Duckabush River — Saturday, Apr. 20, 2002

Olympic Peninsula > Hood Canal

This trail is now my favorite long dayhike. I hiked the first eleven miles of this long trail that passes from The Brothers Wilderness Area in the Olympic National Forest and into the Olympic National Park with awesome old growth giants looming overhead and sheer rock walls bordering the rushing river. I suspect that this trail is incredibly busy during summer, so now is a good time to try it. The trail is in great shape all along the river, up the many switchbacks over Big Hump and to FiveMile Camp - testimony that it likely gets a lot of use. Beyond FiveMile, the trail gets less use, but takes one into much more beautiful territory. There are quite a few washouts between FiveMile and TenMile and one of them requires you to do a bit of searching to find where the trail continues, but none are too serious. A gorgeous river, rock cliffs, giant old trees, many great campsites and one fairly good aerobic workout on an exhausting 22 mile round tripper.