Lovely day and the trails are in good condition, mostly dry. Violets and Trillium are blooming, Bleeding Heart is a couple days from opening up along Deceiver.

Just want to put a note here to remind people not to leave valuables in their vehicles. We returned to the parking lot to find a deputy writing up a report because one of our cars was broken into at Sky Country.

Thank you to the deputy and to the hikers who called 911 when they saw the broken glass.

Despite the hyperventilation of snow-crazed local T.V. weather forecasters, today was quite a nice day for hiking. Starting at the Sky Country trailhead, I rambled around Cougar Mountain and visited all three of the park's lovely waterfalls (Coal Creek, Doughty, and Far Country) and various other highlights. The air was dry and brisk, a light dusting of snow flocked the trees, and the frozen soil of the trails crunched crisply underfoot...what could be nicer?

Two of the waterfalls have gotten a makeover--Doughty Falls sports a new overlook and the formerly elusive Far Country Falls has a new access trail to its base.

The conditions of the trails was generally excellent, with a few minor blowdowns here and there being the main problem. Often I will do a trail-by-trail breakdown of maintenance problems in my trip reports, but there is no need here at Cougar Mountain. Not much snow, ice or mud anywhere. Some general issues deserve a mention:

The Vista Points--Long View Peak and Far Country have become grown over and don't offer much of a view anymore. May I suggest that King County do a little tasteful tree removal to improve the view?

The Holly Menace--Something has to be done about the slow motion invasion of holly trees through out the park. They are everywhere! Otherwise, in 20 years, the trails in the park will be viewless tunnels through thickets of those scratchy shrubs.

The Renton Fish and Game Club--Somehow, even though they are about 3 to 4 miles south of Cougar Mountain, they are blanketing the park in gunfire noise. This problem seems to have gotten much worse in recent years. They need to build higher berms and walls to mitigate the noise. For now, I only hike at Cougar Mountain on mondays and tuesdays, where they are closed. Ah, blessed silence!

I took advantage of a few hours of dry weather to tour some of Cougar Mountain's trails. The chilly storm engulfing the Northwest had left patches of snow on the higher regions of Cougar Mountain, but signs of spring abounded despite the cold weather.

In a suburban park like this, the trails should pass the tennis shoe test, that is one should be able to hike in tennis shoes without getting one's feet soaked in mud and water. For the most part, I found that Cougar Mountain's trails passed the test with flying colors.

One problem with Cougar Mountain is the gunfire noise coming in from the Renton Fish and Game Club. This noise seems to have gotten much worse in recent years. The club is not open monday or tuesday, so these days are the best time to hike if you want some peace and quiet here.

Here's more info on some of the trails I visited:

Shy Bear Trail

Highlights: A secluded valley with creeks and marshes abounding with newly sprouting skunk cabbages.

Condition: recently reworked by the WTA and in good shape

Deceiver Trail

Highlights: Pretty forest, Long View Peak (not much a view), beautiful mossy Doughty Falls, which is flowing strongly now.

Condition: Good, with signs of reworked tread. The Doughty Falls viewing spot now has log steps and there is a new bridge over the creek.

East Fork Trail

Highlights: A quiet forest trail with small creeks and ponds, the Clay Pit vista, mining artifacts

Condition: Formerly this trail suffered from water runoff and mud. Now it's much better than it used to be, thanks to the WTA

This is a tale of two hikes in the Issaquah Alps over the last two Saturdays. The first hike was on November 14th and did a loop hike to Coal Creek Falls from the Sky Country Trail Head. This is a short 3 mile walk on good trails which were not very muddy and had no significant blow down. There is a new bridge over Coal Creek on the trail, quite nice and likely overdue.

On the more recent Saturday, I walked to Wilderness Peak from the Sky Country Trail Head and then to Long View Peak, returning via the Deceiver and Shy Bear Trails. On the 21st there was more evidence of wind fall (blow down) but nothing that could not be stepped over easily. The trails were a bit more muddy and Shy Bear Marsh was more like a shallow lake.

On both days I avoided rain, a nice thing, and saw deer tracks in the mud. Trails are still in good shape despite the rain.