Trip Reports

Parked at Hwy 18 Summit TH. Hiked Iverson RR Grade to West Side Rd. and then south on TMT. South Tiger Traverse Trai is closed for logging. Tread in excellent condition. A few mosquitoes in the shade. Needs serious brushing in sections with the nettles being the worst. Think about long pants for this hike. Poor or no signs where TMT crosses the South Tiger Powerline Trail (really a road). Found TMT by going west on the Powerline Trail just before steep section of road. Almost completely overgrown and no sign. Once in the woods the trail is OK again. At Hobart Gap the trails did not match our Green Trails map. This last section of the TMT was the most scenic of the southern sections we hiked. There is parking at the southern TH for about 10 cars on the shoulder. Stats were 11 miles, 1,900' and 6.5 hours (incl. 1/2 hour of route finding at the Powerline.)

What a great day to go out and walk in the woods. The trail is 16 or so miles long going from the Tiger Mt Rd (near the Issaquah Hobart road) and meanders north to Highpoint. The trail is in pretty good condition but there is the usual ""thin"" trail in the middle part of the 16 miles. The only drawback of this trail is the absence of viewpoints. There are some nice local territorial views but the first real views are at Tiger 3 or 2 which is a long ways when you start at the south end of the trail. This is a nice trail for solitude as we only saw a few other people over the entire day (until we got to Highpoint of course). There were only 4 people on Tiger 2 which is not even part of the TMT and we saw one other person below the Railroad Grade on the north side of Tiger 2.

I've always enjoyed a nice hike in the rain (but in July?), and my Tiger Mountain trek this past Friday evening was no different. Arrived at the High Point trailhead at about 5pm, and while it was wet, it was not raining. I decided to complete one of my favorite loops that includes all or parts of several trails. Started up the main trail to West Tiger 3, my first visit since all of the maintenance and re-routing. I was quite impressed with how much work has been completed - and the trail has really changed (I think for the better). I wonder how this change has impacted the length of the hike to West Tiger 3.

It started to rain somewhere near the West Tiger Railroad Grade - I am sure it was somewhere near there as I don't think I actually ever saw the Railroad Grade intersection (I'll watch for it next time). As the trail approached the peak, the work ends and the previous trail is followed to the peak (and it all looked familiar again). The rain was now pretty much coming in sideways, and the peak was in the clouds, so I moved on over the peak on the trail to West Tiger 2. I connected with the Tiger Mountain Trail (TMT) and turned to the right in a driving rainstorm. I enjoy hiking in the rain, but the wind was pretty tough during this stretch, but soon abated as I hiked down from the saddle between West Tiger 2 and 3. Wind would not be an issue for the rest of the hike.

The TMT in this area does not seem to get a lot of use. The trail is almost overgrown in some of the marshy areas. At one point, I had to look pretty hard for the trail through all of the vegetation. There is a bit of trail maintenance underway in this area - that will help as the trail can get pretty thin, on the side of some pretty steep hills. It is good that I was dressed for the rain, as the vegetation was soaked, and it was trying to soak me. By the time I hit the One View trail, the rain was starting to lighten and the the trek through 15 mile pass and over the last climb up and down to the Poo Poo Point trail intersection was pretty uneventful - except for slippery areas and several huge puddles.

The trip down the Poo Poo Point trail was also pretty uneventful, except for lots of mud. Still lots of wet vegetation. Once I hit the road at the bottom it was only misting. I headed back to the trailhead via this road and the Bus Trail. While walking on the Bus Trail the rain hit hard one more time and it continued all the way back to the car (outside the gate).

A wonderful hike, close to the city, but it sure did not seem like it once I passed West Tiger 3. I saw no other hikers after the West Tiger 3 trail as well - it is good that my cell phone works in all of these areas. On this trail (and the road) a little over three hours, and it was a great way to end the week. Would like to hear more about intersting loop hikes on Tiger Mountain.

Hiked the TMT today. Basically a mudfest. On this drizzly day, we only saw the hard core Sunday morning trail runners. As expected, the trail is very overgrown in any recently logged area. the Pawprint rest stop needs a roof over the picnic table. Middle Tiger area was quite pleasant. Birds were still out, some bunchberries in bloom and we saw a nice patch of what I think is Moneses uniflora - wood nymph. A good day in spite of the weather.

This was my third time to Middle Tiger but my first visit via the Preston Trail. Our group lead by Tom from IATC went up the Preston Trail to the Paw Print Rest Area and then via the TMT to the Middle Tiger Trail, over Middle Tiger and then back to Paw Print via an abandoned road and the Tiger Mt. Road and returned via the Preston Trail – about 12 miles round trip.

The Preston Trail goes through some great woodland areas and is shady all of the way up, a real plus on a warm Sunday. Some of the upper trail is quite brushy but not hard to follow.

The TMT is in very good shape on the two miles we traveled. Going up the Middle Tiger trail from the TMT is steep but it is short so no problems. We stopped for lunch at the summit; someone commented that the last time they were here there were mosquitoes, well up to that point no bugs, but as if on queue they came out with a vengeance after this comment.

My last trip down the road from Middle Tiger was very pleasant. This time brush was had grown up on the upper part of the road; eliminating much of the views but again no navigation problems.

The return from this point was fine, with no problems. We did encounter a territorial dog at a house on the “power line” section of the Preston Trail. He or she barked and followed our group coming and going but was not a problem.

There are still an number of blow downs on all the trails and roads noted except the Tiger Mt. Road. Logging is going on in the general area and has closed the East Tiger Trail.

Last December after the big wind storms, a group of us tried to hike the Tiger Mountain Trail (TMT) from south to north. We failed miserably and had to bail out a side trail at about 1/3 of the way in. On that trip we lost track of the number of blowdowns at 200 or so. This trip was much more pleasant and enjoyable. We dropped a car off at the High Point parking lot at 6:30 and were on the trail just north of the Issaquah-Hobart Road by 7 am. Throughout the day we kept marvelling at the amazing trail repair that had been accomplished over the entire 15 miles of the TMT. The weather was amazing – sunny with a light breeze. The trilliums were huge; there were a few samples of skunk cabbage around; and there were lots of YWF’s (yellow wild flowers). Very few people were on the southern 2/3 of the TMT (3 other people and 3 or so dogs). We stopped for our third lunch break on the summit of Tiger 2 and enjoyed the views to Rainier and out to the sound. The sound of the generator running near the antenna tower seemed better to us than the hordes of people that we knew must be over at Tiger 3. The parking lot was entirely different at 3 pm compared to 6:30 am. There were so many people and cars that we even considered trying to sell our parking spot.

The goal was to do the entire Tiger Moutain Trail (TMT) from south to north as we approach the shortest day of the year. We failed miserably but we did get to use one term over and over again – “blowdown”. It seemed like there was a “green wall” in front of us after each turn of the trail. We jokingly thought we would run into 100 blowdowns over the 16 miles of the TMT. That estimate would turn out to be a little low. We started at first light at the TMT point on SE Tiger Mountain Road. Even the parking lot had a lot of debris laying around. It is only 1.5 miles to the junction with the South Tiger Loop Trail but that leg took over 1 hour. Generally, any place close to a ridge or gap was a real mess. The next leg on the east side of South Tiger also had plenty of “green walls”. It took another hour or more to get to the north end of the loop trail. Bail out plans began to surface. It was decided to bang away for a while longer and continue on to the trail junction that heads up to Middle Tiger. The trail was not too bad until we neared Karl’s Gap. What a mess! It might be easier just to re-route the trail around this part. At the junction to Middle Tiger, the fun meter, energy levels and amount of daylight left were dropping quickly. We lost track of the “blowdown” count at somewhere over 200 and we had hiked about 1/3 of the TMT. The bail out trail from this point down to the West Side Road is faint and partly hidden beneath some blowdown debris but the trail is passable and actually in much better shape than anything we had been on to that point. We then followed the West Side Road to where it comes close to SE Tiger Mountain Road. We picked one of 2 trails which dead-ended in one last blowdown section. We crawled under and around and ended up in someone’s backyard. We found our way to the road and then had a couple of miles of road walk back to the cars.

Six Summits and a Point

My point is not to poo poo the accomplishments of the other fine hikers who have hiked the six Tiger summits in a day. But, I think it is rather pointless to do the six highpoints and skip the other highpoint, Poo Poo Point.

Early in the week I had emailed David and proposed the Six Summits Hike for our Saturday Hike. David replied with a counter proposal to do the Six Summits Hike and Poo Poo Point. So I thought, if we're going to go out and do a killer hike, why not do a good job and make sure we're really wiped out at day's end. I also conned Jim, who was interested in doing Six Summits, into the trip.

Saturday was a great day for our big adventure with mostly sunny skies and cool temperatures. So Saturday morning found us eagerly tromping along the West Side Road towards Poo Poo Point. We reached Poo Poo Point a little after 9 and thought we had a good shot at doing the whole hike. After a brief water break we were hiking the Railroad Grade towards West Tiger 3. The Railroad Grade was in good shape with only one windfall that was easy to step over. The deciduous trees had not leafed out yet so we had views of W. Tiger 1 and 2 along the way. The Section Line Trail from the Railroad Grade up to Tiger 3 was our first steep grind, but mercifully short, gaining only 500 ft. Tiger 3 had a crowd of people enjoying the morning sunshine.

The hike up Tiger 2 and 1 was straight forward. We saw a couple of people on the top of each. We proceeded on the Bootleg and East Tiger trails up East Tiger. Both trails were in good shape and lonely. The Christmas Tree which is located on the Bootleg Trail just before the junction with the Paw Print Connector Trail, still had most of its decorations.

As luck would have it, we reached the top of East Tiger at half past 12 just in time for lunch at the picnic table. At 3004 ft elevation, E. Tiger was the high point of our hike. The hike was half over and we had reached five of our seven highpoints. The remaining two would take the rest of the day. After a pleasant half hour eating our lunch, we were on our way. We then descended the ""Hubcap Trail"". This route starts a couple hundred feet back down the road from the picnic table and hits the Preston Railroad Grade about 300 ft from the Tiger Mtn Road. As it turned out this was the most dangerous part of the trip. Just past the hubcap, David had grabbed a branch, it broke and he went for a tumble. Fortunately he only suffered a small cut on his hand. Farther down, Jim pushed on a small tree and it fell over almost hitting me. It was on the Hubcap Trail that we saw two garter snakes sunning themselves.

It was then on to Middle Tiger mostly hiking on roads. The spur road heading up Middle Tiger had one of the best views of the trip. The view stretched from the Olympics to the Cascades with W. Tiger 1 in the center. This view made up for the tiny, 10 degree view from the top of Middle Tiger. We were surprised to run into another hiker on the top of Middle Tiger, being that this was a relatively deserted part of the Issaquah Alps. The steep 500 ft. descent to the TMT was hard on our tired legs. We trudged along the TMT towards South Tiger. We took the South Tiger Traverse and turned up South Tiger at the large stump with the two notches. At the completely forested summit we signed the register happy to have reached the seven highpoints. This was the only summit where we didn't see other hikers. At our moderate pace, it took us seven hours to reach highpoint number seven.

Now all we had left to do was to backtrack to the W. Side Road and hike it back to our cars. The hike consisted of a 19 mile, 4400 ft gain loop by the peaks plus a short hike to and from the loop. This was a great time for a Tiger Mtn hike. There wasn't any snow on the trails and the deciduous trees did not yet have leaves to block views. We saw several trillium, salmonberry, skunk cabbage and yellow violets in bloom.

Charlene and I started up the High Point Trail, the original northern terminus on the TMT. The trail starts up an old road, crosses under a powerline and climbs into cool second-growth forest. We took a left at Dwight's Way and traversed across the north end of Tiger to the intersection with the original Preston Trail. This area of West Tiger is barely used, quiet and peaceful. Trilliums and violets were waking from their winter's sleep and birds were singing.

We turned towards the West Tiger 1 Trail, crossing the North Tiger RR Grade. There was a couple of intersections in this area that were a bit vague, obviously less traveled. Portions of the trail were overhung with fern fronds, although the tread was relatively easy to follow. After the RR Grade, we climbed up the heavily forested slopes of WT1 crunching through a thin layer of ice pellets until towards the top, we were hiking through about 4 to 5 inches of snow.

West Tiger 1, at 2948 feet, is the second highest peak of the Tiger complex, but is covered by communication towers and outbuildings. A bypass trail brings the hiker up to the west side of the towers, to a metal hikers hut and view point. A convenient bench served as a nice lunch spot. From our vantage point we could see a few paragliders testing the thermals near Poo Poo Point. Although our view of The Mountain was blocked by low clouds, we could see practically the entire Puget Sound Basin before us.

From WT1, we descended the maintenance road and came to WT2. We completed the loop by dropping down the bypass trail on WT2 to the TMT and out to High Point Trail. Portions of the West Tiger RR Grade and TMT near Fred's Corner were very muddy from recent hard rains. We admired the newish log bridge over one of the small creeks. Trees and bushes were budding out.

This was definitely a lesser used side of West Tiger. All day we only saw 8 people and 6 of them were on top of WT1 and WT2.

Driving back later on the Issaquah-Hobart Road, I briefly admired the sight of about 16 to 20 paragliders hovering above the valley near Poo Poo Point. They had attracted quite a crowd below of spectators and even a sheriff's car.

Stats: 7.2 miles, 2600' gain.

We had a pleasant after work hike up the Highpoint and TMT trails to W. Tiger 2 and continued on the road to W. Tiger 1. We returned via the Preston Trail and Dwight's Way. Though muddy in spots, all the trails were in good shape. We saw a number of trillium in bloom at lower elevations, especially along Dwight's Way. The sign announcing Fred's Corner was missing, but we did see both the Ruth's Cove and Tom's Crossing signs. Along the TMT was a huge trail bridge that seemed a little out of character. A short ways before this bridge we caught a glimpse of Mt. Baker through the trees. From Tiger 2 to 1 we had a great view of Mt. Rainier. On the way up we noticed an old mountain bike track on the Highpoint Trail which was signed hikers only. Later on Dwight's Way we encountered two mountain bikers. Of course they said they didn't see any hiker only signs. But we did. Where the Highpoint Trail leaves the powerline corridor was a hiker only sign which was partly obscured by a fern (which we trimmed back). The hiker only sign at the trailhead has been vandalized but one could still make out the message.

After years of hiking up to Poo Poo Point on the High School trail, we decided to try the new trail from the hang-glider field on the Issaquah-Hobart road. The trail begins across the grassy field from the parking lot (which is on the east side of the road). It turned out to be quite a good trail, beautifully constructed. The trail goes up steeply with long switchbacks to the lower hanglider site in about two miles. We stopped for a snack there and enjoyed the panoramic view. It's too bad it was so cloudy, because if Mount Rainier had been visible, it would have been spectacular. We continued up the trail to the upper site (about a quarter of a mile further). Then we continued from Poo Poo Point up the trail, along the railroad grade to a junction (at 2000 feet) with the high school trail(left) and the One View trail (right). The One View trail goes one mile and intersects the Tiger Mountain Trail. We turned left on the TMT and continued about 1.2 miles to Manning's Reach, our destination, where we had lunch. Luckily, the sun came out just as we sat down and we had a pleasant rest with a fine view out to the Lakes and even the Olympics mistily in the distance. The TMT south of Manning's Reach certainly doesn't get much traffic. The trail is rough in spots (quite muddy in places too), and we had to climb over several trees. We only saw one person at Manning's Reach and later, one more on the One View trail. Aside from these, we had total isolation from Poo Poo Point onwards. And this on a Saturday!