Jeno and I met at 6:00 AM at the very small Bear Ridge trailhead (parking for 3 cars) along SR-900 this morning and headed out on a meandering loop around the east and north sides of Cougar Mt.
Our route was Bear Ridge > Tibbett’s Marsh > Tibbett’s Creek > Clay Pit Road > Cougar Pass > Harvey Manning > Million Dollar View then back via Harvey Manning > Tibbett’s Marsh > Bear Ridge.
Bear Ridge is overgrown in spots and there was mud on a few of the trails but overall, the trails were in pretty good shape. When we turned onto the Tibbett’s Marsh trail the bugs came out in force. For this early in the year quite frankly they were atrocious. Jeno asked me if I had any bug spray and it hadn’t even crossed my mind to have some in my pack today…it’s still early in the year. When we got up to Clay Pit road and went down to the viewpoint my hiking sidekick emptied out his pack…and lo and behold buried deep inside he had some bug “wipes” which saved the day. Thanks buddy! After using the wipes, the rest of the hike was a-ok from a bug standpoint.
The clay pit has a great view on a clear day like today. You can see Tiger Mt off in the distance. There is also a kiosk located up there with some historical info about the area. Looking at the kiosk I either forgot or didn’t remember that one of my former clients Mutual Materials had the clay pit up there for years so that was pretty cool to read about that.
After our short break at the clay pit we went over to Cougar Pass and then onto the Harvey Manning trail which leads to the park up there and the Million Dollar view. The nice thing about that area is you’ve done most of your climbing so the trail just has some gentle ups and downs which was much appreciated by your trip report writer’s knees. We had seen a woman running with her dog at the clay pit and we ran into her again at the view. There were half a dozen cars parked at that trailhead this morning and we had a decent view to boot.
After a break we headed back down on a more direct route via the Tibbett’s Marsh trail back to Bear Ridge. We saw a number of runners this morning including a couple who passed us twice going one way and then coming back the other way. We also saw a number of hikers. Our total count was an even dozen people evenly divided between hikers and runners. We got back to our cars at 9:15.
Stay safe everyone. See you on the trail and don’t forget your bug spray.
SR
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