Hoh River Trail to Blue Glacier — Saturday, May. 26, 2018

Olympic Peninsula > Pacific Coast

A friend of mine and I decided to do a (semi-last minute organized) Memorial Day weekend backpack up to Blue Glacier. We camped at Lewis Meadows the first the night then Elk Lake the second. This was ~10.5 miles the first day, a strenuous ~8 miles up to the glacier and ~3 miles down the second, and a ~15 mile slog the last day. For us, this was about 20 hours of hiking in all. Overall it was a pretty good trip, full of good views and a good workout. Couple of miscellaneous notes: * The 10.5 miles up to Lewis Meadows is pretty much a long -- if lush -- green tunnel. Because of this, days 1 and 3 (assuming a 3 day trip) will mostly be a slog. Day 2 is fun (if a bit terrifying for those not used to technical hikes). * Because of how last minute we organized this trip, we did not do a great job of looking into campsites. If I were to do this again, I would probably aim for starting earlier on day one and camping at Martin Creek (a non-permit zone below the fire line) and farther down the mountain on day two. While Lewis Meadows was fine, Elk lake was quite buggy (and the nearest water source was Martin Creek anyway, to boot). * We forgot to bring a trowel. Given that we did this, using the outhouse at 5 Mile Island (the last one before the Visitor's Center) would've probably been the right call.