First time visit to the Mount Adams Wilderness, and it did not disappoint. A friend and I made the three-hour drive from Tacoma to the Killen Creek Trailhead to spend three days. The parking area was mostly full when we arrived (can hold about 10 cars) around 11am on Friday morning. There is no privy at this trailhead so plan ahead. The trailhead kiosk was out of self register permits and the drop box where you put your completed self register permit was empty, leading us to believe that maybe the ranger district was not staffed sufficiently to replenish their self register permits at the various trailheads.
Not too many steps from the trailhead you enter the Mount Adams Wilderness, announced by a sign that was posted about 20 feet high up on a tree. The lower two miles of the trail ascend via a combination of big steps up and some nice gradual switchbacks that appear to have been cut in not long ago by trail crews. We appreciated the gradual switchbacks as it was foggy and humid on our hike in. About two miles in you begin getting views at the first camp. Water there is still running well. There was one stagnant area higher up between the first camp and the PCT junction that you could filter from if you really were desperate, but we chose to continue because we knew Killen Creek was a better source and that's the area we were camping in. Mount Adams was cloudy but as we continued to hike in, the weather conditions improved, and the cloud cover dissipated as we headed north on the PCT. We found a camp in the Killen Creek Meadows area behind Shy Lake which was beautiful and no bugs! We took our stoves and food to the rock that overlooks Shy Lake for a beautiful dinner view. All the clouds had lifted around the mountain, the lake was still for excellent reflection photos, and it was a clear night.
The next morning was also clear skies. We ate our breakfast at the same rock, met another hiker and her dog who were visiting from the Portland area, then headed out for our day trip to High Camp. We made quick time back to the Killen Creek/PCT/High Camp trail intersection and snacked of the plentiful berries along the way. The High Camp sign is slightly hidden behind a small tree on the far right when you're facing the PCT sign so it can be easily missed. It isn't too long on the ascent before you start getting great views of Mt. Rainier and the Goat Rocks behind you. Large cairns mark the route up but then dimmish to small stacks of rocks higher. We came upon a wildlife camera hidden in one of the rocky areas that was a fun find. My hiking partner waved hi to it when we finally figured out what it was.
The steepness of the High Camp trail increases considerably about half a mile in and the trail becomes a combination of boulders, dirt, small rocks, and approaching High Camp there is an exposed section of loose scree with a very steep drop off on one side. The hike up wasn't too bad but coming down was a lot harder to control body motion. High Camp was beautiful. We walked around some and explored the various camps and views of Mt. Adams, Rainier, and St. Helens. It was really windy, so we hunkered down in one of the more protected campsites with trees and a rock wall to cut the wind. We encountered very few people at High Camp: a solo backpacker on a day hike, a pair of day hikers, and a trail runner with a dog. After we ate our lunch we made our way back down to the PCT and met a PCT thru hiker named Mango who was on his way to Canada.
For the remainder of the day we did some exploration north on the PCT to Butterfly and Pocket Lakes. This was a great short side trip. These lakes appear to be lightly used by folks riding horses based on the areas trampled around trees and horse poo that had accumulated in the same area. Even so, they were beautiful lakes and I love meeting horses and horse people on the trail. In places, both lakes have just as good of views of Mt. Adams as Killen Creek Meadows does. Back at camp we dried out our clothes in the sun, relaxed, and enjoyed the rest of the evening with another lakeside dinner at Shy Lake. The haze around Mt. Rainier had cleared out in the evening and made for clearer views to the north.
On Sunday the skies were mostly clear through the night until around 4am when the clouds started building up. We knew rain was expected to come in and we wanted to pack up before our things got too wet so we woke up about 6am and packed up while it was still dry. As we started hiking out around 7am the rain started and continued off and on back to the trailhead. We did have a curious experience on one of our breaks where branches or heavy pine cones were coming down behind us but we couldn't see a squirrel or chipmunk in the trees that was dislodging these things from up above. It reminded me a lot of the movie The Dark Divide and the sasquatch experience, haha. When we returned to the trailhead, the parking area had cleared out and there were only 5 cars left including ours. Excellent trip and I'd love to return to do some more exploration in the area.
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