Tom, Dick and Harry is one of those classic summer hikes that can be done in the winter as well. The problem is that a few years back, the ODOT decided to stop cleaning and plowing the parking area for this trailhead leaving the winter option almost closed. If there’s snow on the road, the only option is to park at Ski Bowl and walk next to the highway for about a mile to the trailhead. As you can imagine, that portion of the hike is not very scenic and would certainly leave a sour spot on an otherwise great day. But, if you look at a map, there’s the possibility of doing a backcountry route to Mirror Lake and the join the trail to Tom, Dick and Harry. This route requires some good navigation skills and crossing several creeks which, depending on the season, can be very challenging. If everything goes well though, after about an hour of forest navigation you come out of the trees at Mirror Lake with wonderful winter views all around you. As you walk around the lake you can enjoy the frozen surface and view of Mt Hood behind you. From that point on, it’s easy to re-join the TD&H trail and go up. Depending on snow levels though, it’s possible that the trail becomes difficult to follow so you may find yourself navigating thru pretty steep slopes. If something like that happens, there’s always the option to veer a bit to the south and start climbing towards the ridge which eventually will cross the trail again. Once there it’s easy to follow the topography towards the summit as you are out of the tree line. The rewards for all that hard work came right the moment we reached the ridgeline to the summit as the view to Mt Hood opened up right in front of us. We continued a bit more to a good flat spot where we stopped for lunch and to enjoy the sun. We had the option to go back the way we came but to make it more interesting, we opted for descending straight to the lake. As you can see in the map, it’s a far quicker but steeper route so we had the opportunity to do some glissading down to the lake. The rest was easy as we just retraced our steps to the car.
Interactive map
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