Old Government — Wednesday, Aug. 17, 2011

North Cascades > Mountain Loop Highway

We decided to take the Old Government #733 trail as a short day hike. I think it's often overlooked because there are no 'Big Views'. According to the Garmin Basecamp software there were about 5 streams that could be encountered if the run off from Boardman was sufficient. The Garmin map shows it connecting with the Dickerman trail in about 2.8 miles. The trail follows the old Monte Cristo - Everett Railroad along the mountain loop high way. I enjoyed a walk in the lowlands on a path amid rock faces, a bog, and forest. You're never far from the Mountain Loop highway. A few wild flowers, some club & stag horn mosses, and fungi were seen at different points along the way. The trail was small and mostly not well maintained. A small path of conifer needles and cones amid towering trees filtered sunlight on the path later morning to noon. The forest snags still bore the scars of a 1905 fire. Bugs were not terrible. I had not put any repellent on, and only suffered a few bites. The trail has seen better maintenance in the past. This requires traversing over, under and around blow downs. We did notice one blowdown was cut to allow passing through it. All of the foot bridges over the streams were in states of rotting. This was not to much of of problem though because the area was a little muddy to relatively dry. All very passable with good shoes/boots. At about the 2 mile mark the trail appears to end at an unnamed creek. Searching for the tail to continue on to Dickerman lead us to a beautiful creek/water fall that mad the entire journey worth it. Slide show on my youtube channel: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FNJMPhDM_Wo