Oyster Dome, North Butte — Saturday, Jan. 31, 2026

I arrived at the Upper DNR parking area around 8:45 on a rainy Saturday morning to meet the rest of my hiking group and the parking lot was about half full. There are privies at the trailhead and they are in pretty good shape right now. The road to the parking area is in good shape with a few larger potholes here and there, which were easy to navigate at a slower speed. A Discover Pass is required at the trailhead.

Our outbound route followed the Lily-Lizard Trail-->Lizard Lake Trail--> North Butte Trail and the viewpoint-->Lily Lake Trail-->Oyster-Lily Trail and the Oyster Dome Trail to the viewpoint. Our group stopped for lunch and pictures at the Oyster Dome viewpoint and our inbound route retraced our route on the Oyster Dome Trail-->Oyster-Lily Trail-->Lily Lake Trail-->Lily-Lizard Trail to the parking area. 

It rained intermittently during our hike but the trails we hiked today were all in good shape with no obstacles other than a few areas of mud and water on the trail. This route has a couple of water crossings but both were easily navigated today with fairly obvious stepping stones over each of them. The route is also a pretty steady climb to the viewpoints with a few steep spots. It was foggy at the North Butte viewpoint but the fog cleared by the time we reached Oyster Dome for clearer views. 

There was a fair amount of hikers and trail runners out today braving the weather but nowhere near the usual amount you see on a nice day. Our group arrived back at the parking are around 2:30. Everyone in my group was using different apps to measure distance today, but most of us averaged between 9.5 and 10 miles for this loop hike.