Slab Camp Creek and Gray Wolf River, Deer Ridge & Three Forks — Saturday, Jun. 4, 2022

With very little reports on this loop, I risked my first backpacking trip of the season starting at Slab Camp and looping through Gray Wolf, Three Forks, then down Deer Ridge. 

Day 1: The road in is filled with potholes and large puddles to drive through but I saw many cars making it up. I have a Subaru and had no problems. Hiked in to Slide Camp (5.2 miles aprx.) and camped here because it was getting too late to make it all the way to Gray Wolf. The trail was well maintained with just a couple drops of rain along the way.

Day 2: Packed up early and hiked into Gray Wolf (3.1 miles from Slide Camp) to find a good campsite for the night. We saw one other group of 2 and did not see another person all day. We wandered further up Gray Wolf Creek after setting up towards Gray Wolf pass and only made it to the first creek crossing. We crawled over and under probably 15 trees and when we got to the bridge to cross the river there were 2 more trees that collapsed on the bridge and broke the railing. Considering how fast the water is flowing right now and how the bridge seemed to bend under the weight of the trees we decided not to cross though it seems possible. After hiking back to camp for lunch, I wandered up Cameron Creek with the same story as Gray Wolf. Plenty of trees to navigate around and only went about a mile or so before getting tired of crawling in dirt. 

Day 3: Took our sweet time hiking up Three Forks (4.8 miles) (somehow I didn't know how steep this was) and crossed some snow at the very top before the intersection with Deer Ridge. It was probably around 200' of snow that was unavoidable but I was only sinking in just above my ankle. The snow at its deepest is probably 1 - 1 1/2 feet deep so it wasn't too bad. Most of it was soft on top and then packed down below. I had gaiters so my feet stayed pretty dry but we did not use microspikes for this. After reaching the intersection with Deer Ridge, we were greeted by some sunshine and clouds moving in. Deer Ridge was snow free and a lovely downhill the rest of the way. There were no wildflowers blooming yet up that high but it was freshly melted out terrain. Only saw 3 people on the hike out. Day 3 was about 9 miles total. 

Overall, this is a great loop! All beginner-intermediate friendly if you don't mind a little elevation. Total mileage was 23 miles with 5600' elevation gain.