A friend and I hiked the whole loop today. It was much harder than we anticipated it being. Took us 6 hours to hike the loop with one short stop for lunch. The trail was rough. Trees down everywhere, a slide on part by a bridge (we navigated it, but it was tough), a tree across a bridge, deep snow (we weren’t prepared and post-holed up to our hips many times), and the snow is wet/heavy, not packed or powdery. The downed trees was probably the worst part. They are all over the place and with the deep snow it was difficult to hike. I’d wait a couple weeks before going back to let some more snow melt. Would not suggest hiking alone if you do decide to go up soon.

A friend and I hiked the whole loop today. It was much harder than we anticipated it being. Took us 6 hours to hike the loop with one short stop for lunch. The trail was rough. Trees down everywhere, a slide on part by a bridge (we navigated it, but it was tough), a tree across a bridge, deep snow (we weren’t prepared and post-holed up to our hips many times), and the snow is wet/heavy, not packed or powdery. The downed trees was probably the worst part. They are all over the place and with the deep snow it was difficult to hike. I’d wait a couple weeks before going back to let some more snow melt. Would not suggest hiking alone if you do decide to go up soon.

There are a LOT of trees down on this trail. We met the Mount Rose crew coming out as we were walking in around noon. They said it took them two hours to clear to the first bridge (over Big Creek). And they have their work cut out for them getting their beloved trail back into shape.

We walked for about an hour or so counter-clockwise on the loop before we turned around. I had not brought my micro-spikes and wish I had. There is still a lot of snow and at times you are walking on top, slipping on icy snow, and other times you posthole through. A person can get around or under all the obstructions on the trail, but it's slow going. 

Many thanks to all the volunteers who will be clearing up after this wild December.

The roads to Upper Big Creek were in excellent condition (I-5, 101, 119). The small lot before the locked campgrounds gate is inaccessible right now due to all the snow from the snow plows (thank you for keeping the roads nice and clear). There were a number of cars parked on the side of the road. We all seemed to fit nicely. I was worried about the trees above breaking off and landing on our cars. I shook that off and made the mistake of choosing spikes over snowshoes. Or maybe it wasn't a mistake. Not sure. There is a lot of snow in the campgrounds as you make your way to the trailhead. The bathrooms are open and stocked with TP. There is a nice snowshoe trail starting out in both directions of the loop. I chose to go counterclockwise. It gets brutal. There is a section of the trail after the skincreek bridge (I think that's the name of the bridge) where the trail under the snow had already become a little eroded away and very narrow. So the footing in the snow was incredible precarious on the hillside. I felt like I could easily slip down into the water below. The bridges are laden with soft unstable snow. The hillsides have a huge amount of snow. There are a bunch of broken trees on the trail. I crawled under two and climbed over, ducked under, or walked around the rest. The last bridge going counter clockwise is a narrow little bridge. I silpped and landed on my hands and knees. There was so much snow, I couldn't safely get back to my feet. It was not my favorite trail experience. I didn't want to turn back and face the narrow hillside again, so I pressed on. The good news besides the total beauty of the terrain, is that the second half of the trail going counter clockwise is nicely packed from snowshoers-you lovely souls! I did not realize the groups going clockwise and the groups going counterclockwise were stopping and turning back around the area of the bridges. I did the whole loop.

Go clockwise. Then you can safely turn back if you feel the trail gets too dicey. Also, I don't trust the trees with all that heavy frozen/melting snow. Once I made it back to the road with my car in sight, ten feet in front of me, a tree broke and crashed to the ground not hitting any cars-whew!

Be safe. Happy snow-going.

Keeping up my tradition as a widower of spending holidays hiking, a friend joined me this Christmas to make a fun leave-no-trace Christmas Dinner along the Big Creek Loop Trail - I've included 5min of video highlights below..

There was 4 to 8in of fresh snow, but we did not need spikes or snowshoes.  Lots of vine maples to duck under from snow weight but only 2 downed trees across the trail.

There's room to park off the street before the closed campground gate for about 12 cars. 

only saw a dozewn or so other hikers.

I hope YOU had a great Christmas too!