I’m still asking myself why did it take me so long to go back to Huffman Peak. The first time I tried this loop was about 6 years ago and we found, really fast, the March was probably too early in the year. Back then the weather was less than perfect, there was considerable snow and the clouds covered most of the limited views from the trail. More importantly though, we were not able to find the actual summit. In contrast, this time was the right time to do it. I had seen some pictures from a friend on Facebook who gave me a couple of important details to reach the summit. So with all that in hand, we headed out to Siouxon Creek to start our hike. Instead of heading down and east along the creek. This loop starts going uphill towards the west but just for a little bit. As soon as you find an intersection the trail goes quickly down towards Siouxon Creek meandering thru some pretty big trees. While I hanged in the back of the group it was almost like watching a trail of ants walking around standing toothpicks. Soon and still fresh, we got to the creek which we knew we had to cross. With the recent low water and snow years we’ve had, Siouxon was running extremely low so for a moment we considered the possibility of using rocks to cross. After a couple of minutes, we realized that it wouldn’t be easy to that given the width of the creek. So with a bit of reluctance, we took our shoes off and waded the creek to the other side where we got our shoes back on and started the hard part of the hike. One of the main descriptors for this hike is that it pretty much goes up. Even though most of the trail follows a ridgeline towards the summit, views are very limited. There is only a spot or two where you can see the Siouxon drainage to the southeast but nothing more. After several hours of huffing and puffing we finally got to a saddle just before the trail makes a turn and goes around the north side of the summit. We looked for a marked path towards the summit but only found what looked like an animal path. So just before the trail started to descend again, we veered off trail and tried to keep in the ridgeline towards the summit. At that point, the going got slow. On one side, the path was not easy to follow, but on the other, most of the mountainside was covered in bear grass that gets really slippery when you step on it. Aside from dealing with that, we had to find our way around and thru multiple low pines with dry branches that acted as little hands grabbing onto our gear and clothes. Yes, we did get our good share of scratches before we finally got out of the dense vegetation to an open slope. At that point we started getting the good views. Even though there was a bit of haze, Mt Hood was showing its face out in the distance. Ahead of us we saw a good approach to a rocky outcrop that seemed to be the summit. Once we got there and made the final push, we reached a rocky ridge and that’s when we got out rewards, first with an incredible view of Mt St Helens, and then, a bit further up, Mt Adams.
We traversed the top to the eastern end where remains of an old fire tower are still visible and stopped there for lunch. After a need rest and being fried with the intense sun, we continued on the ridge and found a much easier way down back to the Huffman Peak trail. At that point we were back in the forest making our way to the Wildcat Mountain trail which we took going down. We did the necessary stop at Wildcat falls, both from the viewpoint on top of it and also from the trail as it passes next to it. Even though I took a couple of pictures, I had to make a mental note that I need to go back there to take some more serious pictures… on of these days. Back at Siouxon Creek we had several options to go back. WE chose the shortest which pretty much meant crossing the creek right there and then doing a little bushwhack back to the Siouxon trail. The hike from that point back to the car was very relaxing as the sun started to move away from the ridge and the colors in the forest started to change to intense oranges. It was an intense workout but the rewards make out for it.
You can see the rest of the pictures here
Interactive map
To see the full map, click
here
No comments:
Post a Comment