I’m sharing this as an overnight since we stayed at Colonial Creek South campground. We took our 3 kids on a trial run of backpacking and stayed in one of the walk in campsites. While not far from the car, about .15 of a mile, it’s uphill to get to it. We had everything we needed in our backpacks besides our tent, a few chairs and little cooler. We started with Thunder Knob on Saturday. Trail was a little busy but not as busy as I thought it would be for a sunny Saturday. Trail is dusty, has roots and rocks, but is done nicely that it doesn’t feel like you are always going up. Views at the top are so amazing! My 3 year old made it almost to the top. Next we did Thunder Woods Nature Trail. When they say steep on the sign, they mean it. The loop is just under a mile and off of thunder creek, so maybe 1.25 total. The trail I don’t think is used often because it is overgrown in places. You do cross a boulder field with some lose rock. But it was pretty in the mossy undergrowth. Has markers 1-16, which is kind of nice and it’s a 1 way going counter clockwise. Today before we left camp, we went out on Thunder Creek to the junction with 4th of July pass. The trail is also a little dusty but also has a few muddy spots. Roots and rocks but has minimal elevation gain. A few overgrown areas with ferns and devils club. If you have balance problems, probably not the best trail or maybe just take it slow. Some wildflowers blooming here and there. There is a pit toilet at Thunder Camp, so you can always stop there to use the bathrooms. And they have ranger talks in the amphitheater at 4 pm. So, if you are there around that time, Ranger Christi was doing a talk on bears.

Visited the Salmo-Priest Wilderness on an overnighter from 6/16-6/17. The plan was to take the Shedroof Divide trail from Pass Creek Pass to Hughes Fork, to Jackson Creek, back to the Shedroof Divide trail, back to my car. 

The road up to Pass Creek Pass is in good shape - a little rough, but my two-wheel drive RAV4 made it up just fine. There was one sketchy spot where a creek goes over the road though. 

Shedroof Divide from Pass Creek Pass to Thunder Creek is actually really nice - some blowdowns, but I believe WTA went and worked there the weekend of 6/23. The section from Thunder Creek to Hughes Fork is a bit faint through the burned area, and there were a lot more blowdowns - nothing impassable though. 

Got to Hughes Fork and made it maybe 3/4 mile before it turned into a bushwhack that I wasn't ready for, so I backtracked out and took Shedroof Cutoff (nice trail) out to the road, then down to Thunder Creek and back to Shedroof Divide. Thunder Creek was a really nice trail overall, but did have some pretty major blowdowns that were a little tricky to get over. WTA may have cleared these since then. 

No snow on the trail - saw a couple patches down below the Shedroof Divide and up on a Ridgeline, but that was it. No wildlife except birds and squirrels/chipmunks, but did see very recent bear scat. The mosquitoes were also pretty bad where I camped at the Shedroof Divide/Thunder Creek intersection.

Great hike overall, and I look forward to exploring other areas of the Salmo-Priest later this summer.

Headed out Saturday to explore some roads and trailheads I've never been on and planned to do a short solo day hike up thunder creek a ways. I'm going on the BCRT trip here in a few weeks and wanted to check it out. It was after 1 o'clock by the time I started up the trail and I didnt plan to go all the way up to the junction with Shedroof as I wasn't sure I wanted to do 10 miles. Well as it turns out I went up to the junction and then decided I didnt want to go back through the old roadbed/clearcut section of thunder creek again. The wilderness/old growth section is truly amazing but wanted to explore new trails. I haven't been on the shedroof divide before and wanted to see the views. They did not disappoint! I also knew a loop could be done by using Shedroof cutoff that would get me back pretty close to the car. Got out the map and figured I had enough daylight to do the loop so I headed north up the divide. There's always that extra motivation when on a new trail! 

The Shedroof divide between thunder creek and the shedroof cutoff does have some trees down but the real nuisance is the brush. Guess I should have worn long pants! There are long stretches (many of them through the burned area) where you can hardly see the trail. Thunder creek trail is in great shape. I anticipate most if not all the work will be done on shedroof divide trail.

There were a few spots to get water up on the divide but they were small and not sure how long they'll be available. There is one decent spot near where Jackson creek trail begins. Mosquitos weren't bad but the black flies were relentless! Had to keep moving to keep them off me. Didnt see a single person or animal all day.

Had a great day even though my planned short day hike turned into about 14 miles. Took just over 7 hours. Got to explore new trails and made it back to the car before dark so all was good!

Our group of 6 participated in a 4-day BCRT on the Jackson Creek Trail which is located on the eastern slope of Shedroof Divide. Jackson Creek drops down to Idaho and our goal was to log out, brush and deal with tread/drainage issues as far as we could to connect to work already done on the lower section of this long-neglected trail. This is a multi-year project on this part of The PNT.

Our access was the adjacent Thunder Creek Trail on the western side of Shedroof Divide which is in excellent shape. 

We were able to improve approximately 1.5 miles of trail from the Shedroof Divide junction. There is still lots to do in the future to restore this trail.

A couple of us took an after-work stroll about 2 miles north on Shedroof Divide to the summit of Thunder Mountain via an unmarked and unmaintained spur trail for big views from this former lookout site. 

Huckleberries were plentiful and the only other people we saw during the entire trip were 2 equestrians on the hike out. 

This is one of my favorite dayhike loops in the Salmo Priest Wilderness. I normally hike it counter-clockwise, but this time opted to hike clockwise. I worked with an excellent BCRT crew that logged out & spruced up the Shedroof Cutoff trail in July, and all of the crew's attention to tread and drainage was showing! A subsequent PNTA crew removed the difficult tree our crew had to leave behind. Another BCRT crew cleared the part of the Shedroof Divide trail between the Cutoff and Thunder Creek, and subsequent PNTA and BCHW crews completed the task so the trail is currently 100% free of downfall. There are a few brushy sections, but they are short and tend to have a lot of very ripe huckleberries that make it nice when it's slower going. I was doing this route a day ahead of the Jackson Creek BCRT with an ulterior motive to check on the campsite near the top of the Thunder Creek trail. In previous years I've needed to pack a lot of garbage out of this campsite, so I wanted to make sure it was in good condition before choosing it for the trailwork crew. I'm happy to report that there was no trash this time! The exit via Thunder Creek trail was lovely as far as the clear-cut. That trail is absolutely gorgeous; probably my favorite in the Salmo Priest although marred by the ugly clearcut for the last 2 miles (and 8 switchbacks!). That section seems as though it might never end, although the trees are finally getting tall enough to provide some afternoon shade. The loop is 15.25 miles with over 3400' gain, so it's a tough dayhike. It includes a couple viable camping options along the route so could easily be a nice overnight backpack trip as well.