Intended to backpack here but there were two dozen cars at the TH and parked along the other side of the road. Gave up and went somewhere more remote. Turns out "desolate" hikes are no longer... Thanks WTA and social media (not).

My friends and I greatly enjoyed this trail. The wildflowers along the ridge line dazzled while Rainier, St. Helens, and Adams peaked over equally stunning ridges. We spent two nights at the lake, where we found maybe a dozen campsites, including a particularly beautiful one on the lake with a nice fire pit. Being independence day weekend, these sites filled up quickly, surely disappointing a few hikers.

The hike weaves in and out of the eruption zone, and any time you're outside the blast, i.e., in old-growth forest, a horde of mosquitoes will be circling you. This includes the lake, but we were able to deter them with a reasonable fire. During the day, we escaped them by heading up to the wildflower meadows on the ridge.

Nothing on the trail impeded us, although a fork near Deadman's lake initially confused us because the sign is nearly illegible. Go left here and you'll soon find the lake.

If you come from Randle, follow Google Maps directions along FR 25 and FR 26. You won't have any trouble with the roads. The entire section is paved except for the final 1/4 mile. We took this route from Portland.

Fabulous hike. The wildflowers along the ridge were in full bloom and the views are incredible. The first 2 miles are no joke, but the views from the ridge line made up for it. There were a few small snow patches, but very easy to cross.

Hikers beware: Once you drop down off the ridge line and continue to Deadman's Lake, the mosquitos are AWFUL. Bring your strongest insect repellant. 

Trip Type: 1-night, Loop
Trails:

• Green River Trail 213
• Vanson Ridge Trail 213A
• Vanson Lake Trail 217B
• Goat Mountain Trail 217

This trip started out as a 2 night weekend trip however, as usual plans change.

Getting to the trail head wasn't an issue at all, I used Google Maps which did take me on NF-2742 that did have gates (open, at the time) which may pose an issue if/when they were closed.

Once on NF-25, the road certainly has slumps, potholes and other potential hazards, and driving speed will be slow.

Day 1 / Friday
Parked at the Goat Mountain / Deadmans Lake TH, and took the Green River Trail (across the road from the Parking Lot), and headed downhill. The trail was wonderfully soft filled with needles and other forest duff. Trail condition was excellent. I followed this down to the junction, where it splits off and if taken, will take you back up the hill on the other side of Ryan Lake.

I continued towards the horse camp, and at one point I passed through a small meadow, and the trail widened which looked like it could have been an old road at one point.

Because it was fairly late I stayed the night at the horse camp. There is no water here, and it's a little bit of a walk to the river where you can gain access to the surface.

Day 2 / Saturday
The forecast called for showers in the afternoon and rain on Sunday, which was my planned day to finish. I wasn't in the mood to be wet over-night so I decided I would see if I could hike the rest of the trail in one day, this would be dependent on how much time I had left once I reached my planned destination, Vanson Lake.

The Green River trail is wonderful; peaceful, and once you hit the old growth it just becomes even better. The trail isn't always near the river, and frequently you can't see it even when you are near. As others have previously mentioned, the trail has been re-routed around washouts. The trail itself was in good condition, but being early in the season there was a fair amount of blow-downs that had to be navigated through. The trail was always easy to pickup but some of the downed trees took a little effort to pass by.

I arrived at Vanson lake around 11:30 am, two hours before my targeted time of 12:30 pm. The lake was covered in mist, it was cold and I certainly wasn't feeling like hanging around for the rest of the day. So I pulled out my stove and ate my dinner, while the dog ate his. I figured this would help give us energy to finish the 8.5 miles that we had left to go to reach the trail head.

As we made our way across the ridges, we passed several people heading down to the Green River, and once we broke out of the tree's the clouds had partially broken up giving us some views, unfortunately we couldn't see one mountain top, but at least the views of the valleys were glorious. Especially hearing the thundering of the streams draining from the Venus lakes and Island Lake across the valley in the Mt Margaret Backcountry.

A few short hours later we arrived back at the trail head and headed home. Tired, but satisfied in completing a nearly 20 mile hike in one day.

Spent the day up near MSH, along a trail that marked the demarcation between the blast zone and the unaffected lands from the 1980 eruption. This trail has skyrocketed to the top of my “favorites” list and I am already dreaming of a second trip. We could see so many cool trails along the surrounding hills beckoning you to climb various rock walls and cliffs. You could also hear the wind shifting between the east and west ridges along with the roar of distant waterfalls.

Access: if you are using the GPS coordinates from either AllTrails or WTA, please note that you will arrive short of the trailhead due a closed and locked gate. It is possible to loop around by taking other FS roads, so you should plan another 30-40 minutes for the drive to where you can start the hike. May want to find your route ahead of time as there is no signal in the area. We were using Google maps and could find the very large loop needed to get to the parking area.

Trail Conditions: easy to follow and well maintained, but needed our map as there are a few off-shoot trails. The first 2.5 miles is a steep climb with about 1700’ of gain. We came upon several snow patches that needed to be crossed to continue along the trail so we were thankful for our poles and microspikes.

View: as you travel towards the areas affected by the blast, MSH is off to your left and Rainier is off to your right (north). Also a peakaboo view of Mt Hood off to the south.

Flowers: bear grass was up and should be in full bloom in 1-2 weeks. Same with lupine. Tons of phlox along the rocky ridge and also saw dark purple larkspur and red and orange Indian paint brush. Avalanche lily and trillium were most abundant on the forested section of the trail.

Goat Mountain and Deadman’s Lake
11.5 miles and 2950’ of elevation gain.