Cedar Spring Campground trailhead, up over Goat Peak, and back down to Bumping River to Cougar Flats campground on the Goat Creek trail. This is a distance of about 13 miles and the trail is in great shape for this time of year. Barely an obstacle or blowdown the entire distance and not a trace of snow to be seen. There is water avail. in several spots, the best being two well-flowing springs just off the trail possibly 5 and 8 miles in, at a guess. This is a fine day hike, but be aware the elevation gain is nearly 4000 feet and parts of the trail are steep. There is also about 1/4 mile of steep slope on loose material.

The road to the Goat Creek trailhead was closed Saturday evening, July 23, due to ""extreme fire danger"". A volunteer Fire Patrol person told us that it will not re-open until the next good rain, at the earliest. All available firefighters were assigned to the Hoquiam fire, or they are in Iraq. This may mean that other National Forest trails will also be closed.

I led a Mountaineer trip to this awesome waterfall that I last visited about 4 years ago. The trailhead starts from a logging road off Riffe Lake. This trailhead is no longer published in any hiking book that I know of. So I'm grateful to the Olympia Mountaineer hike leader who gave me the driving directions. This is lush forest hike along Goat Creek. About a mile in, you reach this awesome waterfall. What makes this waterfall even more interesting is that the trail goes behind the falls and you walk under this huge cavernous area. You immediately know why the waterfall is named Cathedral. It's like entering one of those large cathedrals in Europe. Just jaw-droppingly awesome. After pictures were taken we hiked further. our final destination was a small, no name lake on the map about 4 miles in. We passed beautiful cascading water and a couple of other waterfalls. More pictures. Just before the lake we ran into a water crossing that made some of the folks uncomfortable so we returned to the last waterfall where sun was shining through the forest and made that our lunch spot. After lunch some of us returned to the Mt. Tumwater junction to check out the Mt. Tumwater trail and was immediately stopped by an even larger, faster creek crossing and turned back. This is a nice, easy hike that is accessible for 3/4 of the year. The road up had large muddy spots that made us put our vehicles in 4WD, however, the little Jetta made it up just fine. The piture I am submitting is courtesy of one of our hikers, Chuck B.

Mother nature snookered me a bit today as I tried to outsmart her. Rain on the west side? I'll go east, and heck I'll go for views! Turned out dry so a forest hike along a river would have been the best choice for photography, and even east the cloud deck socked in at 5500' which put me JUST into the clouds and no views! But I almost didn't hike anyhow after the amazing wildlife display I had just getting to the trailhead! I left home early....4:15AM...so I could be home mid-afternoon. With my planned trip taking me east of Chinook Pass down hwy 410 I had thoughts of elk in my sights throughout the Pleasant Valley. But the wildlife started early: 4:17AM I had a huge coyote along the road that heads downhill from my home. Just before the Crystal Mountain turnoff along hwy 410 a black bear yearling dodged across the roadway. And the elk...sure, I wasn't too surprised to see them east of Chinook Pass, but I saw them EVERYWHERE! The biggest surprise was just north of Enumclaw along my backroad short-cut around town, where I saw a cow elk and a very small calf come out of a farmers hay field and cross the road--it was just light enough at 4:45AM that I could watch them! Then, another cow and baby calf along hwy 410 just south of Greenwater. Once I headed down the Pleasant Valley east of Chinook Pass I was almost about to call it a day and just sit and watch them. Eight calves and 17 adult elk were seen in the 8-10 miles from Bear Gap to the Bumping River Rd. turnoff, and it finished off with two more cow elk with a very small calf smack in the trailhead parking area!! Alas, I somehow decided to go ahead at 6:10AM and hike anyhow. The Goat Creek trail is the easiest approach to hike up Goat Peak on American Ridge as the 2700' gain to the ridge trail junction is done over four miles. There were blowdown the entire way up but they were scattered and all fairly easy to get over. The forest floor's carpet of vanilla leaf was outstanding! At 3700' the open rocky areas were covered with lupines and paintbrush in full bloom. From 3700'-4200' the forest was alive with the loud calls of hundreds of Evening Grosbeaks who were everywhere in the trees at this early hour--this was the largest concentration of evening grosbeaks I've ever witnessed! An unidentified owl flew off a dead snag in the same area and soared down a gully below me. And the beargrass...a good mile of the trail passes through a complete change in ecosystem where the silver and grand firs give way to alpine firs and mountain hemlocks, and through here the trail was lined with the beautiful white bombs of beargrass in full bloom! A few calypso orchids were still blooming, and once I broke out of the forest the last 1/8 mile before reading trail #958 these bare open slopes were a landmine of phlox, Columbia lewisia, larkspur, and penstemons. Here too where the views open up magically, so did magically the clouds drop on top of me. Suddenly I was socked in and in a heavy drizzle. Upon reaching American Ridge Trail #958 I decided against going up another 700' to the Goat Peak summit that could not be seen in this soup I was hiking in. But I did venture westward another mile along the steeply up/down American Ridge trail to a high point over 6100'. What a gorgeous ridge hike this is! Trees dotting the landscape that are full of character, and the flowers were excellent! Two more elk came up and over the ridge in the thick fog not 50' ahead of me like ghosts looking for a quick way to get from one valley to another. Once the drizzle started getting me more wet, I packed up and began my 5.5 mile stomp back to the trailhead. On the hike back I again took the time to enjoy the beargrass and evening grosbeaks, and I also spotted a stunningly beautiful yellow and black warbler and a pair of Western tanagers. Oh, there was never a snowpatch to see...it's all gone but I'm certain a little bit is still on the north side approach to Goat Peak for a bit yet. I didn't see a sole until just 15 minutes from the trailhead I passed one fella hiking in, and then right at the trailhead a group of 12 heading in that must have been a Mountaineers group or plant society group. I drove on home still in a daze from the massive wildlife drive I had to the trailhead and surely plan on an early 4:00AM start to come down here again just to see and photograph the elk that dot the landscape!

Great weather, few other people on the trail. I hadn't hiked this since I was 12 years old. A few logs to go over/under/around, but over all a nice little leg-stretching trail. I even found 4 Morel shrooms growing trailside. A dandy hike for warming up after a long inactive winter.