You’re zooming along state Route 706 on the way to some unbeatable hiking, climbing or sledding on Pierce County’s most famous peak. You round the corner past Elbe, and then the sign pops up: “Chainsaw Art.” Whoops, missed it. Then comes another: “Ex-Nihilo Sculpture Park.” Well, looks good, but shouldn’t you really be hitting the slopes?

Not so fast. The road to Mount Rainier is paved with art, figuratively speaking, and if you speed past you’ll really be missing something. Chainsaw Sasquatches, giant roosters made of engine parts, creamy pottery and intricate Indian jackets await you. Take it from the tourists – they stop, and so should you. Here’s the lowdown on Elbe-to-Ashford’s mountain-high art.

DUSTY CRAWLER’S CRITTERS

With a fading sign and a cabin nearly invisible up a steep rise, you may need to U-turn for this one. Dusty Crawler (a.k.a. Terry Strube) does his chainsaw carving on the top of the hill overlooking the Nisqually River just past Elbe, where state Route 706 meets Highway 7. It’s worth the search, though. Dusty’s a character who seems to know most other chainsaw carvers of repute from Ashford to Australia. He also collects their work, and his back deck is peopled with figures such as the tiny gnome with a pointy head (Dunne Nunne, Australia), the redwood lizard with a frog hiding below it (Pat McVeigh, Seattle) and the smooth-winged, pale angel (Dusty’s wife, Pam Strube.) Some are for sale, most aren’t. Dusty himself focuses on burned and painted bears and highly textured eagles, when he’s not organizing regional carving competitions like the upcoming Morton Loggers Jubilee, August 8-9.

“It’s a beautiful place to carve up here,” says Dusty. His tip for buying chainsaw art? “Go to an auction, like at the Jubilee. It’s a great place to buy your first piece cheap.”

KNOTTYWOOD ART

Around six miles further along from Elbe on the left, it’s hard to miss Knottywood. Perhaps it’s the herd of driftwood moose in the ditch, or the 10-foot-high carved Sasquatch. Drive in and you’ll see hundreds of sculptures dotting the property of chainsaw artists Gary and Peggy Johnson. Eagles, totem poles and a host of teddy bears stretch 100 yards in either direction beyond a low cedar cabin hung about with an eclectic assortment of beaten metal fish, carved fir trees and old tools.

Then there’s Gary. Tall and skinny, with suspenders, slouch hat and long white hair and beard, Gary Johnson wears the mountain carver mantle with authenticity, and breaks off roughing out a strange shape to talk.

“It’s supposed to be a woodpecker,” he sighs, consulting an Internet-pulled photograph. Johnson’s been carving 10 years, ever since he saw other carvers and realized he could do just as well. He does the sculpting with a basic 50-cc chainsaw with a 14-inch bar, while wife Peggy fills in the fine details with a four-inch circular grinder. They get visitors and mail orders from Germany to Hong Kong.

“It’s a learning curve,” says Johnson, of teaching yourself to carve with a chainsaw. “It’s trial and error.”

EX-NIHILO METAL SCULPTURE PARK

Just half a mile on from Knottywood on the other side of the road is the one art location you can’t fail to see. It’s an acre’s worth of rusty iron sculptures averaging 12 feet high: Ex-Nihilo, the home of Daniel Klennert’s recycled metal artwork. Klennert’s fairly well-known – he’s exhibited at home and garden shows and festivals, been the subject of travel books and a Disney documentary, and seems to be on the route for all the Rainier tourist buses. Set up like an old-West ranch, Ex-Nihilo (Latin for ‘out of nothing’) manages an elegance and meaning you wouldn’t expect from old machinery parts and wood. There’s an enormous horse with coal-hod hoofs and a rump of quilted horseshoes, a skeleton swinging from the gallows, a retro Harley and a 12-foot driftwood man with dry mossy hair, staring eyes and a tiny bird in his mouth. Walking around to the back park (yes, there’s much more) you pass old Maytag washers and rusty bicycles, a nonchalant jazz band, a driftwood elephant calf nosing its mother, finally reaching a moving garden with three memorial crucifixes, all of recycled iron. Tourists snap photos, but the overall feel is contemplative.

“We looked all over for a place – South Dakota, Santa Fe,” recalls Klennert, sitting outside with his partner Barb on homemade Adirondacks. What sold them on this place was the barn that now houses the gift shop and Klennert’s workshop. In time, Klennert thinks, there’ll be enough artists along state Route 706 to rival Santa Fe’s Canyon Road. Meanwhile, he keeps making art.

“I fall in love with a piece of metal, and discover what it wants to become,” he says.

ASHFORD CREEK POTTERY

Right at the end of Ashford there’s an understated gray building with a 1950s Coke machine in front. Ashford Creek Pottery is the gallery of potters Jana Gardiner and Rick Johnson. Inside it’s cool and calm, with Bach cello suites playing and Gardiner working calmly on a pot. As well as Gardiner’s green and cream raku and porcelain vessels (which sell in the Mount Rainier gift shops), Ashford Creek sells muted mountain watercolors by mapmaker and climber Dee Molenaar, Rainier-themed stained glass mounted on ice axes by Lee Christopherson and Mary Randlett’s well-known nature black-and-white photographs. The gallery’s quite empty.

“People just fly by on their way to the mountain,” says Gardiner resignedly. But the two potters have lived 30 years in Ashford, and the location’s effect on their calm, leaf-swirled pots obviously makes up for any lack of visitors.

PAINTERS ART GALLERY

Immediately opposite Ashford Creek Pottery, there’s a bright red house with a teepee outside. It’s wooden, and painted with the American flag. In character, this summarizes artist Joan Painter and her tiny house-gallery. Crowded with Western pastels and acrylics (some of them hers) cloud-swept color photographs of Mount Rainier, imported Indian souvenirs and extroverted belly-dance outfits, the gallery is also the local source for beading – hundreds and hundreds of different beads, plus tools, materials and locally-made jewelry. But the best stuff is way in the back: Painter’s own beadwork, handmade bead by bead, onto canvases and Indian jackets. There’s a replica of the Mona Lisa and Queen Guinevere. There’s an Indian-style beaded guitar strap with bucking broncos and Harley Davidsons.

“I ship beads all over the world,” says Painter, who’s been featured in Sunset and Artist magazines, and who used to tour Western art shows with Fred Oldfield. She moved to Ashford 20 years ago, “because it was cheap,” and loves it. She’s getting back into painting, and balances the beadwork with belly dancing.

“Tell everybody about Ashford,” she says. “We need people to come here.”

Rosemary Ponnekanti: 253-597-8568

rosemary.ponnekanti@thenewstribune.com

The art stops of Highway 706

Looking for art, culture or just plain novelty along the way to Mount Rainier? Here are five stops. (All directions are for traveling from Tacoma.)

Dusty Crawlers Critters (chainsaw carving)

Artist: Terry Strube aka Dusty Crawler

Where: 54309 182nd Ave. Court E., Elbe

Directions: Up on the hill on the left immediately at intersection of Highway 7 and Highway 706 after Elbe

Contact: 360-569-0970

Open: 9 a.m.-5 p.m. daily

Knottywood Art (chainsaw carving)

Artist: Gary and Peggy Johnson

Where: 20115 Highway 706, Elbe

Directions: About 2 miles east of Elbe on left-hand side

Contact: 360-569-0960, www.knottywoodart.com

Open: Anytime

Ex-Nihilo Sculpture Park (recycled metal sculpture)

Artist: Dan Klennert

Where: 22410 Highway 706, Elbe

Directions: About a mile after Knotty Wood on right hand side

Contact: 360-569-2280, www.danielklennert.com

Open: Thursdays-Sundays

Ashford Creek Pottery (ceramics, watercolors, photographs, stained glass)

Artists: Jana Gardiner and Rick Johnson, potters

Where: 30510 Highway 706, Ashford

Directions: At the end of Ashford, just after old general store on right-hand side

Contact: 360-569-1000

Open: 10 a.m.-6 p.m. daily in summer, by appointment in winter

Painters Art Gallery (Western paintings, bead work, bead supplies)

Artist: Joan Painter, bead artist and painter

Where: 30517 Highway 706, Ashford

Directions: At the end of Ashford, immediately opposite the pottery gallery

Contact: 360-569-2644, www.painterartbeads.com

Open: Daily after 1 p.m.