South Coast Wilderness Trail - Toleak Point
Bring a tide table and a good book on this scenic traverse of the wild Olympic Coast. While much of your hike will be across sandy beaches, there are several places that will require you wait for the tide to go out. Along the way, plan to climb up steep headlands with cable ladders, ropes and your hands and knees. The absolute elevation gain is minimal, but all of those ups and downs add up to more than 3000 feet. It's a challenge, but a good one.
The best way to hike this stretch of coast is to leave one car at the Oil City trailhead and drive the other one to your start at Third Beach near La Push. Plan at least two - and even better - three days for your walk. Make sure you bring along an excellent map and heed all instructions about where to cross and when. It's about a mile and a half through forest from the trailhead down to Third Beach. After crossing the beach, you will reach your first ladder to take you above Taylor Point. Watch your footing - it is slippery all along here when wet! And time your arrival back down at the beach for low tide. Scotts Bluff Camp is a great place to camp or push further to Strawberry Point. Toleak Point beckons, along with some nice sea stacks. One of many photo opportunities along the way and also an excellent place to camp. Past Toleak there are some natural arches. At the second one, look for the ladder up the headland. At the top you will cross Goodman Creek, which runs high in spring. Back down on the beach is a lonely stretch of sand - you'll likely have it to yourself. Finally, the last stretch requires waiting for low tide or heading up high to avoid the crashing waves - avoid round Hoh Head in any condition. As you approach the Hoh River, follow the Oil City Trail back to your car.
Driving Directions:
From Port Angeles follow US 101 west for 55 miles to the junction with State Route 110 (signed "Mora-La Push"). From Forks the junction is 2 miles north. Continue west on SR 110. In 7.7 miles, at Quillayute Prairie, SR 110 splits. Take the left fork (La Push Road) and proceed 3.8 miles to the trailhead, located on the south side of the road. Privy available. Recent Trip Reports
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Third Beach, South Coast Wilderness Trail - Toleak Point, South Wilderness Beach
— May 12, 2012
— PNA
Overnight
Issues:
Mud/Rockslide
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A friend was visiting this weekend, and we decided to do a short trip south from the Third Beach trailhead....
A friend was visiting this weekend, and we decided to do a short trip south from the Third Beach trailhead. There sure are a lot of possible names for this trail in the WTA database - I only included a few, and don't which might be "correct" or "incorrect".
The parking lot was surprisingly uncrowded, given the prolonged forecast for great weather. Numerous people were headed for Toleak Point, but we didn't go that far. The hike to Third Beach is nice, and in pretty good shape. We just kept hiking south from there, crossing up and over Taylor Point. The very first part of the climb up from the beach is steep clay, which was fine when dry, but might be pretty difficult when wet. The forest stretch has some pretty wet mudholes, although they seemed to be drying out quickly. Then the drop down to the next beach is in good shape. We had to go over Scott's Bluff both ways, which is again a steep clay surface on the north end. There is no marker for the north end of the trail!! You just have to look for the ropes going up the slope. This is probably a slippery mess when wet. The south end is all forested and brings you right to Scott Creek, where there are a few campsites in the woods, and a few spots on the sand that are fairly high. We camped there, but walked down as far as Strawberry Point (which has nice campsites on either sand or in the very sparse trees). Most of these beaches seem to be actively eroding, and probably would not be passable at a high tide or high surf. But they are easy walking for the most part. Bringing gloves could be very helpful when using the ropes - a lot of them are pretty abrasive and quite small diameter. Didn't see much in the way of wildlife, although there were raccoon, fox (?), deer and otter tracks on the sand. Eagles and robins and winter wrens were about it for birds. We did have very bold mice at night and chipmunks in the daytime - be careful with your food! Not a lot interesting in the way of flowers - Trillia, elderberries, a twinberry, salmonberries, and the last of the swamp lanterns. It was a really nice, relaxing, lazy trip to enjoy the nice weather and the sound of the surf. And some bouldering. And walking barefoot in the sand. Overnight
Issues:
Mudholes | Water on trail
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This was a fairly important hike to me. Whilst commuting by bicycle back in February, a nice Doberman Pinscher...
This was a fairly important hike to me. Whilst commuting by bicycle back in February, a nice Doberman Pinscher came along and sunk it's teeth into my leg. This lead to some health troubles and a long road to recovery.
After all this, I've slowly been working to get back into shape, get muscle tone back, etc. Last week, in another milestone hike, I hiked Dirtyface, showing that I could once again undertake a challenging hike. This hike, to Toleak Point, was my return to carrying a big overnight pack. With almost every high-country destination still snowed in, the choise of destination was pretty straightforward. Judging from the line at the WIC in Port Angeles, everybody else thought so too. Oh well. True to the nature of the REALLY wet side of the mountains, I approach the trailhead under a light misting rain. This had stopped by the time I hit the trail, and most of my hike was under cool, cloudy skies. The overland trails had a couple of man-eating mudholes, but at least all the ropes and ladders were in place. And, of course, hiking on the beach was sublime. I reached Toleak Point, set up came, and watched the sun finally burn through. I spent severall idyllic hours roaming the beach before bedtime. Morning again brought a nice cloud layer and delightful hiking conditions. It'd almost feel wrong to hike the Washington coast under sunshine. Clouds, rain, yes. But sunny skies would almost diminish the experience. ;-) After returning to the car, I made the quick drive to Rialto Beach, and did a short jaunt to hole-in-the-wall for lunch. Sooooooo nice! Multi-night backpack
Issues:
Overgrown | Mudholes
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This hike is well worth the extra effort of shuttling cars and timing the tides. It's one of the...
This hike is well worth the extra effort of shuttling cars and timing the tides. It's one of the most unique trails I've done. The variety on this trail is amazing. Sandy beach, rocky beach, thick forest, thin forest, rope ladders, ropes, etc.
I hiked south from Third Beach to Toleak on Saturday, Toleak to Mosquito Creek on Sunday, and Mosquito Creek to Oil City on Monday. The trail was passable and without any blowdowns. It seemed a little wild for a maintained trail. I'd read other reports of ladders missing steps. It looks like they've replaced those. The trail south of Mosquito Creek was quite brushy and muddy. On the first day, I was concerned about making it around a rock with a 4 foot tide requirement. I got there as the tide was going out, planning on waiting until it was passable. The map didn't show an overland route, but it turns out that there was one. On the second day, I was concerned about fording a couple of creeks. Luckily, it hadn't rained in a few days and the creeks were low. Goodman was mid-calf. The guidebook suggested fording Mosquito creek at low tide, but on my trip that wasn't really necessary. I got to Mosquito early, and debated whether to complete the 3.5 mile overland section that day or the next day. I decided to complete it the next day and explore the beach south of Mosquito instead. Good choice - it didn't look like there were many, if any, campsites on the beach just south of that overland section. There were a few sites in the woods, toward the southern end of the overland. On day 3, I did the 3.5 mile overland, a short hike on a beach, and then crossed a big pile of rocks which required a 2 foot tide. Footing on the rocks is tricky, and there are a lot of them, so leave yourself some time to cross them. 1 hour should be more than enough, but I don't recall how long it actually took.
South Coast Hike, Third Beach, Toleak Point
— Aug 29, 2010
— copisetter
Multi-night backpack
Features:
Wildflowers blooming
Issues:
Mud/Rockslide | Water on trail
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We started from the Third Beach trailhead around 1:30pm on Sunday and passed a number of weekend hikers and backpackers...
We started from the Third Beach trailhead around 1:30pm on Sunday and passed a number of weekend hikers and backpackers heading out of the forest. The trailhead privy was well stocked with toilet paper and hand sanitizer. The 1.4 mile trail down to the beach was mellow and fairly wide.
As soon as we got down to the beach we saw some dolphins and seals playing in the surf- not a bad way to start the trip! From there we continued down the beach and up the rope ladders (not for the faint of heart) to the next few beaches, ultimately ending up at the awesome campsite at Scotts Creek. It took less than two hours to get there and we settled in for the afternoon with an early dinner and walk south to check out the tide pools at low tide. There we saw dozens of purple and red starfish and green anemones. If you're looking to explore some tide pools, these were the best we saw on our short trip. We woke up to a gorgeous day and headed south around 9am for some more exploring while the tide was low. We made it all the way past Toleak Point where you can look out and see Alexander Island after crossing Goodman Creek. The ladders south of Toleak had some wooden pieces missing making the climb a little spicier than usual. We only saw about 2 or 3 other couples throughout the entire day and otherwise had the beaches to ourselves. We saw a bunch of banana slugs, wildflowers, birds, one bald eagle, and some seals and otters throughout the day. The blueberries were just a week or so too ripe for eating. We had turned around and had lunch back at the south end of Toleak Point around 1pm, just in time to beat high tide at camp. It was definitely helpful to have water shoes (Chacos/Keens,etc) as the rocks were slippery and we had to wade through the water a few times coming back. The point just south of Scotts Creek is impassable at high tide but there is an unofficial trail just behind it that we found and used with ease. We made it back to camp by 4pm just in time for naps and an early dinner. Since we had to get out early the next day, we packed up and hiked 1.5 hours back to Third Beach to camp for the night, arriving just before sunset. As we woke up to pouring rain, we were happy to only have to hike out 1.4 miles to the trailhead. Overall, a wonderful and very unique adventure! Overnight
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Toleak Point Quickie… – ONP 07/22-23/10
Introduction:
(Intro from Day Hiking Olympic Peninsula – Craig Romano
“Sand ladders and ankle-twisting terrain climb...
Toleak Point Quickie… – ONP 07/22-23/10
Introduction: (Intro from Day Hiking Olympic Peninsula – Craig Romano “Sand ladders and ankle-twisting terrain climb 250 feet up and over the imposing head-land. Travel through a grove of old growth Sitka Spruce before making a steep decent back to sea level.” Ok, from this point you have to watch the tides and you will do the above all over a couple more times to reach this destination. Directions: Drive 55 miles west of Port Angeles to the State route 110 (Mora – La Push cutoff) and take a right and follow this road towards La Push. Park at the Third Beach TH on the Left. I only had a two day window and the tides kind of dictated this hike. It only takes 2 ½ hours hiking time to get to Toleak Pt from the Third Beach TH at a slow to moderate pace. The trail is on the rough side but there is nothing too serious to worry about. That said, I would not want to do this trail in the rain. There are head-land trails with ropes over any point that the tide would prevent you from getting around. (Be sure not to leave anything of value in your car at the TH. We did not have any problems but others have in the past. There are signs warning this as well.) Happy hiking... |
Toleak Point. Photo by Morgan Heim.
2010
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