I drove down to the COlumbia River Gorge to volunteer with WTA for the weekend, on a new to me trail.
Getting there, the directions on WTA state to go through Carson to get to the trailhead, however there is another way to get there on a little bit better road. Other directions are as followed:
From WA-14 East in about 49 miltes turn left onto Cook-underwood Rd. Contine for about 5 miles, then turn left onto Willard Rd. Stay on Willard Road and in about 1/5 miles continue straight onto Oklahoma Rd. After .7 miles turn lefft onto Forest Service Road 66 (There is a small sign). IN about 1.94 miles, stay straight onto Forest Service Road 68 (66 will turn right) You'll some up on a T for spur 500, and infront of you is a grassy hill (The trailhead!). Turn right onto Spur 500 and the parking lot is right there to your right. There is no bathroom, but there is room for about 8 cars, if you are meeting people there, I would highly suggest double parking (as the trailhead parking lot is deep).
There are some pothole along the way but they are not as bad going this way as it is coming in from the directions on the website. (this is also the way that GPS will take you). The road is kind of narrow but there are pullout spots.
IF YOU DO COME IN FROM CARSON: There are some good sized pot holes, and some logs in the road, a few that were cut halfway into the road, you can get around them, but they are there.
Our work- the crew continued up FS 68 to the ALWAY TRAIL (a user built trail, that is not on the website) This ALWAY trail is a little hard to find in some spots as it's not maintained by WTA, but there is evidence that it is maintained as some older trees that habe fallen have been cleared out of the trail. This trail is no joke, the family that built it was a straight up kind of family, it's steep for sure! in about .6 miles you gain just shy of 700 feet! from here we worked towards Grassy Knoll using power brushers and hedgers to clear out very brushy portions of the trail. We did make it to the Knoll! You can now see the trail and where you should be walking at. along the way if you turn behind you you'll see Mt. Adams, and as you continue towars the Knoll Mt. Hood is right infront of you!
The Knoll is pretty cool if you have never been there before. There is evidence of the old fire lookout. Views here are pretty amazing, from Adams, to Hood, The Columbia, to the far stretches where the trees stop and the eastern washington brown hills start.
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