First, an update on the drive. The road is open all the way to the Staircase parking area. The park entrance booth was not staffed, so you just drive on in and display your pass in your vehicle. The potholes are pretty bad on the dirt portion of the road, but with careful driving, it’s all doable. 

As the attached route screenshot shows, I made it almost to Flapjack Lakes, but the snow is insurmountable in the last 1/2 mile or so. At least I was warned several miles in advance by two separate pairs of backpackers, so I wasn’t too disappointed. It was still a beautiful day for a 13-ish-mile round trip. 

There were probably 8-10 significant blowdowns, many of them before the turnoff for the Flapjacks. All were easily climbed over or under, though. I was glad that, anticipating the snow up top, I wore boots, because there were some mud puddles, and a couple of the water crossings got my boots, but not my socks and feet, wet. 

We encountered two atypical conditions on this hike; we anticipated the first one; the second one was a surprise.  

1.  The road into Staircase closes just after the parking lot/kayak launch/bathroom area near the bridge/causeway over Lake Cushman.  Three or four cars can park near the closure, which is at the Olympic National Park sign.  Many more cars can park in the lot near the causeway.

2.  We intended to hike the loop in a clockwise direction.  We hiked to the suspension bridge, finding ourselves crossing three or four downed logs with relative ease.  We crossed the bridge and came to a small stream crossing that typically has a log for crossing, or most times, like today, one can rock hop across the stream as it's pretty shallow.  We hiked to the second stream crossing, the one that is much larger and typically has a log with a hand rail on the downstream side.  It was as if the bridge had been picked up, moved downstream, and broken into hundreds of pieces.  We looked upstream and downstream for what we felt would be a safe crossing (not necessarily dry, but safe), and not finding one, we turned around and hiked back out the way we came.  I'm including two pictures of the area.  

Bathrooms are open (but not stocked) at the Staircase trailhead by the bridge.  The gravel road past the Mount Rose trailhead is full of potholes, but drivable if you go slowly.  We arrived about 9:00 a.m. and saw no other cars; on the hike we encountered six other people total.  

The road is closed at the park boundary due to a washout at the entry booth, but the extra 1.2-mile road walk was very pleasant, allowing our group to enjoy views of the river, small waterfalls and a herd of elk grazing along the roadside.  They quickly disappeared uphill before we could get very close.  The trail itself was in surprisingly good shape given all the winter rains and wind.  We encountered five trees down across the trail but all were easily stepped over and offered no challenges.  Numerous muddy spots were likewise no deterrent and it was good to note that people are not walking around them widening the trail and destroying vegetation.  The rapids were spectacular as were the abundance of mosses and ferns.  Once reaching the bridge, we enjoyed the sun-dappled crystal clear pools and then decided to retrace our route instead of completing the loop so we could enjoy the river views in reverse. Total distance hiked: 4.2 miles.  It was a magical day in a magnificent place! 

We were a determined group of Solstice hikers in the pouring rain and had a nice morning but per the previous reports, we can confirm that the road is closed about a mile from the entry booth, but there is parking down by the river and it was a nice walk up the road. There really is a stream across the road just below the ticket booth - we hopped across, and it is deep enough that we got wet in spite of our rain pants and waterproof boots. The trail is gloriously mossy and the river is beautiful but 1) the bridge is out at the rapids, about a mile up the trail, 2) the North Fork trail seemed to be washed out at the same place, and 3) the Shady Lane trail (an extension listed in the mountaineers book) looked sketchy about a half mile down the river due to a slide so we turned around. Returning to the car, we peeled off our wet socks and headed to the Hama Hama Oyster shack for hot chowder/soup and cheese sandwiches.

We wanted to take advantage of a break in the “atmospheric river” weather and thought the Staircase loop would be a good choice. However, Road was closed at the gate at the park boundary. So we parked and walked up the road. At the park entrance booth, the road was flooded and starting to erode (aha! So that’s why the road was closed! we said to ourselves.) The water was about hiking-shoe deep so would have been crossable, but some of our party wanted to keep their feet dry, so we turned around and did a short hike at Big Creek instead.