I parked at the little Bear Ridge pullout and crossed the street, uphill on the private road to a gated old logging road. Walk the old road for a few minutes and you'll see the access trail on your left. The trail switchbacks up past an old cabin in the woods (empty) and a couple neighborhood access trails before reaching the Mountainside Drive TH on Squak. I continued uphill and onto the Chybinski Loop. By this point there is snow on the trail, fairly packed and slushy/icy in places as well as the mudholes you should expect after as much rain as we've had lately. I continued up until I reached the turnoff for Margaret's Way. Margaret's way at first is in fine condition and was even run-able for me (I have a low tolerance for mud and slush/snow when running) and then became increasingly muddy in places with a couple of epic mudholes. At the Cougar/Squak corridor trailhead I headed north on SR900 for a short distance to the Cougar Mountain Wilderness Peak trailhead. I went to Wilderness Peak next, then back down the trail to Shy Bear Pass and down the trail towards Fred's Railroad trail. I followed this to Clay Pit Road, then across to Klondike Marsh, to Cougar Pass, then back to my car via the Tibbet's Marsh/Creek and finally Bear Ridge. Overall, above about 1000 feet you should expect some snow. There was more snow on Cougar than on Squak- perhaps beacuse of different sorts of tree cover? the more open areas have more snow. However, I didn't step in any snow more than about 3" deep. As these trails get a lot of traffic and have been rained on for a couple of days, the snow was more of a slippery packed slush mixed with mud most of the time. I was fine in my trail runners, however, the weather forecast is for sub freezing temps this week. If you are headed this way after the hard freeze expected Tuesday, I would come prepared for all the wet slushy snow and mud to become ice. This hike is a little over 13 miles and 3000+ elevation gain/loss.

This was a short loop trip to Wilderness Peak. It is basically a level walk with a 600 foot elevation gain at the end to the "peak". Other than a semi-steep ascent of 0.5 miles or so at the end it is pleasant and the woods are cool and shaded making this a nice walk on those last to summer days where heat can be a factor. My phone app noted a 4.5 mile RT with 600 feet of elevation gain/loss from the Sky Country trail head. Other than the woods there is a large beaver dam on Clay Pit road at a Coal Creek crossing. The dam is worth seeing. There is a note on the East Fork Trail (off Fred's Railroad) of a protective owl that has attacked hikers on this trail. I did not see the bird but did see plenty of warnings.

I was a very hot day so we looked up a shady, mostly flat trail. Lots of trees in this area but I wish the breeze moving the leaves above us had come down to our level. From the Harvey Manning trailhead, our route today was Shangri La (heading W), Coyote Creek, By Pass, Fred's Railroad, East Fork, Mine Shaft, Tibbets Marsh, Cougar Pass, and Harvey Manning (renamed somewhat recently I gather). The GPS said 4.9mi total that included some detours. We only encountered a handful of trail runners and hikers. Maybe the "real" hikers ventured further from home that day. I listed the bugs as not too bad but they were pretty thick on the East Fork trail. There is a marsh that is not on the map that provided a fertile breeding ground. We just kept moving and took lunch at the Mine Shaft with no bugs around. I was wishing that the mine shaft grate had an opening so we could go down far enough to get some cooler air. Thanks Boy Scouts for the bench and information sign. The shaft is 1200 ft long! The sky was hazy but there were decent views at the Clay Pit and at the trailhead pergola. You can see Mt Baker from the pergola but with the haze it was barely there. It is right in the middle of my crummy phone photo. The hanging baskets at the pergola had the only flowers we saw. Wildlife was one very small frog, one squirrel, and some birds.

My spouse and I went on this 4 mile journey in 88 degree weather, but we came prepared with water and had a great time. The trees provided plenty of shade from the blazing sun, and we only saw two other people along our way. We parked at Sky Country trailhead and almost had the whole lot to ourselves. Plenty to see on the trails, and the mine shaft looked awesome. We saw a couple frogs and rabbits, and heard birds. But it was mostly peaceful, if not eerily quiet. Beautiful hike!

This was a short hike (about 1 hr in length) with limited views {falls were in full throat}. Some low-land wild flowers were in bloom and the trees are coming out of hibernation. The trails were dry except for the Quarry trail which had mud patches. With the sun out and temperatures in the 70's this was a great walk in the woods.