Barlow Point — Sunday, Apr. 19, 2026

(Update - the road opened yesterday) We biked the roughly 7 miles with 700 ft elevation gain to the TH and hiked up to the point. Nice views at the top, lots of trees down, including a bad one on the main trail that I would recommend taking Railroad Grade to avoid. No snow except at the very peak and mostly dry. 

Road/Parking: Paved all the way with one rough spot. Lots of cars at the Deer Creek Gate at noon on a beautiful weekend but still plenty of room. No bathrooms at the gate but the ones at Big Four and Barlow were both open and Barlow was even clean and stocked. We saw a few other cyclists, a bike tied up at Dickerman, lots of hikers by big four, and one decent avalanche as we were passing. 

Bike:All the trees have been cleared from the road now and there is no snow all the way to the end of the road so it was very pleasant. Intermittent views throughout. Moderate incline most of the way up with just one spot that was a bit steeper but had a short downhill just before. We basically just coasted most of the way back. 

Trail: Most of the down trees were step over, duck under, or could be detoured around fairly easily, but there were a few bad ones, mostly between the two railroad grade trail intersections. One I could just barely climb under. We also found Railroad Grade to be lovely, in much better shape, and had some interesting history on a sign, but it might have some road noise once the road reopens. The non-Railroad Grade side has some narrow sections where the edge of the trail is degrading a bit that some people might not like. The rest of the trail was a pretty steady climb with lots of light debris on the trail occasionally making the way ambiguous. Its fairly rocky and rooty and we found poles to be optional but nice to have. We found a tiny Pacific Corus frog new the top. 

Stats: 2 miles with 850 ft elevation gain/loss, 1.5 hours moving, 2 hours total. We are typically fast/moderate speed hikers but this one was about an hour up due to the trees down and way finding.