Company Creek — Friday, Jul. 30, 2004

Central Cascades > Entiat Mountains/Lake Chelan

My party hiked the loup from Devore Creek over Tenmile Pass to Company Creek Road on the 30th and 31 of July. We did not know the trail was closed (due to Sisi Ridge fire)because there was no sign at the Devore trailhead. There has been no maintenance on this loup for quite some time. The Devore Creek Trail is okay except for the usual downed trees (many) and one short section in a gully at around mile three (from start) where the trail was erased last fall, which was a little bit difficult to get around. The Company Creek trail is in terrible condition with much route finding required. The trail disappears completely in several places in the meadows below Martin Peak but resumes to climb the headwall of the valley. This area is particularly beautiful. The descent from Hilgard Pass on the north side consists of wonderful short switchbacks on a very steep wall which someone took enormous pains to construct. That effort seems ironic considering how the trail is now all but abandoned. Several sections of trail were obliterated last fall, particularly at and near the north crossing of Hilgard Creek. The footlog at the crossing of Company Creek was tossed to the north bank but there is an acceptable alternative a short way downstream. Below this point the trail is very overgrown in the avalanche sections. I am very curious about whether there was ever an official trail down Tenmile Creek to Holden and if so why it was abandoned. We noticed a faint ""trail"" at the last switchback at the bottom of the descent from Tenmile Pass in the forest right before the trail began to go upstream towards Hilgard Pass and wondered if that went to Holden.