runners and potential hikers and trail runners of all skill and ability levels that is helpful, accurate, fun and inclusive. Well, hello everybody. Today, we have a special guest from Spokane, Emily Mandagie, and she is also a blogger, and she, she and her husband, birdie, have this beautiful website that's all about outdoor adventures and hiking, kind of in the greater Pacific Northwest Area. And so we are going to be talking about hikes in the Spokane area today. Emily, welcome to the Washington State hiking podcast. Thanks for being here.

Emily:

Hi. Thanks so much for having me. I'm excited to be here. Yeah,

Jennie Flaming:

so Emily, can you start by kind of introducing yourself to everybody I know that you are a born and raised resident of Spokane. Tell us a little bit about your your journey to hiking and to the work you do. Totally.

Emily:

So, yeah, like you said, I was born and raised in Spokane, and then as I graduated high school, I wanted to kind of go off and do my own thing, but not too far. So I went to the University of Washington. That's where I met my husband, and we decided, you know, the activity we liked to do together was go hiking. And what better place to, you know, dip your toe into the hiking world in around Seattle, right? So that's where we kind of started. And I think, like, 22 was our first hike we've ever done together. Special, yeah, it is a really good one. And then we started realizing, like, hey, we really like to do this together. And birdie started taking pictures and sharing them on Instagram. And then just the snowball got bigger and bigger and started rolling into, oh, people are interested in these pictures. Oh, they want to know what the hike is. So we started the blog with, you know, pairing those pictures with words and making, you know, trails, you know, informational and how to take that picture on that trail. And then it got bigger and bigger from there. And then we started the bandage.com which is our Pacific Northwest blog. And then, yeah, from there, we just kind of took off with our business. It was really fun. And, yeah, we had a really great time starting it. We moved back to Seattle, I mean, Spokane, sorry. We moved back again in 2018 when we were ready to purchase a house, you know, as we were deciding it was just more cost effective to purchase a house in Spokane. It's a little bit cheaper than Seattle, and I was from there. My family was there too, so it was a really good place for us to put down some roots. So we've been in Spokane since 2018 and have really loved being here.

Jennie Flaming:

Love it. That's awesome. So Emily, for folks who are not familiar with the Spokane area, can you talk a little bit about what makes it such a great place for hiking in in Washington, and what's kind of unique about it? Yeah,

Emily:

if you have never been to Spokane or Eastern Washington. It is vastly different from the western side. The Cascades kind of cut it right in the middle. And on the western side, you have, you know, these really lush rainforest, rainy green hikes. And on the eastern side, it's a little bit drier. In the center of Washington, it's kind of this really interesting geographical, you know, like Missoula flood plains area. And then on the very eastern side of Washington, where I live in Spokane, it's kind of the foothills ish of the Rockies, and so you're getting a little bit more elevation. There's a little bit more forest area, but it's definitely not the forest that you experience on the Olympic Peninsula, for example. You've got, you know, pine trees and, like, wildflowers, rolling hills, not like Rocky, Rocky Mountains. You don't have, like, snow capped jagged peaks, but you do have snow on top of the mountains here. I hope that explains it. But, yeah, it's, it's a little bit different from the east or the western side, but it's, it's got its own beauty. Definitely.

Jennie Flaming:

I totally. Agree with that. Emily, okay, so let's talk about some of your favorite hikes in the Spokane area, and maybe just tell us a little bit about where they are, that some of the things around their difficulty, like it's steep, long, you know, that kind of stuff. Maybe great times of year to do them. Let's, let's hear a little bit

Emily:

about that. Yeah, I would say the the closest hikes around Spokane are on the shorter side, on the easier side, and there's also a lot of mixed use trails going on, for example, in Riverside State Park, which is on the northwest corner of Spokane. You have biking trails, you have hiking trails, walking trails, and they're all kind of like intermingled. So you will see a lot of people sharing the trail on the summertime and just, you know, recreating how they please. What I really like about Riverside State Park specifically is all of the little outlets to the river, so, as the name suggests, it's on the riverside. So there's not really like a destination or an end point or like the highest part of the trail. It kind of like meanders along the riverside, and then ever so often there's like a spur to, like a little private beach or something. And so all of the hikes that I am envisioning around Spokane aren't really like point A to point B. It's kind of like a long trail, and then all of these other like little branches that you can kind of veer off of and just have a picnic, or, you know, pop up a little umbrella and take a seat and enjoy the scenery. So it's very casual and very recreational. There's not really like any destination, specifically, is in Riverside State Park. Specifically, Yep,

Jennie Flaming:

yeah, love that. That is a really beautiful place. What would you say, Emily is the best time of year to go to Riverside State Park?

Emily:

Oh gosh, you know, probably the spring or early summer. I say that because there are lots of wildflowers, and I just looked up the name of this before this call, but it's called Balsam root. See them a lot in the Columbia River Gorge, but you see them a ton here in eastern Washington, yep. And those are those, like patches of little yellow flowers that kind of look like maybe daisies, but, yeah, they're just they're beautiful everywhere. And so if you and it's not too hot in late spring, early summer, so if you go in the morning, it's just that really nice fresh air, and you've got almost guaranteed sunshine over here in that time of year, so it's just like a really pleasant time to be outside.

Jennie Flaming:

Yeah, totally agree. Love that one. Okay. What else? Emily,

Emily:

well, nearby too, there's mount Spokane State Park, which is maybe a 45 minute drive depending on where you live, in Spokane, and I really like that place because there's a lot of interest. That's a little bit more kind of I would call, like traditional hiking, where you have a destination. There's one trail specifically called Quartz Mountain Lookout, where you park your car at a warming hut. So you use it in the winter time for cross country skiing, but in the summertime, you can kind of go through the network of those cross country trails, and all of the sides of the trails are like filled with huckleberries. And so you take, like, a little bag or a bucket or something on your way, and you just, like, pick and eat huckleberries as you go up to the top. And then once you've reached the end, there's Quartz Mountain Lookout, and it's one of the few lookouts in Washington state where you could actually rent it and stay overnight. Cool. Yeah, yeah, we stayed overnight. Oh gosh, a couple years ago, and it was just so fun, because you got to see the city light up at, you know, on the in the distance, because you're like, not too far away from Spokane, you can see lights, you know, at the bottom of the mountain. So it was just beautiful.

Jennie Flaming:

That's awesome. You know? That just made me think of Emily, when you lived in Seattle, did you ever go to Blake island in the Salish Sea?

Emily:

It's like, I know of it, but I don't think I've, like, been there, been there. Yeah, it's,

Jennie Flaming:

it's. Hard to get to you, because there's not a regular boat that goes there anymore. There used to be, but if you camp there, you're kind of camping on this pretty isolated island. But then you like, look across the water and see downtown Seattle.

Unknown:

Oh my gosh. It

Jennie Flaming:

just made me think of that when you were talking about about Mount Spokane, kind of the same idea, like, yeah, this, like, beautiful area, and it's quite close to a major city, yeah,

Emily:

kind of like, perched in the middle of, you know, the woods, and then all of a sudden you're like, Oh yeah, there's civilization. Yeah.

Jennie Flaming:

Love it. Okay, yeah, um, what else Emily,

Emily:

um, one place that I've really liked to go for, like a little quick hike, is a place called Waikiki springs. It's nearby Whitworth University, kind of north Spokane. And it kind of, I forgive me if this is the wrong term, but a lollipop loop, is that what it's called, where you have the single, you know, trail, yeah, make a big circle, and then you like, return on the same trail.

Jennie Flaming:

I call that a lollipop loop. Okay,

Unknown:

yeah, I think so

Jennie Flaming:

that's at least one of two of us that do that? Yeah,

Emily:

great, yes, yeah, it's great because it is actually one of the entry points. So it's a it's a river. You cross a river, when you go there, it's the little Spokane River, and it's an entry point to actually float the little Spokane River. So an option is to bring, like, a paddle board or a kayak or something, and then pop it in the water, and then you can float down the river and pop out somewhere else. Granted, sounds, you can't hike between the two. Maybe you can hike between the two, but I haven't really heard of people doing that. But yeah, that is an option for, like, a pop in, you know, boat summertime activity, but yeah, like I said, in Spokane, there's a lot of mix use on these trails, so you'll see, you know, dogs and children and boats and bikes. So it's really fun to be able to, just like, be a part of the community and see all of those people enjoying the trail in so many different ways, yeah, which I think is really special, but yeah, Waikiki Springs is one of those where it's short enough to take a small child and they will, like, have fun. It's interesting. You go up a little hill, you come down a little hill, you cross a river. There's cattails everywhere. Yeah, there's a lot to see. So that one's really fun too. Oh,

Jennie Flaming:

love it. Oh, these are so great. I am really excited about my next trip to Spokane

Unknown:

now, yeah, go hiking together. I know that

Jennie Flaming:

would be really fun. I used to spend a lot of time in Spokane because my aunt and uncle lived there for a long time, all the way that I was through college, and you know, up until about the time that you moved there, they moved to Tacoma to be closer to my cousins, so I haven't spent as much time there in the last six or seven years as I did for like 15 years before that. So, yeah, this is all okay. So Emily, we've, so far we've talked about three awesome hikes, super close to Spokane. What else do you have for us?

Emily:

So this is not necessarily a hike, but it's called the Centennial Trail, and it's a 37 mile paved route that goes from nine mile falls Washington, all the way through Spokane, through downtown, and goes all the way to the Idaho border. And I really like it because it goes through to town, and it goes through one of my favorite neighborhoods, Kendall yards, and you can go get coffee. You can see the waterfalls downtown. You walk right back by them. There's a donut shop on it, and so it's your traditional hiking route. But I that's one of my favorite things to do. When people come visit us in Spokane, we'll like wear strollers and we'll go grab a coffee and get some donuts and just walk, walk all the way through downtown. And granted, we don't go all the 37 miles to Idaho, but you can. And then there's so many different parts of that trail that go through, like a quiet Riverside, and it's just really special. And, like, again, very mixed use. I would say it would be very comparable to the Green Lake Trail. Yep, that was around Green Lake. But it's just not a circle, it's a line. So you see tons of different people, running, walking with strollers, playing with kids, biking, rollerblading. So that is you. That's a fun thing to do. That's not quite hiking, but you know, you're walking, you're gay, yeah, so and

Jennie Flaming:

a trail with a donut shop is like, sounds amazing.

Emily:

Yes, yes, yep, it's one of my like, go to stops when people come to visit us. I was like, Okay, we're gonna kind of woo you on Spokane. Let's go to the Centennial Trail. Get some gas, coffee. Yeah, yeah. Mm, hmm, perfect.

Jennie Flaming:

I actually know somebody who biked the whole thing, and they said it was really awesome. Yeah,

Emily:

my brother did that recently too, on his bike. I have yet to do it, but one of the big goals for birdie and I in the next couple years is to get and invest in some really good bikes. Ooh,

Jennie Flaming:

I'm excited about that. Yeah, perfect. Okay, what else do you have for us? Emily,

Emily:

there's one other one that I have in like, the very close Spokane area, and that is called the painted rocks. It's very close to our house, which is fun because I live in Northwest Spokane, and this trail is located in northwest Spokane, again, mixed use, because you go there and it's one of the exit points for floating the little Spokane River. But one reason I really like it is I've actually never made it to the end of this trail, because there's just so much to do in the middle. Oh, we go, and there's like, all of these offshoot like river spots, and so all when I was growing up, I don't remember making it to the end, because we always ended up in a river spot, eating our picnic lunch, throwing rocks in the river, playing in the river, and then going home. So that's one of the first ones we're going to take our son at this year. He is walking now, so we're going to let him just decide how far he wants to go, yeah, and stop at a little river spot, let him explore how he wants to and then turn around and go back to the car. So I really like Spokane trails in that way, especially the ones close to the city, because there's not really a destination to get to, yep, it's just like for the enjoyment, and there's just so much to do in all of the parts of the trail.

Jennie Flaming:

Yeah, love it. Oh, that sounds perfect for, like, different ages of kids and adults and that kind of thing too. Love

Emily:

it for sure. You see a ton of families out in the summertime just, just meandering the trail. There's no really destination. It's just, I love seeing families just let their kids enjoy all parts of the trail. Yeah,

Jennie Flaming:

that's so fun. Okay, what else?

Emily:

Well, one I have really loved this was before we had our baby boy. It's actually Idaho, but it's one of the popular backpacking trails that you can go to. It's in the Selkirk mountains, and it's called beehive lake. I wish I had the distance for you, but it's kind of around maybe four miles total, okay, but it's incredibly steep, which I mean, you get there, and it's, like, very rewarding, because, you know, you get there, and the lake is stunning, but I would say it's more, how do I say this beehive Lake is kind of like you climb over the mountain and then you pop in, and I would say it's a Traditional kind of what you would expect a one day backpacking trip to look like, if you can Cascade Mountains, for example, yep, but it's just, you know, in northern Idaho, and I would say it's right outside of standpoint. So this okay, you're committing to maybe an hour and a half drive to the trail head from Spokane. And it's really beautiful. It's drier than the Cascade Mountains when you're walking through I would say, yeah, it's similar, but you're just not getting much rain, yep. And that one is really fun and a very easy day, like one day hike, I would say it's it's not easy getting there because it's pretty steep. But as far as, like the time frame that you need to do it in, it's easy to do it in one night, right?

Jennie Flaming:

So it makes for a good even though it's a tough trail, it makes for a good one night backpacking trip because it's not super far and it's hard, but it's not extremely long, so it's doable, even if you go really slow.

Emily:

That is correct, yeah. And one of the my favorite parts of the trip is. Is going down and then going back into Sandpoint. There's a ton of really good like, burrito places, coffee places, standpoints, kind of a more destination Lake town. It's on the ponderay lake, so there's just a lot of good food. So it's always the best when you have, like, a really hard hike, and then you're rewarded with, like, a really delicious meal afterwards, and not know the perfect place to do it. Love it.

Jennie Flaming:

Great tip. Wonderful. Yeah. Okay, so let's see. Do you have one or two more for us? Emily, am I keeping track? Okay,

Emily:

I think so. Yeah, I have one more. Okay, perfect. It's kind of a hiking trail, but kind of not, and it's actually Montana, ooh. And I say it's Montana because, well, it is, and it's close and accessible to Spokane, which is why I like it. Yeah, it's called Garnet ghost town. Okay, let's actually, I'm gonna look it up really fast. Yep, it's called Garnet ghost town, and you can hike into it, or you can park close, depending on, like, there is accessibility parking if you want to go, like, straight into the ghost town. Gotcha. And there is a little kind of trail that you can follow that goes through all of the old, I think it was a mining town, and there's the buildings are still standing. It's preserved, yeah, and so maintained. It's not like, updated or anything, but they keep the buildings, like, intact, so they're not like, falling down and being like a danger to people, right? It is really cool. And you can hike all the way up to, like a school house. That's way far in the woods. There's a lot of like, little hidden gems that you can explore. And so it's not quite like a traditional hike, like you park your car, you go to a lake and you come back, yeah, but it's interesting, because there's so much history involved in this place. I think it was like a gold miner town, okay? And I'm not sure why it stopped being a town and then everybody moved out, but, yeah, it's intact, and it's really fun to go to. There's this like, little pamphlet that you get with all the information of, like, what this house is and what the use was, and it's really interesting. And, yeah, get your hiking shoes on, because there's a lot to see, and it is a big space. Oh, that's really cool. Yeah, it's really fun. And you can go in most of the buildings too. Oh,

Jennie Flaming:

that sounds like a really fun adventure. So you said it's in Montana. Um, like, where is it like, close to I 90, or do you take a different road to get there? Kind of, how do you get there?

Emily:

Let me look it up. I would say it's close to Missoula. It's outside of Missoula, a little Okay, so I know we're talking about hikes in eastern Washington. So this one's a little bit of a stretch. You

Jennie Flaming:

know what? Emily you I have never heard of this, and I just love it. And so I think you are telling us your favorites as a local, and I love it, and it's totally cool if it's in Montana or Idaho,

Emily:

okay, yeah, it's, I would say it's probably like in the three to three and a half hour drive from Spokane. So it's yeah, what, what me and my family did was we went and we camped nearby, yep, and then the day trip was to go to Garnet ghost town and then come down to our campsite. But it was one of those things where, if you wanted to take a weekend trip from Spokane, that is 1,000% Yep, a doable, easy trip, because there's a lot of camping, like, campgrounds nearby, yeah? So you could totally do that in a weekend, which is, yeah,

Jennie Flaming:

definitely. But so it's close to Missoula,

Emily:

yeah, it's, it's just outside of Missoula, more on, like, the eastern side, yep. So kind of by Sealy, like, if you've ever heard of that place, that's a great place to go camping. Nice. But, yeah, it's really fun. And hi, you know, I know it's a little bit farther from Spokane. I do know that there's some ghost towns close to Spokane that I would like to check out personally, but I will gone there.

Jennie Flaming:

Yeah, yeah, that's awesome. My husband, Jay is from Montana and closer to Yellowstone. His parents worked in the park, and he and his best friend in high school spent lots of time exploring ghost towns, kind of in that part of Montana. But I hadn't heard of this one. And you know, Missoula was pretty far for the probably, well, probably further from Missoula than Spokane is actually, yeah, oh, that's so cool. And so one question I had about beehive Lake, I wanted to go back to that for a second, which was in Idaho. So you talked about it being a backpacking trip, but I assume it would be a. A pretty good day hike as well. I mean, it would be longer, of course, because you'd be going out there and back in one day. Have you done it as a day hike? Would you recommend that? Or do you feel like this is really a place to go for backpacking?

Emily:

I would say you could totally do it as a day hike. It would take all day, because, you know, you have to factor in if you are from Spokane, or you're like, home base, you know, for hiking in Spokane, you're driving there all day, yeah, it's probably all day, and then you're hiking in the hot sun, and then you're coming back an hour and a half, yeah, I would say, if you are, like, kind of base camping in Coeur d'Alene or Sandpoint. That's a little bit more fun because it won't take you all day. But the reason that we chose to do it with a backpacking trip is, one, because of the drive, and two, it was just a really hot, like end of July time, and jumping in the lake was so refreshing. And so to be able to, like, you know, set up camp, sit down, have a meal, jump in the lake during the day. It was just really fun to have that like easy time, to just take it slow. Yeah, that was when we really got to enjoy it. And then we got to watch the sunrise. It was so beautiful. So you totally could do it as a day hike. But I personally would recommend it as an overnight because of all of the elements that you miss out on during a day hike, like the morning sunrise, jumping in the lake, a meal, taking a nap,

Jennie Flaming:

Yeah, I bet the stars must be amazing there too. Oh yeah,

Emily:

oh yeah. And what is special about Spokane hiking or overnight backpacking around here is that the the sky is really clear, like all the time. So you do get really good, good star reviews at night over here in eastern Washington.

Jennie Flaming:

Amazing. Love. It Wonderful. Well, Emily, thank you so much for sharing these wonderful Spokane area plus Idaho plus Montana hikes. Um with us. Anything else you want to say about any of these hikes or Spokane before we before we wrap up? No. First

Emily:

of all, thanks for letting me, like divert into Idaho and Montana. I know this is a Washington podcast, so I appreciate it.

Jennie Flaming:

We have, we have episodes about our neighbors as well, so it's perfect.

Emily:

Love, awesome. No, it's been really fun to chat with you, and I hope that everybody gets to experience Spokane at some point in their life. I just think it's a really beautiful place to just take hiking a little bit more slow and recreate among a lot of different people who are choosing to just enjoy the trail in a different way. So I just think that that is a beautiful part of Spokane, and yeah, I hope everybody gets to come here and experience it for

Jennie Flaming:

themselves. I hope so too. Thank you so much. Emily,

Unknown:

yeah, thank you so much.

Jennie Flaming:

If you're enjoying the podcast, we would love to have you leave us a rating or review wherever you're listening that will really help other people find us. And don't forget, there's a link to Craig's books and my email list in the show notes, if you'd like to connect with us and support us further, and you can always leave us a tip in the show notes. You.

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Jennie Thwing Flaming

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Craig Romano

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