I think I did this hike a long time ago but just in case I didn’t, it was time to try again. This trail is also knowns as the Mazama Trail. That’s because at some point, this trail was decommissioned and no longer maintained. When that happened, the Mazamas, a local outdoors group, decided to maintain the trail in exchange for the name. Getting to the trailhead is half the fun as you have to drive up on a forest road that almost seems you should be hiking instead of driving. Once you negotiate that, you can start on the trail as it travels on the west side of the Ladd Creek Canyon. The route is pretty straight forward as it follows the side of the ridge to a rock field. A couple of switchbacks later, you reach the wilderness boundary and the Cathedral Ridge. I don’t recall views from here as it was probably very forested. Now the views extend a bit more as part of the forest went up in flames with the Dollar Lake fire three years ago. That with the low hanging clouds and fog make most of the hike almost magical. And needless to say, we had the trail to ourselves. The original plan for this though was to reach the Timberline Trail, veer left and descend to Cairn Basin which I haven’t visited for a year or two. That plan got thwarted about a quarter of a mile or less from the Timberline Trail as we found the ridge snow covered. We could guess were the trail was and the route to follow but the consensus of the group was not to gamble it and return. That ended up being a good choice as it started raining just a couple of minutes after we stopped to eat some lunch.
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