June 8, 2008:
After flipping back and forth watching the sad cold weather in Washington Hoosierdaddy and I decided to take a chance and go for it – we would try to grab another section of the PCT. We had no idea what awaited us but we had a feeling it wouldn’t be pretty. We had been wanting to do this section for a couple years to get it done and didn’t want to do it in August when it was hot and dry. But maybe a heavy snow year wasn’t the best choice……
Well, I suppose we were not disappointed 
We got dropped off onto FS rd. 43 not long after dawn (the Trout Creek Trailhead) and headed South on the trail over the massive concrete bridge.
The first mile was quite easy. Nothing to impede hiking. You get a great view from here and can see where you will be soon enough. Our cloud cover started to break up here and soon we had solid blue skies above us.
Looking down way below:
Not long after that we hit the first major mess. It was a climb down into a gully, then a mud/moss/slime covered climb back up. Then hands and knees climb under trees.
The trail got better for a while after.
At about 2 1/2 miles in we encountered snow. Ford and I went low (Ford in photo) where the snow was thickest in this gully.
As we crested the first old road crossing at about 2900 ft the snow was steady, a couple feet or more thick.
The trail road walks for a little bit then heads back into a dense forest. The secret is to never lose sight of the PCT logos or the white diamond reflectors nailed into the trees up high. We never got lost in the forest of snow – we looked for cut trees from years past and often spread out a bit to spot reflectors.
Steve standing above a tree well showing the depth of snow at 3000 ft.
The traversing was side hilling snow, crossing long fields of it all the while jumping under and over falling over Vine Maple. Well, it was at this point we were doing a painful 1 mph. If it wasn’t snow, well? It was a ton of blow downs. Ford went to wearing his gloves so he could move faster.
There was more fun along the way – stream crossing in tight ravines with washed out walls where one hopped across then pulled themselves up.
Even as the trail started to drop in elevation the snow did not stop. We didn’t lose snow till about 1500 ft! And as we lost snow….the blow downs became worse. All of us got leg injuries from trees gouging us.
We ate lunch and said “this is not going so well”. We were not making the miles and we realized that within a couple miles we would be going back up. So we decided to find an out and grabbed the maps.
After that we enjoyed the really pretty forest and watching the North Fork creek below us.
Ford in the forest.
There were a lot of flowers opening up along the way from Trilliums to Avy Lilies.
We came out on a spur road right before Rock Creek and headed downhill till we met up with FS Rd. 2000. Then we turned on and headed downhill. We were painfully hoping we would meet someone who would at least give one of us a ride so we could get cell phone reception. Road walking is brutal to the feet and we were dying. For a beautiful Sunday there was nearly no one out and we didn’t see anyone for miles. We came around the corner to this waterfall and saw a small SUV.
Waterfall pouring into Rock Creek along FS Rd. 2000:
The couple were incredibly nice and gave all of us lift to back to Washdougal. We’d have sucked it up and been happy with Stevenson, Wa but they wanted to help us out. And did they! They dropped us off at our car which we were so happy to see.
It was 6 pm – we decided to run for home 3 hours away. After having a spirit restoring pig out meal we hit the road.
Snow free this trip would have been easy and we would have made it to the Columbia River. But….we knew it would be even harder on the second uphill. The fear of where to put our tarps – there was no flat areas on the snow.
We will get this section done someday but it is ok. It isn’t the worst thing to not finish. We had fun, got filthy and got a lot of tales. What more does one need?
