East Fork Foss - Necklace Valley — Tuesday, Jun. 21, 2011

Central Cascades > Stevens Pass - West

Like many others, I found it impossible to stay inside on such a nice day, so I took the day off and hit the trail. I was looking for a nice, long-ish, snow-free hike on a trail I hadn't been on before. After scouring recent trip reports, I selected this one. It has its pluses and minuses. The first five miles of the trail consist of flat, endless, straight-ish path. Aside from occassional glimpse upward at the surrounding peaks there isn't much in terms of scenery until the river crossing. So, lots of green. Not a lot of wildflowers right now. Nevertheless, any time on the trail on a nice day is better than a day in the office. There were a couple of splash-across stream crossings, a little bit of mud on the trail, some bugs (though not many), a couple of minor blowdowns, and several piles of shoo-do-do-wanna-be-like-you-doobie-doo (that's bear scat, if you couldn't figure it out). Nothing too unpleasant or even particularly unusual for this time of year. After the river crossing, I pushed ahead (and upward) for maybe another mile. The trail was snow-free as far as I went, though there were several larger blowdowns on that section of the trail.