First of all, thank you for this website and all of the trail reports. It is so incredibly helpful to a new hiker like myself. My husband and I are brand new to hiking and were motivated to start due to our upcoming Italy trip. Last Saturday we went to the Old Sauk trail. The drive was absolutely gorgeous. We arrived at the trailhead at 10:30 and were the only car there. Note, the trailhead sign has been spray painted on and is hard to read, but the directions (3 miles from the stop sign) led us there easily. Upon entering the trail, we could not believe how gorgeous this trail was. The green of a rain forest and the location right next to the river was perfect. I could not imagine that we had ""discovered"" such a gorgeous hike. The 1st half of the trail is pretty clear, the 2nd half was more covered with leaves and twigs but still discernible. There were a couple of trees blown down across the trail. One I had to sit on (wet!) to swing over. The 6 miles was an easy walk and the motivation of the scenery and river were great. We crossed over the highway at the end of the trail and had lunch by the babbling brook because the ""lunch rock"" was occupied. On our return back we passed many families and couples with dogs who got a later start than we did. It was just a gorgeous day and a great place for a novice hiker to begin. We leave for Italy next week so we'll be back on the trails upon our return in June. Happy hiking! I will include a couple of pictures here for you as well.

Old Sauk trail was exactly as advertised on the WTA website ""Hikes of the Week."" A six mile round trip along a river in deep green moss blanketed forest with no altitude gain. The trail bed is in good shape as are the bridges, cribs, and stairs. There are lots of blowdowns. Barbella and I cleared many of them but more remain. A day crew of 4 with handsaws and one two person saw could clear the train in a couple of hours. No cougar or cougar tracks were sighted and there were lots of people out on the trail this fine spring day. Note: The Mountain Loop Road is open from Darrington to the Bedal campground. Barlow Pass is still buried under 8' of snow and lots of blowdown. The good sheriff was out there clearing brush as we checked on road conditions.

Beautiful day out on the trail. Trail crew was out and working on the fallen trees, doing a great job. small amount of snow on trail but nothing major.

Nice flat scenic hike cut short because of a Cougar spotting about 1 mile into hike. He/she was on the trail when I came around a bend. The cat was not more than 10-15 yards from me. He ran off into the brush, but I couldn't help but feel like he was stalking. Had my large dog with me and he sensed something. Staying with me with his tail down and sniffing the air which was very unusual for him.

Janet & I headed out to see trees and moss. What better ranger district than Darrington in Mt Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest? The Old Sauk trailhead is a bit spooky-looking, but I've never had a problem parking there. It's close to Darrington, and looks to be a hangout for Saturday night kids. The trail itself is in good condition, and fared the winter quite well. There are some patches of snow, but nothing to hinder even the littlest kid. If a family were to choose this trail now, they'd have a fine day. We heard the first varied thrush of the year - lots of them are out and singing their odd, mechanical tune (""fax machine bird,"" ""telephone bird,"" ""referee's whistle"" are various names for the varied thrush). There are several trees across the trail, but not huge jackstraws. One or two required hitching up & over, or crawling under, but not a big deal. The trail crew is mustering (we visited with one of 'em today) and will start work next month, so the Old Sauk will receive attention. We did lose the trail near the end, a little beyond the fork, where you have a choice to continue along the River, or go to the road. We tried to continue on the trail, but after the nifty new turnpike, we lost the trail under a mess of downed limbs. We returned to the fork in the trail and went to the road, and walked the road back to the trailhead, just for something different. Beautiful trail.