Great day climbing up Songbird and Greenway on a bluebird warm day with Kidz Won't Hike and Aferrenberg! After all that rain, it was surprisingly pleasant, the trail was in great shape and things were pretty dry at higher elevations. This is a pretty obscure hike, so imagine our surprise when we ran into a group of about 10 or so others up there! Good choice for this day, including a fun section of ridge climbing with some short class 3 stuff. There's pretty much a visible trail all the way to the summits we tagged.
Parked at Ollie State Park South Fork TH. One toilet open. No other cars at 8:30am. But there were cars up and down the road at the various THs.
Started hiking at 8:45, finished just before 3pm. The trail is relatively steep in places and can get rocky. First short section goes up to the Palouse to Cascade trail (John Wayne). Then a short section hiking on that flat trail, before branching off again going uphill. We detoured to climb Hall Point, before heading up to the ridge that took us to our peaks. Once out in the open on the ridge, it was excellent terrain, with blue sky and sun. There's plenty of sections that have steep drop-offs, some short knife-edge ridge work and a couple class 3 sections to get up. Kidz and I were here in Feb 2024 and with snow it was much more committing and sketchy. On that trip we ended up going out a different way than we came in since we didn't want to down climb the class 3 and steep stuff. This time it was no problem, though still exposed and dangerous. We ran into the other party as I mentioned above around the knife-edge ridge and ended up passing them. From here the ridge opens up and then a broad grassy slope to get up to the large summit of Songbird. We relaxed for a while and then headed off down a series of old roads to tag Greenway. Greenway sits on the edge of the watershed, so the roads over there get active use. Views were great today and seemed extra special given all the horrible weather we've been having. Now lets pray for some snow!
Stats: 7.9 miles, 3,730' gain, 6:10 total time, 1:10 stopped time
Gear: Good grippy boots, work gloves for veggie belays and wet/dirty scrambles. Brought poles, spikes, and gaiters and never used them.
GPX: https://www.peakbagger.com/climber/ascent.aspx?aid=3064149
Comments
Wow, what a great day! Flooding here in Bellingham.
Posted by:
Ups n Downs on Dec 15, 2025 10:37 AM
The weather was fantastic. There's flooding and landslides around this area as well and we didn't know what to expect. But other than a little water crossing the road (exit 38 off I90), we encountered no issues. There are no river crossings on this outing, but we could see some of the creeks raging in the distance.
Posted by:
Glen99 on Dec 15, 2025 11:59 AM