Three-night loop hike in the North Fork Quinault area with camping at Elip Creek, Three Prune, and Three Lakes campsites. This is a beautiful area of Olympic National Park with river valleys, mountain meadows and everything in-between. Get out here before road access is closed off for the rest of the summer! Also thanks to everybody who has helped keep these trails accessible!

All of the trails we traveled had brushy overgrown sections. You will be rubbing up against ferns, huckleberries, and pine branches. All of the trails also had downed trees. Most of these were no big deal but a few required climbing, crawling, or detouring through dense shrubbery. The middle section of the Elip Creek trail (between 2000-3000 ft) had extended sections of brush that were head-height or taller and a few spots where downed trees can make it difficult to relocate the trail. There were still some decent snow patches on the slope just south of the junction between the Elip Creek and Skyline trails.

I'm not sure we took the optimal route getting down to Big Creek through the washed-out area - depending on how you approach it, it could be anything from extremely annoying to dangerous. The trip report from May 2024 has a good description of how to get under the problematic tree - there is a small gap under the tree you can squeeze through on your stomach or back. On this day the rocks around the gap were wet, slippery and muddy. Or you can cross on the steeply-angled tree itself, or climb above and over the tree. These both have risks of falling. Maybe there are better options as the water level in the creek drops.

The frogs at Three Lakes were amazing and put on a concert all night long!

Badly overgrown with many trees down, lost trail a few times, slow moving as we constantly had to check GPS

We decided to make a loop out of these trails after getting weathered and smoked out of Plans A and B. A bit more research into Plan C may have been warranted, but we skipped that step in favor of confidence in our abilities and a bordering-on-desperate need for an adventure. We decided to make a lollipop, starting at Irely Lake and making a long trek up to the Elip Creek campground, camping two nights at Elip Creek with a side trip on our off day, and taking a short trip back to the car on the North Fork Quinault River trail. Our need for adventure was met and our abilities carried us through, thankfully.

Day One – Irely Lake Trail, Big Creek Trail, Skyline Trail, Elip Creek Trail, Elip Creek Campground. We parked at the North Fork Quinault River ranger station at 9am and walked down the road to the Irely Lake trailhead. We wanted to put our road walk at the beginning of the trip and the parking was ample at both locations. Bathroom at the North Fork Quinault River trailhead was clean and well-stocked. Heading up towards Irely Lake, we encountered some overgrown bushes along the trail and some mud, but also found tons of frogs! There were baby frogs everywhere and lots of larger ones too. Watching them was a fun way to pass the time to the lake and beyond. The trail was a little bit overgrown but easy to follow and in good shape overall. We stopped for a quick look at the lake and kept climbing. There is a large landslide presenting a major obstacle in the trail at the Big Creek crossing (picture two). Coming from the Irely Lake direction, it was challenging for us to figure out how to get around it and we spent a lot of time and energy deciding what to do. The trail is marked with an orange tag, but getting around those trees took some doing. We ended up crossing the river on a log and scrambling over some rocks to get back to the trail. It was sketchy but doable. I think you could climb over / under the trees, but we chose not too because it was so muddy and they were so large. By the time we made it up to Three Lakes we were looking carefully at the map and beginning to question our trip plans. The bugs at Three Lakes were tremendous, so we didn’t spend too much time questioning. We ate a quick lunch and kept walking. Above Three Lakes we connected to the Elip Creek trail and began the traverse towards our campground. The views from the ridge were spectacular and we tried to slow down and enjoy them as much as we could. Descending down the last portion of the Elip Creek trail was challenging, especially after dark. The huckleberries are completely overgrown and cover the trail. Yes, better huckleberries than nettles, but we still lost a lot of time fighting through them and even lost the trail a time or two. We came in to camp exhausted, scraped, and bug bitten at 11:30pm. Total mileage for the day 20.75. Time on the trail 13+ hours. Total elevation for the day 9,664ft. We pitched camp, took a quick dip in the stream, ate dinner and collapsed.

Day Two – Elip Creek Camp, North Fork Quinault River Trail. After a good night’s sleep, we decided to stick with our plans and explore up the North Fork Quinault River Trail.  Another camper also told us about a great swimming hole where Elip Creek meets the Quinault River, so we planned to get back in time to check that out. We headed up the trail past the bridge that is damaged on Stalding Creek. We were able to ford the creek easily and spent a little time swimming there too. We continued on past Trappers Camp and found the trail severely overgrown with nettles and other itch producing plants. Thankfully, these did not last too long and the trail climbed easily and steadily into the forest. As the sun got warmer, we continued thinking about that swimming hole and decided to turn around at a nice waterfall after about 4 miles. We got back to the river and spent the afternoon swimming. It was fantastic. Total mileage for the day, 8.67. Total time, 4+ hours. Total elevation, 3,239ft. It was a good recovery day.

Day Three – Elip Creek Camp, North Fork Quinault River Trail. Headed back to the car from camp this morning. The trail was in reasonably good condition throughout. Still some overgrown bushes, but nothing terrible and we made good time to the trailhead. Especially fantastic trees in this section and the mostly downhill grade was a nice change from our previous two days. Total mileage for the day, 7.02. Elevation change, 575ft. Total time, 3+ hours.

All in all, I don’t know that I would have actually changed anything about this trip. Maybe a different route would have provided more balance in the daily mileage. But with these trails as our choice, I think this was a good way to do it if you are able to handle the massive first day. It seemed ridiculous while we were doing it, but the campground at Elip Creek was so pleasant – uncrowded, few bugs, beautiful location, water access, all the good things – I was happy to stay there for two days and have lots of time for swimming on our off day. Highly recommended with all the appropriate cautions.

A beautiful hike with amazing trees, nice combination of lush rainforest lowland, mountain meadows, and riverside trail. There were many trees down across both the 3 Lakes and Elip Creek trails which at times were challenging to cross.  On the 3 Lakes trail there is a bridge out over an early stream crossing, but the creek was easy to ford.  There is a rockslide and large tree down on the trail at the Big Creek crossing.  The creek fording was okay, then a scramble up the slope, pushed my pack under the tree, then crawled under, then a bit more scramble to rejoin the trail.  Elip Creek trail is very overgrown - you can tell where the trail is, but can't always see where you are putting your feet. Lots wildflowers and ripe huckleberries, both blue and red along the way.  Raspberries were not quite ripe.

We camped the first night at 3 Lakes - mosquitos were thick.  The second night we were at Elip Creek - bugs were not an issue.  Note - the bear wire at Elip Creek is broken. On the 3rd day we enjoyed a long lunch break and dip in the river at Wolf Bar before heading home.

Hiked/ran this loop as a summer solstice trip. This is a great loop for the connoisseur of trees and forests.

Beautiful forest and slightly overgrown trail from trailhead to Big Creek crossing. Amphibians jumping off the trail I front of me everywhere. Big Creek crossing wasn’t too bad. Solid logs to walk across on, and then a slightly sketchy scramble up to the trail. Would be harder with heavy pack.

Stopped at world’s largest Alaska yellow cedar. There are some other very impressive, and more alive ones in the vicinity. In any case it’s amazing to see all the low growing small ones up the trail after seeing these true giants. Would have loved to spend more time here.

Three lakes was snow free, seemed like a happy little place to camp. The sub alpine meadows beyond surprised me with clear views into the skyline trail and the peaks above Low Divide. Also just a really unique variety of trees small and large.

Dropping down to the junction with Elip creek there was patchy snow covering the trail, but it was easily passable and won’t last much longer.

Heading down Elip Creek I passed some bear tracks in the snow and smelled the large mammal smell that I normally associate with elk, but didn’t see anything. Had nice views for quite awhile headed down, but soon hit more brushy and slightly harder to follow sections of the trail. I think going down Elip was the right choice, might feel a bit too bushwhacky going up on a hot day.

Forgot how long those last miles on the North Fork trail are, but fortunately had no shortage of world class trees to gawk at.