We did this hike over Labor Day weekend and weren't the only ones with this idea; the parking lot was almost full by the time we arrived mid-morning. Undeterred, we made fantastic time up to the summit, stopping along the ways to marvel at Rainier and all the mushrooms, in particular some excellent fly amanitas. The hike is quite steep but the trail is in excellent condition. The saddle at the top of the mountain made for a great lunch spot with outstanding views and enough room to dine alone even though it was pretty crowded.

We had a fantastic hike up to the peak of Mount Townsend--the trail is well-maintained, and the wildflowers are out in all their glory. Blueberries and strawberries are on the verge of being ready, and we encountered virtually no bugs. I just wanted to provide some information about the multiple-trailhead situation for this hike. Both the 100 Hikes guide description, and the flyer from the Quilcene ranger station, contain confusing text about where the trailheads are. The lower trailhead is reached by taking Forest Road 27, then bearing left onto Road 2760. The lower trailhead is marked, though discreetly, on the right about .7 mile from the fork. The upper trailhead is reached by staying on FR 27 past Road 2760, and then turning left on Rd. 2700 (190). Confused, we started at the lower trailhead. The lower start adds about 1 mile each way--fairly flat, through a pleasant forest.

The hike up to Mount Townsend from the Little Quilcene trail is one of my favorites. It is not as smooth and manicured a trail as the one most people take from the other side, but it is shorter (3.4 miles instead of 4.1) and has less elevation gain (2000 instead of 3000 feet). Since I'm still recovering from jet-lag and hadn't hiked in three weeks, it seemed a more reasonable ""getting back into shape"" hike than the main trail. The hike starts on the Little Quilcene trail and goes steeply up to the Little River summit and then less steeply from there to the junction with the Mount Townsend trail at 1.9 miles. From this point, the scenery gets increasingly more beautiful. Heading up towards the summit of the mountain, the trail winds through areas with wind-bent and gnarled pines, fields of lupine, and magnificent views out towards Buckhorn and other peaks. You can see clearly the Tubal Cain trail heading across the green meadow in the distance. We had left the fog behind while we were driving up to the trailhead, but when we reached the summit, we looked down at clouds over Puget Sound. Above these, Mount Rainier, Glacier Peak and Mount Baker stood out clearly. While we ate our lunch at the South summit, more and more clouds dispersed and the eastern view became clearer. We walked over to the North summit and enjoyed the slightly different view from there and then descended from it by following the ridge north and down to the trail by using a sidepath. Although there were quite a few people at the summits, we encountered only 3 people on our route up and down.

We got a bit of a late start Saturday morning and hit the 8:55 ferry to Kingston. Our plan was to do the Mt. Townsend trail before spending the rest of the day on the beach. While we were looking at trail information in our books during the boat trip, we noticed a description for Lake Constance. It is a ghastly ""bootstep"" trail that climed 3400ft in 2 miles. We, ever the intelligent ones, opted to do that one thinking that a) 2 miles would make it go quickly, and b) what a great way to get the legs going for our Mt. St Helens trip in two weeks. We wanted to make sure we had plenty of beach time. We stopped at the ranger station outside of Quilcene to get a map. We asked the ranger lady for a map and she said ""Oh, ok. You know the road is washed out 5 miles in and well before the trailhead, right? Been washed out since 2000."" So uh... now what? Yep. Back to Mt. Townsend. It's an 8 mile hike round trip from the upper trailhead, with about 3000ft of elevation gain so it would work in our conditioning routine in preparation for St. Helens. But we needed to be able to do it quickly so we could head to the beach. Forest Service road 27 is a great little road and it's almost entirely paved and it sweeps and swoops and bends and turns and is quite fun. We got to the very small and very busy upper trailhead and hit the tread at 10:23. The trail is steep, but it's very well engineered. The rhodies are out in full bloom and it's strange seeing them any place that is not just someone's garden. The trail's in good shape, no mud, a few bugs but nothing to scream about. There's a few trees down over the trail but they're mostly small and inoffensive. Once you clear the forest and get into the upper meadows, the views begin. We were able to see all the Washington Volcanoes! Adams & Helens were abscured a bit by the haze, but you could see them. Glacier and Rainier kept you company all the way through the meadows. Baker said Hello when you popped up at the top. We made the summit in almost exactly 2 hours, which was exactly what we were hoping to do. We only spent 20 minutes up there with the throngs of people before beginning the big plummet down. We didn't see any marmots, but we heard them and we saw tons of critter holes, sans critters. Oh well, another day and another trail I suppose. Anyway, we made it down in 1.3 hours. It was a perfectly planned and executed hike in exactly the amount of time we needed it to be. We cleaned up at the Ranger Station in Quilcene, stopped at the grocery for beverages and headed to the beach. A glorious hike and wonderful Saturday.

The first mile or so of the trail climbs steadily up through forest and Rhododendrons in full bloom. There were three or four blow-downs through here, but they were all easy to get around. A wide variety of flowers were blooming on the open slopes below Camp Windy. The trail to the summit was snow-free and in great shape. Very nice views from the summit include the northwestern Olympics, Puget Sound, Mt. Rainier and Seattle skyscrapers.