Exploring the American Wilderness and Other Adventures

The Gnome Trail, Maple Valley, Washington

A week ago I was the most fortunate to get to road trip with My Therapist and her spawn, who I will call Little One, to see the “Northwest Trolls: The Way of the Bird King,” with some side trips. I will write about the trolls in a different post, but one of the side trips was to go see what Little One calls “the tiny Santas” – or The Gnome Trail.

Gnomes are mythical little humans invented in the 1600’s, meant to be symbols of good luck. They began in multiple cultures around the world, originally created to be works of art and were quite expensive. In the 1900’s, they became more common and moved to gardens, where they are said to protect the earth and its treasures.

We had experienced a series of very unfortunate events that made us feel really discouraged about completing the trip as planned, but imagining telling Little One that we were skipping the tiny Santas did not feel good at all. So, we found The Gnome Trail, which is exactly as its name says – a trail of gnomes. Located in Maple Valley, in the Rock Creek Natural Area, the gnomes were moved from the nearby Henry’s Ridge Trail area. Henry’s Ridge Trail is more difficult to access and users were creating illegal trails through the property. There are different trailheads, but we parked near the site of the Maple Valley Farmer’s Market, where there were bathrooms and a huge parking lot.

The trail began with a Little Free Library with awful books in it about how to control your children. What in the actual fuck. Anyway, beyond that, the trail was immediately creepy and amazing. The beautiful bright green trees covered in lichen and moss were also decorated in a wild and barely defined collage of gnomes, from roots to above where I could reach. There were gnomes that looked like they were meant for gardens, gnomes that were obviously painted by children, and gnomes with themes for sports. They mostly looked like they were meant for the landfill, with very few of them being intact and not terrifying. The best part was that Little One thought they were ALL magical and the contrast between what I was seeing and what she was seeing made it the best time in the wilderness ever.

To her, they were all perfect, and the more tiny the little Santas were, the better. I feel like there is a lot to unpack there. But I won’t. I am just so happy that she shares her magical world with me and has no understanding at all that she is the magic, not the tiny Santas.

When I began editing my photos, I realized I must like the yoga gnomes the best because I have the most photos from them. I begin my classes to learn to become a yoga instructor soon, so I guess it is on my mind. Or perhaps I am very zen. Or anxious. Probably anxious.

A bunch of my photos would not load to this site, which I guess is probably for the best. We took a ridiculous amount of photos while exploring this trail system. Overall, we did about one mile at Little One’s pace, and found countless gnomes. There are many more miles to be had, though, if one really wanted. The moody forest with all the shades of green is well worth any distance selected, especially if you are following a three year old who can barely believe her luck in being there.