We hiked from the lower trailhead 4.5 miles up to Ron Camp Shelter and return.  The trail was in great shape.  We cleared one log.  Many wildflowers were in bloom, including Pacific rhododendron, candyflower, sugarstick, larkspur, paintbrush, Douglas's catchfly, and broadleaf beardtongue.

On an overcast but pleasant Wednesday, we saw no other hikers.  Total elevation gain: 1900 ft.

Gray Wolf Trail Crew worked this trail today, starting from the upper trailhead.  We cleared two big logs, one .5 miles from the trailhead, and the other 1.8 miles in, north of the shelter.  We also continued work on completing the new puncheon and turnpike about .5 miles in, hauling rock and building ramps.

The last few miles of FS road in to the trailhead are pretty badly potholed, as usual.  Given the chaos at USFS these days, don't hold your breath for seeing it graded any time in the coming year.

I did a lovely morning lollipop-shaped jog connecting the Lower Dungeness River Trail and the Gold Creek Trail.

Not wanting to do a long drive on a forest road (saving ~20 min each way), I got to this 17-mile loop with a 3-mile spur from FS road 28 (NF-2909 on Google), which is what Palo Alto Rd turns into. This spur is actually an old forest road itself, numbered 2860 on FS maps (2880 on Google). It has a few impressive washouts, but makes for a fine connector trail; the washouts have well-established detours. WTA calls the spur the “Gold Creek extension trail”. There’s a small pullout off FS 28 with a gravel mound where you can park (this is 0.7 miles past the right turn that would take you to the Dungeness River Trailheads on NF-2880).

This is a lovely early season loop. All of the snow has melted already, and the trails are in great shape. I won’t repeat the WTA descriptions, but I found the smooth trails and rhododendron forest (on the Gold Cr Trail) to be particular highlights. I chose to do the loop clockwise (going south on the Gold Cr Tr then going north on the Lower Dungeness R Tr) so that the road section between the two was downhill (3.5 miles). The start of the road descent (3200', at the Tubal Cain trailhead) was the high point of the loop and there was some snow above this.

Trail conditions were just superb. There were only a ~dozen blowdowns on the whole route. There were a few washouts with slippery footing; the muddiest one was 1.3 miles below the Upper Dungeness TH. All the bridges are intact and water crossings were no problem despite there being a ton of streams along the whole route. Previous reports suggest much worse trail conditions, but this route was part of the Olympic Mtns 100k last August and I suspect they cleaned it up. The trail would obviously be brushier in the summer; that could also explain the difference (I had to contend with no brush).

Stats: The loop is 17 miles, 4000' gain. Adding the spur to make the drive shorter, it comes to 23 miles, 4700' gain. The trails are super smooth so it took me a bit over 4 hours.

I saw 3 groups out today. Very quiet considering most other trails in the area are snowy.

Check below for a link to a CalTopo map I made to record notes on the route.

The road into Lower Dungeness was snow covered and 4 wheel drive made it possible. We saw a bobcat cross the road as we drove in. We decided not to drive down to the trailhead (2870- we didn’t take 2870-230), parked on the shoulder and walked to the trailhead.

Lots of animal tracks in the fresh snow. The hike had a lot of climbing from the start and was fine to navigate in boots without micro spikes. Water crossings were fine and we did need to climb over several downed trees to make our way to the hut.

We made the hut our turn around spot and hiked back to the trail split to 2870. We decided to take that route out and walk the road the final 3 miles back to our truck.

Good workout and a nice walk in the woods.

The Gray Wolf trail crew spent Friday and Saturday following up on work by several WTA crews.  The immediate goal was to continue replacing two rotting puncheons on the trail.  Earlier this summer, the Northwest Youth Corps converted one long puncheon into turnpike.  The trail is bike-able and hike-able but equestrian use is not advised at this time.

The road to the Upper Dungeness trailhead has gotten rougher (potholes and washboarding) each week but is still passable by cars as well as SUVs/trucks; just take it slow.

A wide variety of fungi are making their appearance the past few weeks.  A few ground (bees) nests were spotted but none proved territorially trouble-some; just be careful when walking off-trail.

There are fourteen puncheons in various states of (dis)repair on the trail; this summer started a cooperative effort between the Gray Wolf crew, WTA, and Northwest Youth Corps to tackle their repair/replacement.  To join in, keep an eye out on the Gray Wolf and WTA signup pages.

If you left a pair of size 13 boots (Ecco Track) at the smaller trailhead parking area, we brought them out.  Contact us and we can work out how you can get them.