This isn’t really Middle Earth. Or New Zealand. But the rocky outcrops and enormous boulder fields up near Artist’s Point at at the end of the Mount Baker Highway are not unlike those of the Misty Mountain Hop or the mountains of Rohan.

The brilliant fall colors, which visit us when we’re lucky in October, make for deep layering effects. The rocks seem to jut out more. The valleys are darker and deeper as the hills appear more colored and the boulder fields more ominous. The dogs race up and down treacherous scree slopes and plunge into the cavernous holes left behind by glaciers of lore.

The greatest adventure is what lies ahead for these dogs of the explorers.