There is a lot of route finding involved with this trail right now and it starts with finding the road and trailhead. 

 There is no sign for Porter Creek Road #38 and the sign identifying Porter Creek has disappeared. GPS might help but not recommended  to count on it when it comes to Forest roads. Best landmark I can offer is when traveling on Mosquito Lake Road from Welcome take the hard right at the gravel pit right before crossing the Middle Fork Nooksack. You may not realize you passed it until reaching the Middle Fork crossing, but it isn’t that far beyond the turn. Once on Road 38 there is an FS 38 sign. The road is wide and in good shape for about 5 miles. Just before mile 5 there is a Y in the road. Take the left fork. There is a yellow 38 sign on a tree at this intersection, but it isn’t really obvious until you make the turn. After this follow the road sticking with the most level option at forks to the end. Like many other helpful signs, the Trailhead identification signs for Elbow Lake and Ridley Creek are missing.

The river was high and the improved footlog was a no go without getting really wet on the far end. I found a crossing log I was comfortable with upstream (thanks to whoever cut the limbs off) and then went back downstream and did some brushy climbing up the eroded bank to get on the trail proper.  Once on the trail it was nice and easy to follow through forest flowers for about a mile.  After a mile there are numerous trees over the trail. Most were not difficult to duck under or step over, but some required extra effort and it would have been really difficult with a large pack.

Snow starts near mile 2. Multiple snow bridges that are close to being done.  There are intermittent small patches of trail showing to help with the route finding, but the snow is still deep in places and there is not an established boot pack.  I was trying to go off of memory, so it took me a few circles to find the drop into the final creek crossing before getting to the Mazama camp.

Mazama camp is still snow covered but it is less than a foot deep in that area.  The switchbacks up to Cathedral Pass are mostly snow free.  

Lots of water along the way. If you want dry feet wear boots.

My phone seems to record how I feel and said I went 12 miles…in reality it would be generous to say 8.

Last WTA logout work party at Ridley Creek for this season. Three more beastly trees have been cleared. Two less to duck under and one less to climb over. Many more to go. Ain't no rest for the wicked, gotta keep sawing trees.

Back up at Ridley with the WTA crew cutting more logs. We have made it to about 1 mile in cutting trees. We worked hard for 2 days on an over 4foot high log. This is going to take time to work our way through all of the downed trees. Please have patients, and remember that we are working to the forest services specks. If you want to come cut tree we will have a few more work parties up there this fall and will be back at it again in the spring! Here's hoping for a much less windy winter. 

This is from our Labor Day weekend backpack.  Better late than never!

We hiked in to Manama Park via Ridley Creek Trail and came out via PNW trail to Elbow Lake and back to the road.  This isn’t quite a car to car loop and you come back out about 1.5 miles down the road from Ridley Creek TH.

Ridley was a mess of downfall.  We likely climbed over, under and around approximately 85 trees.  Many were in groups making travel slow and Uber-tedious with full packs.  It took us about 4.5 hours to go 3.5 miles.  Of course, we could blame some of the delay on blueberry grazing.  Even the pups was chowing on those little blue morsels of delight!  They were at peak when we were there, so they may be passed at this point. 

That being said, we passed at WTA log-out crew on our way in.  According to a family we met on trail, (who packed in with a 17 month old kiddo - amazing) the crew cleared close to THIRTY trees by Monday!  Massive props to that crew as some of those trees were true monsters!

Since we opted to hike out the Elbow Lake route, we didn’t see all of the crew’s efforts.  The PNW to Elbow is overall in nice shape.  Recent work was evident along several sections.  Trail work has ruined me so I still noted places I would have liked to fix.  A little benching here, a bit of brushing there….

The Elbow Lake trail needs some brushing and minor log-out.  Most of the downed tress here are easy enough to get over - nothing like Ridley was.

The trail has been re-routed at the Nooksack crossing. The bridge is gone and some handy forest service person (presumably) chopped down a tree(!) to make a crossing. There are still leaves on the tree so it is very new.  They put in re-bar pieces and a hand rope to help with going across.  Do not underestimate this sucker.  I have decent balance, but with a full pack, a bouncy tree bridge with a bend in it, and a rope that actually moves when you grab it more than 1/2 way across - you can lose your balance pretty easily.  2 out of 3 in our group had issues with balance at the bend in the tree.  I was one of them.  

It had rained on Sat night so the river was moving fast.  The tree bridge was the better way across for sure and I’m super glad it was there despite having the stuff scared out of me a couple times! Just remember to stow your trekking poles and unclip your waist and sternum straps when crossing. 

Thanks WTA for all of your work out there!  

*I did not approach Mazama Park via Ridley creek but am only tagging it to describe Mazama Park itself.

Just returned from a 4 day Back Country Response Team work party with WTA. 6 of us camped at the Mazama Park campsite just "below" the PB lookout, down the valley. (Accessed by the Bell Pass/PNT) From Mazama Park it is around .8 miles to the junction to the Lookout (near Cathedral camp) and around 400 feet in Elevation Gain. 

Trail work was completed up trail from the Mazama Park shelter, along the switchbacks on the talus fields towards the PB trail, and about 1/4 mile from the Park Butte lookout itself. It was a great trip overall, though brutal at times in terms of fatigue, possibly not hydrating enough (it was foggy!), and it rained non stop the final night/final morning. Apart from the first day of our work party, we were completely shrouded in fog and visibility was low. We saw Koma Kulshan for maybe 10 minutes the first night.

As such, Saturday August 21st, we spent the day right below the lookout on the Park Butte trail and I counted no more than 25ish hikers that went up. We were actually the first ones in the lookout itself, Saturday morning! So if there's ever a time to try to snag the lookout, wait for a crummy weather day. :) The group of young ladies who DID snag the lookout on Saturday did so right after 12pm. 

As for the trail work itself, we worked on tread, built new drains, water bars, and did a lot of rock removal. I enjoyed using a handsaw to remove intrusive branches and small trees that were obstructing one's path along the trail...

Pikas kept me up at night, just merp-ing away. I saw at least 5, though somewhat unknown if I was seeing the same one twice. Also saw one marmot along the Bell Pass trail. There was a rock slide one night, and scarily enough, some large rocks had fallen onto the trail where we had just been working . Otherwise, you couldn't hear a thing at night, it was dead silent apart from a bit of intermittent rain. We saw no one all day on Friday the 20th but we did not venture up to the PB trail.

The toilet at Mazama Park faces the camp sites and you're totally visible; heads up! The Mazama Park shelter was great for storing tools, bear cannisters, drying gear, and we all huddled in there to eat dinner when it was too rainy. On our final night, a large group of young adults were camped all over the place and had sort of commandeered the shelter itself but we just moved under a tree to eat our last dinner as a group.

Water Crossing - I put on water shoes on Day 1 (Thursday). By Day 4 (Sunday) the water wasn't that much higher considering the rainfall, and we were all tired and just powered through the crossing in our boots, carefully, while using poles or tools to navigate. The water is flowing fast but it's worse than it looks; the depth was no more than ankle / lower calf deep. Don't be alarmed when you see it but make wise choices and consider it could be much higher by the time you go. Some were able to navigate rocks and not even submerge their feet. 

Highly recommend joining a WTA work party if you can. I signed up for this trip mere minutes after sign up had opened. Our group was smaller than expected but I genuinely enjoyed working with everyone and hearing their outdoor adventure stories. Shout out to our fearless leader Kelly for being so awesome and personable! Will remember this experience for a long time.