Hiked on 3/5/21 - 3/7/21
TL;DR - made it to Elk Lake in DEEP snow for the last 2 miles (miles 13-15). 30 miles covered in 3 days. Super pretty trail. Highly recommend.
My buddy and I hiked this knowing that there was a slim chance we’d actually make it to the glacier, but it was one of the only hikes of this distance that seemed backpackable this time of year without doing full-on snow camping. The trip was not what we expected it to be, but ended up being amazing.
The trail is gorgeous and other-worldly. So many ferns, mushrooms, waterfalls, and obviously everything is covered in moss. I liked that the trail was close to the river for most of the hike. Plenty of water crossings to fill up your bottle, and the glacial water tastes amazing. There are some dicey crossings, but no actual fording required if you’re willing to be creative. If you are planning to just plow through the water, the deepest crossing is at mile 8 (we took a log instead). Decent amount of trees down, but again, nothing impassable. The trickiest one was at mile 7.2.
We had to make the drive from Portland, so we didn’t hit the trail until around 2pm on Friday afternoon. Wanted to make it at least to Lewis Meadow, so we had to hike in the dark for a little bit. Made it there around 7:30pm. Lewis Meadow is great and we had the area all to ourselves, but the river isn’t necessarily close, which was a small bummer. Woke up to a light dusting of snow. Decided to leave camp set up and do just a day hike on Saturday. Got a late start and hit the trail around 9am. Incline starts to pick up around 12ish miles (the AllTrails mileage was not super accurate compared to the mile markers on the trail or my GPS watch). High Hoh Bridge was definitely a highlight. Didn’t realize just how high it really is! Holy cow!
Started seeing real snow on the ground right after High Hoh Bridge and it just got deeper and deeper until we ultimately turned around at Elk Lake. Regretted not bringing snowshoes, because we were post-holing at Elk Lake and it was almost waist-deep. We were on the fence between bringing crampons or snowshoes for the hike, and obviously we made the wrong decision.
Made it back to Lewis Meadow about an hour before sunset. Woke up to a couple inches of snow on Sunday morning. Packed up real fast and made it back to the car around 2pm. Hiked the last 8 miles with some friends we met on the trail - shoutout to Serena & Kai-Rey! The trail was MUCH muddier on the way back than it was on the way in. I guess the combination of rain + weekend day-hikers contributed to that.
I’m into birding, and we saw a Pileated Woodpecker, some American Dippers (so fun to watch), and tons of American Robins and Varied Thrushes. Ring-necked Ducks and Gray Jays at the trailhead. Can’t wait to come back in the summer to see the glacier!
Comments