Necklace Valley is a beautiful deep woods experience. The trail is in great shape. In the first 5 miles there are only a couple dead-falls and they are easy to go over/under. It's snow free and full of greenery. Several small stream crossings necessitate boots, but we didn't encounter any significant mud. Bugs are sure to be there for the season, so bug spray is good if you don't keep moving.

We left the trailhead about 6:30pm, Friday night, and arrived at the 5mile campsites about 8:30. Wildflowers are just starting to bloom along that section of trail. Encountered a few mosquitoes but no other hikers. Saturday morning we headed up to the lakes. There are a few downed logs, all were passible but having better contortionist skills would have helped. After you cross the second boulder field you begin to run into patches of snow. The first few patches are very easy to cross. There is a lot of snow melt so when the trail is not a flowing stream it is very muddy. After you pass the memorial bridge, things get tricky. The trail can be hard to find because of the numerous melt water streams. Roughly a half mile from Jade lake the trail is completely snow covered and very difficult to find at times. The lakes are starting to melt but are still mostly covered. We spent Saturday night in the snow and headed out early Sunday morning.

Hiked to east fork foss river crossing log bridge. Overall the trail in good shape. There were several blowdowns but you could go under or over them easily. All of the streams were also manageable to cross. Only saw 3 people on the trail.one person told me he hiked passed the bridge but was stopped by a quite a bit of snow at 2500 and 2 pretty serious blowdowns before jade lake in the same area.

We set off late in the day to start a longer hike around 1:00pm and had trouble parking. Pulled off onto the side of the road on a wide shoulder and made sure that all of our passes were displayed, and payed the $5 use fee. Didn't get towed so that was good! I also drive a Nissan Altima so you should be able to get there in anything. 

This hike would be a great over-nighter, there was a handful of people, probably ~10 over the course of the 4 hours we were hiking. A few campers, one at the river crossing and another at a really cool spot probably .5 miles before it. 

The report before mine says there is lots of obstacles on the trail, I only remember two both of which were pretty minor (not including the wet parts). One was a log across the trail, that was about 4 feet in height leaving plenty of room to go under, and some brush that was on the trail as well, which just stepped around with no problems. There is lots of purple and white flowers blooming, which was a pretty thing to see as well as lots of stream crossings that were really cool. Some of these are a tad higher risk of getting a wet foot. We both hiked it in trail running shoes (not water proof) and had no problems with moisture. 

We are probably the funniest thing to see in the parking lot as we hike with our two children (1.5 years and 2 months old) in backpacks. We managed to do the 5 miles to the crossing in just shy of 2 hours, at a pretty decent pace carrying 25+ pounds that likes to wiggle. There is plenty of up and down, but nothing severe. This is a good hike if you don't have the desire to be in the snow, or lack the right gear. If we did this again i'd bring just one water bottle, and a water pump/filter. There is plenty of water sources to tap into!

The trail itself was in very good condition (especially this early in the season) with a few minor blowdowns and some mud patches. There are some pretty primitive and magical log bridge river crossings on this trail and the spring melt had the rivers raging. As the description mentions, the trail stays flat and accessible for the first few miles until you finally cross the East Fork Foss River via a log bridge with a handrail, at which point it veers to the right across another log bridge and then begins the ascent to Jade Lake. We got a late start and the weather was menacing all day so we turned around here. The area was heavily logged nearly 100 years ago and if you know what to look for, the signs are everywhere. Massive old growth stumps, chopped clean off at the top, litter the trailside and you can even see axe marks in the bark from where they started to cut them. The final campsite just before East Fork has some rusting old logging gear too, adding a sense of history to an already beautiful area. The trail was exploding with Trillium and though we didn't see much wildlife, we heard plenty of beautiful birds in the canopy. At about the 2 mile mark, towering granite walls rise up on your left and you realize just how small you really are.