Swan Creek Park — Sunday, Dec. 8, 2024

For those who are interested, the Rt 41 bus goes from the Tacoma Dome Transit center to the 42nd Street entrance to the park. From the 42nd Street entrance, I dropped down to the Swan Creek trail and walked the mile  to the Pioneer Way trailhead. Parts of this section were in the poorest condition. There is a 20" log across the trail, midway there is erosion of narrow and slanted trail sections, broken stairs and ganglia of exposed roots, which were slippery in the damp conditions.
In the last half mile to Pioneer Way there was evidence of the fall salmon run. There were at least two dozen dead salmon in the creek. (I believe the run is mostly over in November.)
From Pioneer Way, I backtracked a mile and then continued south on the Swan Creek trail another mile until it climbed to the rim of the canyon and looped back on to the Canyon Rim Trail. Curious to me, the upper section of the creek had no evidence of the salmon run (the creek actually goes for many more miles).
The forest suffers from many aggressive invasive plants, but overall it is a nice green experience. Many times it was easy to forget how close you were to industrial America, but in places there are clusters of garbage and what looked like abandoned encampments. Everybody on the trail was friendly and pleasant.
In the south section of the park, on the plateau, the forest is saturated with mountain bike infrastructure. I saw two cyclists. There were many more people/dog couples in the area. This plateau area has the worst garbage problem.
In the end I wandered for over five miles and enjoyed the trail along the creek the most.