Did this in reverse... some bad blow down in Falls Creek burn area, otherwise trail is in decent shape. Several crews out working, cheers to their efforts! Hit bad weather at extremes...rain and cold, then blistering heat. Burn areas are sad but the flowers and huckleberries are great!

Hike Notes:

Parked at Crystal Mtn. Main parking lot. Arrived around 11 am on a very sunny Sunday. Plenty of parking available. Road is paved the whole way.

Looking east from the lot, you can see a steep dirty road climbing the hill and arcing to the north into some trees - take this road if you park in Crystal main lot. Alternatively, many miles before you reach Crystal Resort, you can take NF-410 (Gold Hill Road) to reach an upper access to this trail, saving about 0.8 miles round trip, and 400' ascent. We saw a truck and a sedan parked here, so must be fairly accessible, gravel roads.

We climbed up crossing Silver Creek and through some switchback to Bullion Basin. The basin is gorgeous - lush and green. We took a very short and steep connector up the basin rim to the PCT, hiked south on the PCT until the junction back to the base of the basin. This segment is amazing. A gorgeous ridge walk that offered amazing views of Rainier, the Crystal Mountain ridge and valley, as well as views over the ridge down the Union Creek drainage to Fife's Peak. It also provided good views of the 2017 Norse Peak fire damage. At the junction we turned left and hiked to the top of Bullion Peak. The top is partially forested, so does not offer 360 degree views, but was a very nice side hike and well worth it for the amazing view of Pahto it provided. We had lunch here before descending, at the junction going straight, back towards the basin. At the basin there is running water (headwaters of Silver Creek) and established camp (including horse camp) sites. We returned to the car the same way we came and the decent was uneventful.

The wildflowers are just past their peak, but are absolutely amazing currently. Saw 3 colors of Paintbrush (orange, red, and magenta! [the last color a first for me this season]), saw arnica, lupine, red columbine, and many more I could not identify! One of the standing pools in the meadows was packed to the brim with tadpoles.

A few notes about the trail conditions.

• This trail is shared with horses - we saw a guided tour of them coming down on our way up, and a second trip with new people coming up on our way down. Horses always churn up trails, and as a result (along with the VERY dry weather we have been having) the trail is EXTREMELY dusty/sandy. Most dusty trail I have ever hiked. It gets everywhere, including your nose and lungs. Just a heads up.
• The trail itself is very easy to follow.
• Bugs were annoying, especially when stopped. Many flies on this trail drawn by the horse poop.
• There is less sun exposure on the lower trail than I expected, but with that being said, there is less than most other trails. Little shade on the upper trail. Bring sun protection.

Saw only two groups of hikers all day! Very low use trail. Definitely a hidden gem!

GPS route attached below.

I still felt spry after hiking around Naches Peak Loop, so I aimed for Threeway Peak via the PCT I Section/Sheep Lake approach. The hike was great to Sheep Lake/Sourdough Gap, but the scramble up Threeway Peak was an absolute nightmare: type 3 class 2-5 scramble with free soloing in stretches.

Trail Conditions

The official trail is in solid shape and it's relatively easy to follow, minus some sections around Sheep Lake which are muddled by social trails, etc.

Bugs

Mosquitos are out, but not as bad as they were at Sloan yesterday, thanks to the wind and probably the drier climate.

Water Sources

Your first reliable water is Sheep Lake, and it's unclear how long that will be true given that most of the snow is gone below Chinook Peak, etc.

Be sure to filter and treat the water from the lake though and if possible get it straight from the source, since some folks weren't following LNT and were camping way too close to the lake (<50'). Furthermore, there's no guarantee that someone didn't jump in after spraying themself down with DEET-based bugspray or sunscreen (this is why I don't generally jump in/swim in lakes).

Wildflowers

I frankly found more awesome wildflowers over in this stretch than Naches Peak Loop: beargrass (not as spent), pink heather, magenta paintbrush, Sitka Valerian, tiger lilies. Didn’t spot any white avalanche lilies, but they were pretty sad looking.

Reminders about Dogs!

Please keep your dogs on leash and of course out of the park.

One of the forks off this trail (the one that goes over into Crystal Lakes via Sourdough Gap) goes into NPS maintained land. There is a sign that clearly states where the NPS boundaries are and if you consult a map that shows the area by land manager, it should become obvious where dogs are or aren't allowed.

Dogs are allowed on this section of the PCT, which skirts along the border of the Mount Rainier NP, but again, keep your dog leashed (all dogs I saw were off-leash). There are bears, marmots, and goats that wander around the area who will distract or attack your dogs if threatened, resulting in danger to you and/or your dog.

Threeway Peak Scramble

This is the nightmare of this trip: let me go into gory detail.

So, first off... I looked through Summitpost and Beckey's Cascade Climbing Routes - Part I book and both were very sparing on the details about the mountain.

Had I gone through more Peakbagger.com posts or the first trip report for Threeway, or thought critically about what the rock would be like that produces shale scree, I could have maybe deduced it was garbage before committing to a dangerous route up.

Long story short, I was dealing with a lot of ball-bearing'esque/loose shale scree over boulders which may or may not have been properly anchored in the side of the hill, so trekking poles were useless and I was on my hands and knees a lot. Oh, I failed to mention that the basis for the side of the hill is sand-like, so stability isn't a thing necessarily in all spots, but it is in some areas, so I was scuff stepping my way up the side of the hill (wahhhhht?! Scuff stepping in scree?!) to build platforms so I wasn't completely off-balance.

Once I figured out how unstable the rock was (basically, no holds could be trusted), I was already 300' up the climb with 250' remaining. Given that GPS tracks posted illustrated getting down via the E arm and one of the other gullies, I kept on going up and around looking for ways to scramble up the rock wall. I ended up literally veggie belaying up a redcedar tree for about 25', going up the S side, the W side, then the NW side, finding a gully I thought was promising/well-protected, then pushed up towards it.

I was so dang close to slipping or losing my balance and falling down a gully a few hundred feet to the area right above Sourdough Gap, it wasn't funny. I spent a lot of time consternating and talking myself down approaches because the exposure was freaking me the eff out (the other side of the col I had climbed up had a sheer 200'+ drop).

Once I got 30' below the true summit, I had to hop over an rib that was a bit taller than I was comfortable pushing up (why in the hell was I wearing trail runners?!). There was a small gendarme on the other side of the rib with decent-ish holds, so I figured I could leverage it. I was trying to stem and awkwardly paste myself against the larger wall. No dice. Started questioning if this was the right plan, so just to be sure I confirmed that I indeed only had to go <50' by doing some careful class 4 moves on top of the small gendarme. I tried moving a 25+ lb shale boulder to give myself a few extra inches and instead kicked it down several hundred feet and it split into pieces, giving me a great idea of what my body was going to do if I fell. The holds/cracks I thought I could use were super weak: I was breaking them off after applying pressure. On top of that, there was small loose scree I had to dust off of the shelfs. I was so close to calling SAR, but I didn't want to give up, because there was no guarantee SAR would be able to help. I messaged kidzwonthike though so at least someone knew where I was and the serious pickle I had gotten into.

Finally, after 20 minutes and several attempts, I talked myself up and pushed off the smaller gendarme high enough using stemming and walking up the wall to trust grab a shale crack (that thank goodness held!), committed my other hand, did a ~5.5 class free solo move, then mantled my way up finally on to the rib, awkwardly grabbing around as quickly as I could looking for my next hold. Once I got up on the rib, I carefully pushed up the mini-gully to the true summit using airy class 3 moves and decent holds that I tested before fully committing to.

Once I got up to the true summit, I screamed as loud as I could and started laughing nervously. I posted a "WTF was I thinking?!" video to IG so others would know where I was. I got a Peakbagger.com GPS track and confirmed what general way I needed to go down, because I didn't want to rely on my hazy memory of the post I found on NWHikers with a GPS track. Thank goodness for cell reception from Crystal Mountain.

After about 15 minutes I started slowly working my way down the E arm.

This section was super chill; maybe hard class 2 at most or class 3. Then I got to the next mini-gully, hopped over a gendarme to get a better view. "Oof. Cliff. Ok..." I crab walked down the mini-gully, took a right and tried to assess a path down. Went too early and ended up dealing with nasty scree/loose large boulders (!). Nothing quite like putting faith in a child-sized boulder which isn't as static as you think it is.

I finally said, "ok, we're scree skiing this thing", and slalomed my way downhill without my trekking poles, leaning back to avoid falling forward. I finally got down to the trail after having to do approximately 300'~400' of scree skiing. It wasn't fun.

After I got back to the trail, I defeatedly took off my helmet and hat and walked towards the PCT I Section/Sourdough Gap junction. I sat down near Sheep Skull Gap looking at Upper Crystal Lake, Tahoma, Crystal Peak, Silver King, and Chinook Peak, and took a sigh of relief/tried to relax my nerves (they were shot).

After that, I ate some chews, some bars, then pressed on at a reasonable pace towards the PCT I Section/Sheep Lake trailhead. It went by rather quickly, but I just zoned out mentally because I was exhausted from having to manage my emotions and the terrain, while also problem solving for my life.

Gear Used

• Climbing helmet
• Trekking poles
• Work gloves

Gear I Wished I Had

• Rock shoes

A group of five fun Mountaineers hiked up Bullion Basin to the PCT (the steep northern track), hiked 4 miles south on the PCT and back, and hiked down Bullion Basin via the gentler southern track. The flowers were best on the PCT in the field between the 2 tracks and in other areas that are north-facing. There are areas thick with pink heather and magenta paintbrush. The south-facing and drier areas still have flowers, but many are fading (columbine and harsh paintbrush in particular). There is a small amount of rock penstemon still in bloom towards the south end of our track.  On average, the flowers are around 2 weeks ahead of last year. 

This portion of the PCT winds around a lot, so you get a lot of different environments and different flowers. Here is a partial list: yarrow, lupine,yellow monkey flower, foam flower, wild strawberries, arnica, bluebells, sitka valerian, harsh paintbrush, columbine, tiger lily, penstemon, silver leaf phacelia, bracted lousewort, Jacob's ladder, sticky currant, mountain ash, a few buckwheats, Thompson's paintbrush, star stonecrop  bracted lousewort, little flower penstemon, Martindale's desert parsley, magenta paintbrush, Cusick's veronica, snow buttercup, varied-leaf cinquefoil, pink and white mountain heather,  larkspur, western wallflower, nine-leaf desert parsley, tall western groundsel,  partridge foot, miterworts, avalanche lily,  rosy spiraea,  rock penstemon, shrub penstemon, spreading phlox, a white cress, glacier lilies, western anemone, showy sedge,  springbeauties, Mt Rainier lousewort, Hooker's fairy bells,  yellow violets, and many, many more. 

There is 1 tiny patch of snow, 10 feet long and level, it will be gone in a few days. 

This report is for a two night trip northbound on the PCT from Chinook Pass to Government Meadows on the PCT - 24 miles total. 

We got a late afternoon start from Chinook on Thursday (no parking problems at 6:30 pm!) and made it to Sheep Lake in under an hour. Surprising number of people camped there considering it was a weeknight but we found a spot in a small set of trees on the far side of the lake. Watched the stars, planets and a couple lingering Perseids. Got very windy at night. No bugs (I was surprised)! 

Friday morning joined the parade to Sourdough Gap, checked out the Crystal Lakes viewpoint just beyond (note, you have to descend a little down the other side to actually see the lake). 

From there it's an interesting and scenic traverse skirting both the backside and frontside of Crystal Mountain. There's no water on this section so carry what you need from Sheep Lake. Saw a number of backpackers- (doing variations of White Pass Pass to Snoqualmie) and day hikers around Crystal. The last gradual climb up to Scout Pass was hot and exposed in the late afternoon. Crossed the ridge and camped at the top of Big Crow Basin where there is a piped spring, a pretty meadow, and several shady campsites. Just a few mosquitoes in the evening, I barely noticed them. About 8.5 miles for the day. If you are northbound FILL HERE for the next day because there is NO water for the next nearly 8 miles until Arch Rock area. 

Saturday we left camp by 8:30 and started almost immediately traversing the hot burned area above Little Crow Basin -lovely variety of flowers -  occasional pockets of trees provide shade, especially at Mortenson Gap 2.8 miles north of Big Crow camp (nice tent sites here but dry). The trail climbs a few hundred feet and rambles through some burned areas and along open ridges, hot and dry but nice views both west (Rainier!) and east. Really intersting to peek into the more remote areas to the east. This was a quiet stretch and we saw almost no one until just north of the Arch Rock area. The spring mentioned at Arch Rock is almost dry but the creek a short bit north was still just barely running with a couple tiny pools deep enough to pump some much-needed water. 

From Arch Rock the trail continues north through burn and green regrown understory for another bit then suddenly enters lovely green forest about 1/2 mile south of wooded Louisana Saddle. Totally forested, smooth trail with a last climb two miles or so from Government Meadows. Just after the Maggie Creek trail intersection (sign here indicates Chinook Pass is 23 miles south) the wide, well marked Horse Camp trail comes in. At this point we had hiked about 13 miles for the day. We had arranged to meet our ride (my family) at the Mike Urich cabin another 3/4 mile north, so dropped our packs and walked to the cabin, set on the northern edge of impressive Government Meadows, to meet them. The cabin area was busy with campers, day hikers, etc. Then back out to the horse trailhead, which seems to be the favored access point to the PCT in this area for all but serious 4WD. 

The low number of PCT thru hikers we saw in these two and half days (saw just 4 or 5 northbound and 3 southbound) seemed telltale of this year, when many were discouraged by less chances of support, hitches, etc.