For many years we have hiked the grassland hills of the Hamilton Corrals, a Commonage area between Hamilton Mountain and the Quilchena – Pennask Road.    We have hiked in spring, summer, and fall and had not yet put it into the schedule, but serendipity intervened and we hiked the west end of the trails on a pleasant early summer day.   We had planned to hike Mt. Thynne.    We drove south to Brookmere, them turned to climb the mountain There was a sign posted at the bottom of the forest service road that the road was closed because bridges were being replaced.     Since we knew there were several roads that approach the mountain, we drove up anyway and, at km 6, the road was blocked, so we turned around and drove back to Merritt, then up Highway 5A.    We turned onto the Pennask Lake Road and up to the trailhead for Hamilton Corrals, our second choice for the day, but since it is a favorite hike, a good one as an alternate.

We hiked double tracks and a side track generally heading northeast through the grasslands toward Hamilton Mountain.

Along the way we passed a series of ponds, marshes, and small lakes.

We hiked out for about an hour then had lunch at one of the larger ponds.

We chose an out-and-back route this time instead of the full loop 12.5 km route because we had lost time driving to Mt. Thynne and back.    This ended up as a quiet hike with eagles, hawks, wrens, robins, butterflies, bees and blackbirds to observe and many wildflowers along the way.

A gallery of wildflowers are shared in a Google Album at this link – Hamilton Corrals Wildflowers

While hiking we were surprised to see a jeep on the double track and we talked to the couple in the vehicle for a while.    As it turned out, it was Murphy Shewchuk and his wife Katharine.    I had read Murphy’s books and had used them as guidebooks for decades.    Here is his website – murphyshewchuk.com