Cleman Mountain - Waterworks Canyon Loop, East Rim Waterworks Canyon — Sunday, Mar. 24, 2013

Central Washington > Yakima

Arrived at the trailhead off of 410 about a half mile West of the 'Y' that connects the highway to Highway 12. It is immediately after the bridge over the river/canal to the right. My brother and I were on our way at about 10:20am. The plan was to immediately hike up to the ridge to the right of Waterworks Canyon. For some odd reason, we completely missed the trail that climbs the ridge and headed up the canyon. The ridge trail is very visible and no idea how we missed it. It is literally like 20 feet past the elk gate on the right. I wasn't too bummed about missing the trail because I thought that the canyon trail would be more of a gradual climb and I had a fairly sore hip flexer from a strenuous hike two weeks prior. Boy, was I wrong. The canyon trail is a very gradual climb and followed the river up the canyon. At about two miles the trail ends. My brother and I were not going to be done hiking after only two miles so we decided to find the ridge trail. That meant hiking straight up the hill to the right. Horrible idea. We hiked up the loose basalt slope for what seemed like forever. Then up some very steep and unstable game trails. We finally made the last push to the top of the ridge and found the trail. We were still about a mile away from the top ridge of Cleman Mountain and 700 feet of elevation. Hiking/climbing out of the canyon through the basalt slide took all of our energy and we decided to take the ridge trail back to the trailhead. The temperature was also very cold at the top of the ridge. The wind was surprisingly calm, but I'm sure it was in the low 40s and in the canyon it was almost 60 degrees. Changing into my shorts was also a bad idea. Glad I brought my gloves. We were so worn out that we didn't take the ridge trail all the way back and took what seemed like a trail at first down back into the canyon. More basalt slides and extreme steep unstable terrain. The trail disappeared quickly so we slowly and carefully hiked/slid back down to the real trail. I would never recommend climbing out of the canyon where there is no trail. It is crazy steep and the basalt slides make it very difficult to gain any ground. If you are planning to make it to the top of Cleman Mountain, take the ridge trail when you first pass through the elk gate. There is no trail from the canyon trail to the ridge trail after this point. If you are looking for a gradual climb just hike the canyon and turn around when you reach the end at about two miles. The canyon trail actually gains about 2000 feet in elevation, but it is very spread out and there are no steep parts. The creek, rock formations and maybe some animal sightings are definitely worth the short hike. Hopefully we will be able to make it out again this year to try and make the summit. My hip flexer and left knee are still very sore and I have to let them heal before I can do anything extreme. Also, I don't want to go too late in the Spring because of the rattlesnakes. Hope our mistakes can help someone in the future!