Bear Creek Mountain is supposed to be accessible from three different trailheads; the Tieton Meadows Trail at the end of the North Fork Tieton Road, Conrad Meadows, and Section 3 Lake. After our visit, I can say unless you love routefinding and bushwhacking for 7 grueling miles, the Tieton Meadows access is basically lost. And, since the South Fork Tieton Road is still closed because of a washout, Section 3 Lake TH is the way to go. That’s the short version. For the play-by-play, read on.

My colleague and I planned to do this hike from the North Fork Tieton Trailhead, because that road was clear and I wasn’t sure the Section 3 Lake road was passable yet. We started at the brisk hour of high noon, relying on late summer sunlight to help us finish. We both had to drive from the Puget Sound area to get to the trailhead, hence the late start. 

Feeling sturdy and full of hope, we set off. Less than 0.3 miles in, the trail crosses the North Fork Tieton River, requiring a ford. So, shoes off, walkwalkwalk (regret leaving Tevas in car), get on other side. Once across, we tried to pick the trail back up. We found one promising route, but it led us in the opposite direction from where we needed to go. After checking the map, we headed upstream a bit, hoping to run into something obvious. 

No luck. The only thing that seemed like it might be trail was an overgrown section right above the riverbank, just around the bend from where we’d crossed. It looked like trail that had partially washed out, but we followed it for a while until we were pretty deep into the woods and it became obvious it was a game trail.

At this point, we’d spent almost 40 minutes brushbashing, and even if we found the trail, we were an hour behind schedule. Looking at the map, we saw the trail leaving from Section 3 Lake TH is just 7 miles roundtrip – totally doable even with a really late start. So we gave up on BCM from the North Fork Tieton and headed to Section 3 Lake.

Aside from the last 2 miles of the road (which most definitely need a high clearance car), Section 3 Lake is 1000% better than the North Fork access. The trail is extremely scenic, taking you through alpine forest for only about 0.75 miles before breaking out into an expansive alpine meadow full of lovely flowers, where you can see your destination. Of course, the summit is 7337 feet, and that meadow is right around 6300 feet. And the trail to the top of BCM is only 0.9 miles. Which means it's more than 1000 feet in less than a mile. I had to stop and catch my breath a lot.

There are a few snow patches along the trail. On the trail to the summit, there’s still a fair amount of snow left to cross, but it’s never too hard to see where the trail goes. However, just before coming out onto the shoulder below the summit, there's still a pretty dicey patch of snow we weren’t thrilled about having to cross. So we climbed up the rocks alongside it, then edged along the top of it, where there was a path of dry rock.

On the way up, we had one exciting moment where the ground I was on slipped out from under us and started flowing like mud, because of how much melted snow had soaked the dust beneath it. Nothing bad happened, but it was creepy to watch – like the beginning of a landslide.

This route meant we missed the trail from the shoulder to the top, so we walked cross-country to the summit, which is totally stellar. The Goat Rocks are RIGHT THERE, and there were some friendly ladybugs too. We had some fun with the map trying to figure out what was what, and a nice guy at the top chatted with us for a while before heading back to where he was set up. We mentioned we had tried to come up from North Fork Tieton and he kind of laughed and said, “That way is um…hard.” It was a relief to know that other people had had a hard time finding it.

On the way down we followed the trail down from the summit, and ended up having to kick step across that big snow patch we'd avoided on the way up, which was really not fun – it’s got a steep angle and the runout is into a patch of sharp rocks. We took it slow. I slipped a few times, but thankfully we got across unscathed. I’m not sure that patch ever fully melts out, so plan on having microspikes or at least poles. Poles especially would have really helped.

The rest of the way down was uneventful, except that we did find where the Tieton Meadows Trail meets up with the Bear Creek Mountain trail, and it’s in awful shape. Once again, we felt gratified that it actually was a really hard to follow trail, and the problem wasn’t with our navigation skills.

We finished our day with ice creams at the Clear Lake store. They’ve got quite a selection – a good place to stop coming back from a long day in the mountains.

The road in is closed about 3 miles or so before the trailhead, but you can walk in pretty easily. We hiked in and camped at the trailhead. We day hiked a couple of trails a short distance before heading out. About a half mile in from the Scatter Creek parking lot, this trail disappears into the river. We could barely see a trail on the other side. The Tieton River is running high and fast, and cannot be safely crossed right now. It looks like the trail is gone. There are many blowdowns on the trail and it is hard to follow in places. We called the ranger station and gave them a trail report.

Road to the trailhead is washed out about a mile in. Our expected 1.5 mile hike turned into 8+! Our group consisted of 6 adults and 4 kids ages 5-11. The littlest one had to be carried about half the time, but the hike is nice if you are wearing the proper footwear for the mileage. The hike on the closed road to the trailhead was easy with very gradual elevation gain. Found a couple patches of wild strawberries on the shoulder that was a welcome treat. Trail 1128 is a little overgrown and there were a lot of mosquitoes. Got as far as the river but when we sent our scout across we couldn't find the trail to the meadow on the other side. Decided it wasn't worth the treacherous crossing with the kids (river was running high and fast even for mid-July) and played at the trailhead before heading back down.

This is a good example of why we need up-to-date trip reports. We took this easy hike because one of us was out of shape and another one had never hiked before (new boots). The problem is that Road 1207 is closed due to a washedout bridge approx 5 miles away from the trailhead, according to the Creaky Knees Guide. At the trailhead there was an easy footbridge, and after 0.2 miles we came to the North Fork of the river - no log accross, and no easy crossing due to high water. Bummed, we ate our lunch by the river and walked back. Hot day, walking back on the hot road to our hot car, footsore, what a bad day! The 10 mile total had no elevation gain, and we were thankful we had plenty of water. Fortunately, the new hiker has agreed to try again this weekend, and we will be sure to pick an easy trail with recent trip reports!

Arrived at North Fork Tieton River trail head about 1:00 PM, July 4th. Promptly applied bug deterrent, as the worst spot on this trip is always the parking lot. Checked in at registration box (plenty of permits for a change) and headed across the foot bridge, into the Goat Rocks Wilderness, and up the trail. Trail follows old road bed for about 100 yards to intersection of Tieton Meadows (#1128) trail. Hang a right. Tieton Meadows trail proceeds about 50 yards and dead ends in the Tieton River, which is flowing with much vigor and no apparent reasonable crossing short of a cold and dangerous swim. Trail from there on is a ""typical"" Cascade forest ecosystem - dry enough not to have much underbrush, but wet enough for moss, lichen, flowers, cedars and lots of small stream crossings and waterfalls. Trail is in good condition, without much evidence of horse traffic (if you know what I mean). At about 1.5 miles, trail # 1117 diverges to the right. Don't go there. Hidden Springs trail is a horrible, brutal, senseless track straight up the side of the steepest flank of the mountain for two miles of unrelenting Hell. Don't take this trail. Go straight, please. The Hidden Springs trail is ill - advised at any time, not only due to it's brutality, but its sheer senselessness. It's doesn't go anywhere special, and chooses the meanest way possible to get there. If you HAVE to take this trail someday, do it from above as a quick route off the PCT, or as part of a loop. NEVER go up it, I beg of you... ANYWAY...1118 (North Fork Tieton River Trail)continues past this junction for another 3.5 miles or so, meeting up with the PCT at Tieton Pass. As of the 4th of July, there was only one significant blow down - a 2.5 foot diameter log just above the switch backs. This log, and the heavy snow - lack of forage - has kept the usual hoards of horse people at bay so far ( not for long - when the grass greens up, this area gets real horsey for a month or so)... I turned left ( south) on the PCT and got into deep snow real quickly. The trail was hard/impossible to follow. None of it showed through the snow cover and only my memory guided me to Lutz Lake, which was under 4-5 feet of snow. By the looks of it, there will be two to three more weeks go by before it's reasonably dry through that section of the PCT (trail #2000)and Early - mid August before much of the higher sections are passable (in my humble opinion). After a brief stint getting lost in the snow, I made it back to the truck & home. 12 miles RT - aprox 6 hrs.