In Twin Peaks Episode 1.002, there is a transitional shot of the top of a snow-covered Mount Si in North Bend, Washington. During my visit in October 2019, I took a similar shot of this gorgeous mountain overlooking the town. Here is a comparison on screen appearance from 1989 to today, with extra photos from the mountain top taken in August 1996.
WHERE IS THE TOP OF MOUNT SI LOCATED?
The shot in question appears just after the bottle breaks from Special Agent Dale Cooper’s rock-throwing exercise. Look carefully in the bottom right corner and you see the top of the Double R Diner.
Here’s a similar shot from October 14, 2019. Granted, I took this image just down the street from the old Alpine Blossom & Gift Shoppe on North Bendigo Boulevard. I wish I would have taken the shot from the parking lot of Twede’s Cafe.
During my visit to North Bend on January 23, 2020, I took a similar shot of Mount Si outside Twede’s Cafe. Sadly, it had been raining everyday since New Year’s Day so it was nothing but overcast skies when I visited.
Nevertheless, I combined the two images to give an approximate idea of where the image from Episode 1002 was taken.
MOUNT SI – STORY OF MOON THE TRANSFORMER
Mount Si plays an important role in the “Story of Moon the Transformer” from the Snoqualmie Tribe. They shared an abbreviated form of that story on their website as recorded by Arthur C. Ballard told to him by Snoqualmie Charlie:
There were to sisters from tultxʷ. (Tolt) They decided to go to baʔqʷab (the City of Snoqualmie) to dig fern roots. When they were done, they decided to sleep there for the night. That night the two sisters were looking up into the sky. They looked at the stars and wished they could marry one. While sleeping that night they were taken to land of the Sky People.
When they woke up they saw that they were married to the two stars they had been looking at. They lived there for a long time. Every day the men went out to hunt and the sisters stayed and dug up fern roots. One day the older sister became pregnant and gave birth to a boy named słukʷalb.
After a while the sisters missed their home and family. One day while digging for roots, they realized if they dug far enough they could see the world below. They decided they could go home this way. One sister would dig while the other would watch baby moon and weave a cedar rope. After fifteen days the rope reached the top of qʷalbc (Mount Si).
They climbed down to the earth. All of this time their family had missed them and had sent the Bird People to try and find the sisters. Everyone was happy that the two sisters had returned and were surprised to see słukʷalb. To celebrate the sisters made their ladder into a swing. Everyone had sport on it by swinging from qʷalbc to dx̌aclbac (Rattlesnake Ridge).
While all of their family was celebrating, Dog Salmon came and stole the baby. Everyone tried to find him but it was Bluejay who was able to find słukʷalb, who was now grown up and had children of his own. He told Bluejay he would come home when his children were grown.
When słukʷalb returned He had a special power. He was now dukʷibeł. dukʷibeł changed everything into what it is today. When he came to the great fish near where he had been stolen as a baby, he turned it into Snoqualmie Falls. From here Moon the Transformer created the various people and all the rivers as they are now. He placed all of the fish in the rivers and made the wild game good to eat.
TWEDE’S CAFE – THEN AND NOW
After the transitional shot of Mount Si, we see an establishing shot of the Double R Diner in Episode 1.002 (just before Audrey Horne enters the restaurant). You can see the lights on top of the building that are barely in the shot of the top of Mount Si. I took a similar shot of this Twin Peaks film location on September 14, 2019. The pine tree was added to shot as no trees like that ever existed in the parking lot.
TOP OF MOUNT SI – AUGUST 1996
So what’s the view like from the top of Mount Si?
A much younger version of me hiked to the top in August 1996. This was a few days after I attended the 1996 Twin Peaks Fan Festival. Being an Eagle Scout and having spent 10 days hiking at Philmont Scout Ranch in New Mexico, I thought this would be an easy hike. Wow, I was wrong.
The rather arduous hike took my fellow Bookhouse Boy Joe and me a few hours to get to the top. Once there, however, we were rewarded with breathtaking views of the Snoqualmie Valley.
The town of North Bend seemed so tiny from the top of the 4,167-foot mountain. I would love to see the same image taken today (but I’m not as good as I once was – Ha!).
I then decided to scramble a little further up something called “Haystack.”
According to Wikipedia, “The summit of Mount Si can then be reached by an exposed scramble (a class 3 as defined by the Yosemite Decimal System), up the north side of the summit block which is known as the ‘Haystack.'” I remember debating if I really wanted to make the treacherous climb.
Ultimately, I’m glad I did as the views were truly spectacular!
Younger me poses for a picture on the backside of Mount Si after making the hike up Haystack. Maybe during my next visit to Washington state, I’ll revisit this hike.
