Beautiful weekend!  I have rarely had the level of visibilty we enjoyed on this hike, clear skies, sunshine and cold at night but man were the mountains out!

Ridley creek is a great place to start as you transition from lowland river, to valleys to alpine meadows and finish with peaks!  Kind of a do it all hike for those that want a little of everything!  Trailhead was empty at 1pm on Friday afternoon and we did not see anyone else on the trail until heading home on Sunday, so plenty of solitude, even at Mazama camp.  

Key Points for this hike:

• Mazama Camp is a great, plenty of sites to camp at and emergency shelter if need be.
• Great views right below Baker, Sisters Mountains to the Northwest and Park Butte right above.
• Easy access to Park Butte, Rail Road grade and others for extended hiking/mulitday trips.
• Stunning views atop Park Butte as well as Bell Pass and Railroad Grade.
• We were able to see Glacier Peak and a crystal clear Mt. Rainier from 130 miles away!

All in all a great hike for both day or overnight.  Would recommend to anyone who doesn't mind some elevation gain.  The tread was good 90% +  of the way, just a good steady climb at about 800' per mile, the results are worth it!

Keep Ridley Creek Trail open, register your name at the begining!

We had a great hike to Park Butte by way of Ridley Creek Trail.

The Ridley Creek Trail does not seem to be designed at Forest Service standards, but the maintenance work has been good. There are spots that are very steep that would have been mitigated with proper trail design when it was first built. Some sections are actually spring run-off drainage beds. The brush is beginning to crowd the trail in places. Fortunately, trail work has been good, otherwise.

The trail is dry the entire way by this time of year. There was only one good water source on the way to Mazama Camp. The water source at camp is still available as well.

Mazama Camp has several tent sites, the log shelter, and a toilet. At the junction of Bell Pass Trail and Park Butte Trail is Cathedral Camp with several sites and a toilet.

The route climbs quite a bit, but there are flatter sections between the steeper parts.

The blueberries were good, but a bit tart yet, along much of the wooded part of the trail. In the meadows, the huckleberries were in their prime and loaded.

The lookout is perched on a narrow rock ridge and has one rack to sleep on. The views would have been amazing, if it weren't for the heavy smoke obscuring all of it. You could actually see further at Mazama Camp than at the lookout.

The GPS says it's 3.73 miles to Mazama Camp, .69 from there to the Park Butte Trail, and .87 miles to the Park Butte Lookout. That equals 5.29 miles total, one way.

All-in-all, a great day out. We're looking forward to coming back when the air is clearer.

We hiked up the Ridley Creek trail to the Park Butte Lookout this past Saturday and slept overnight at the lookout.Most of the logging road along the middle fork of the Nooksack river is in very good condition.  However, about five miles or so is filled with large potholes.  It's passable with smaller sedans, you'll just have to take it slower.

The bridge over the Nooksack is in good condition, which is very good because that'd be difficult to cross otherwise.  The first couple miles of trail are in the woods.  Volunteers have down a great job maintaining the trail and adding a couple log crossings.  There's a couple small streams where it's useful to have hiking poles to add in keeping your feet dry.  Small plants are slightly overgrowing the side of the trail in spots.

The switchbacks gain elevation with purpose, starting a little over a mile in.  We hit intermittent snow at about 4,200 ft elevation.  At 4,300 ft the trail was completely snow covered, in a couple feet of snow. Sheltered from the sun, it may take a couple weeks to melt out completely.  Post holing in the water soaked meadow becomes a hazard.  Route finding becomes an issue as well.  We were very glad to have a GPS, since it was so foggy we couldn't see an 1/8th of a mile in front of us.

There are a couple difficult stream crossings due to the snow bridges melting out.  Also, once you get across Ridley Creek, you have to hike up some steep snow to follow the trail and get to the meadow with the Mazama shelter. We had ice axes, but managed fine with our hiking poles.  We also had mountaineering boots, which proved useful kicking steps.  We didn't need crampons.

The switchbacks rising from the Mazama shelter to Park Butte are mostly snow free.  The last section from the switchbacks to the saddle is still snow covered, and the snow is somewhat steep.  Mountaineering boots again proved useful kicking steps.

From there it was all snow covered to very near the lookout.  There's a source of running water after you get through the saddle - in between a couple tall trees, at about elevation 4,870 ft., about 280 ft due east of the summer trail.

We spent the night with another couple in the lookout.  There was a bed that held to, we slept on the floor.  Six people may be the comfortable limit for the lookout.  There are a couple tent spots melted out near the lookout as well.  There wasn't much running water, though you may find a trickle running down a section of melted out trail.

Note: This lookout is a historical building in the wilderness, maintained by the dedicated volunteers of the Skagit Alpine Club.  Please be diligent about treating the lookout well, including picking up after yourself and putting the shutters up and down correctly so that future hikers can enjoy it.

The clouds finally cleared a bit around 8 pm, giving us some great views, if briefly.

One great part of spending the night there was waking up in the middle of the night and seeing the headlamps of climbers summiting Baker at 3 am, stretching from the Easton Glacier to the Roman Wall.  There were like tiny glowing caterpillars. 

We all awoke about 5 am, just before sunrise, to clear skies.  The views were magnificent and awe inspiring.  Snow covered peaks are everywhere, and the immensity of Baker looms above.  We could see Rainier too.  The other couple left at 7:30 and found the snow to be quite firm.  We left at 10 and found the snow very soft.  Hiking in the snow under the hot sun was quite draining.

We went around the Cathedral Crag and visited the Mazama shelter for lunch.  There's a couple tent spots melted out there.

Bugs weren't present on Saturday, likely due to the light, misting rain, but some came out Sunday.  There weren't enough to be a bother when we stopped for lunch at the Mazama shelter.

Pup and I went up on Saturday. There was a WTA crew working, THANKS Crew! Two tree down but easy to cross. Hit snow at 4200feet (about 3miles up) which made the rest if the hike hard to navigate. Did not make it to top/intersection with other trails. Beautiful day out and nice shade for the up hill. Can see Park Butte Lookout and the Twin Sisters. Give it a few weeks and it should be great to get to thr top.

On this beautiful day we had a lot of sunshine and a great team of WTA volunteers to work on a section hit hard by erosion.  The road to the trailhead for most of the drive up from Acme was in good shape. The last 10 miles of FS road had you dodging a few small craters but it was passable to all cars, Even  a Tesla Model S was able to make it up.  Once we got the briefing we headed out to the work site. Just before the single log bridge there is an amazing view to the north. Once we hit the other side we continued up the trail to our work area. The trail up was in pretty good shape thanks to the earlier work parties! We spent our day moving some very large rocks and doing some tread repair.

I look forward to coming back to hike up to the top and enjoying some of the WTA handiwork.  The trail head has descent parking but does not have any facilities.  Water is available from the creek.