Loowit Trail — Friday, Aug. 12, 2005

South Cascades > Mount St. Helens

After spending the night at Point 3670 ( another old fire lookout) we slowly made our way to the Siouxon Peak trail. This is a super trail....getting to it is not so super. Take forest service road 61 ( Dry Creek road)from the Wind River road and then 6103. 6103 is in bad shape with car swallower potholes forcing a slow pace indeed. The trailhead is at a clearcut at the end of 6103....skirt the upper end of the clearcut and gulp before crossing a small avalanche chute at the east end of the clearcut. Follow the old road bed up through lovely dry forest filled with large timber. This area really should be added to the nearby Trapper Peak wilderness. The roadbed switchbacks up and turns into trail at the base of Siouxon. The trail and roadbed are maintained by the local mountain bike guys....great work! Climb up the old lookout trail into meadows and then a knife ridge. The trail to Huffman peak cuts off below the old lookout site. Enjoy the gentians and penstemon and harebells below the ridge. Climb up to Siouxon and bask in sunshine, breezes and wonderful Mount Adams and Mount Hood views. (St Helens is visible from the trail but trees shroud the west and southwest views.) Marvel at the tenacity of the folks who built, manned and maintained lookouts in these fantastic places. We did not see a soul..... On our way out, we decided to stop at yet another old lookout location. Burnt Peak overlooks the Lewis river, but there is no trail, and no view. We found a fire service road (3211) and bushwacked our way to the highest point of this peak....trees grown up around the site for 30 years made it quite the scramble. The lookout platform and some lookout junk is still there....