Beautiful well maintained trail. We hike to the edge of the Big Hump. We started late about 11:30 in the morning and returned at about 5:30 mostly due to allot of picture taking. There lots to see if you go at a slow pace. This hike could easily be done 2-3 hours. Trail showed little or no damage from the wind storm. Although a hike in the spring would probably mean crossing a fast pace creek and there was clear evidence in the now dry creek bed we crossed. We started out going up a long easy incline and going down a bit harder incline due to the ruts and rocks in the trail. We did have to dodge the numerous trail mines left behind the ""hikers"" on horse back. There are several ideal camping spots by the river and the river was serene. Few bugs encounter. This trail is recomended for all ages even us old seniors...

I took my packgoats on an overnighter up the Duckabush River trail #803. We went as far as the Olympic NP boundary. A FS sign at the TH said its 6.5 miles to the boundary. We camp at a nice spot about 5 3/4 miles from the TH. The trail is in good shape and logged out to the NP boundary except for a couple spots at about 5 ¾ miles from the TH. The logs there were not hard to go over. My goats had no trouble hopping up and over. After Big Hump there were several areas that showed evidence of quite a lot of work cleaning up last winter’s blow-downs. The forest is old growth from the start of Big Hump on. There was a nice scattering of wildflowers…paintbrush, red columbine, bunch berry, queen’s cup, and sedums. There were a few mosquitoes, but they were not really much of a problem.

There were already twelve cars when we reached the parking lot at 10:30, but there were twenty-eight (and more parked down the road and in the horse-parking lot) when we returned at 2:45. A good number of the hikers we encountered were planning on camping at either 5 mile or 10 mile camp. I wondered where they would all fit! The trail is in fine shape all the way to Big Hump, although a sign at the trailhead indicated that there was a good deal of blowdown between mile 4 and 5. We didn't reach the blowdown, since we turned back about a third of a mile past Big Hump. It was a beautiful hike, even though the day remained cloudy. Since most of the beauty is in the gorgeous first growth trees on the way to Big Hump and in the views of the river, the clouds didn't really interfere. Even the views from Big Hump and the lower viewpoint were lovely. We estimate that we hiked about 7.5 miles and did about 1700 feet of elevation in and out.

On Friday, May 11th, I hiked in to 5 Mile camp with a WTA Backcountry Response Team to clear blowdown from trail #803. We spent 3 days clearing more than 2 dozen trees from the trail, including all the blowdown between Big Hump and 5 Mile. Did a some work between 5 Mile and the National Park boundary but this portion of the trail is still blocked in several places. All in all a great weekend! Thanks to Janice, Laurie, Don Juan, Don Also, Ken, Scott, Shane, Rod, Kevin and Maria, Andrew and Jenny, Jim and Dona, for all the hard work and making everything fun!

We headed for the Olympics from the ferry in Edmonds to Kingston, 1:30 sailing and arrived at the trailhead around 3:30 on Friday. It was drizzling pretty steady. We put on our new rain gear and headed up the trail. The trail gradually climbs through silver fir and vine maple until you reach the little hump. Lots of Trillum in bloom and yellow violets. Decending from little hump the way flattens to moss draped trees more silver fir and a green carpet of moss. The tread is very good and well drained. Some vanilla leaf and woodland flowers in bloom.Good camps around 2-1/2 miles by the river. The trail is in good shape to the big hump. Paintbrush in bloom and some wild Rhododendron budding should be out in a week or two. At 4 miles descending big hump, the blow downs begin. Not big at first but there after there are a few large ones that require detours or deep knee ducking. They are negotiable but a little strenuous for backpacks. They are supposed to have a trail crew in on the 11th of May so check with Ranger.There is a nice camp at 5 mile. There are a couple of sites. One is pretty wet. The other is large and nice. This is a nice early season hike. Saw quite a few people Saturday, not not too many. We headed out Sunday to partly sunny skies, maybe eight to ten cars at the trailhead.