Mount Townsend — Wednesday, Mar. 18, 2020

My friend and I boarded the 7:10 ferry from Edmonds to Kingston after catching a beautiful sunrise over the sound, and entered the Olympics at around 8. The road becomes icy after 10ish miles of pleasant paved & gravel roads, at which point we parked, put on gaiters and spikes (imperative), and began our hike. We road-walked to the Upper Trailhead (makes no difference which one you take) for about 1.5-2 miles, then hiked the upper trailhead for another 1.5 miles, then reached the Mount Townsend trailhead. The trail is decently tracked out for the first portion, but quickly becomes treacherous after a few creek crossings: it becomes icy, steep, and angled (as in angled straight down the mountainside). This part, thankfully, only persists for about half a mile, then its pleasant hiking for a bit. At a certain point the trail enters avvy-prone territory, when the bootpath we were following splits up into countless, aimless little paths. We elected to choose the one that went straight uphill (directly into avvy zone), and continue following the faint path(which by this point consisted of a single pair of bootprints). After a few small switchbacks, the bootpath we had been following completely stopped, and we were stuck in quite a pickle. After consulting our map we elected to keep pushing (and postholing a LOT) up to what we estimated was Camp Windy. The snow got really deep, but we just kept walking straight uphill through the forest before eventually breaking out of the treeline. At this point the mountain becomes a huge, exposed, steep face of snow, ice, and shrubs. It afforded us great views of the sound and the Welch Peaks, but no hint of the views to come. We kept trudging slowly uphill and finally reached a small col, where we took a right and finally ascended the broad ridge of Mount Townsend. There were a few false summits, but eventually, by following our bootpath, you will reach the top. The views are sublime. On the way down, be sure to look out for glissading chutes we created all over the trail, that will make your hike down much faster, much more fun, and much more wet.