Church Creek — Wednesday, May. 9, 2012

Olympic Peninsula > Olympia

I discovered this trail when I was hiking down the road when the wilderness gate was still closed. And put it on my too do list. So today I drove to the trail head thinking this was going to be quick .7 miles to the shelter. I did come prepared to ford across the creek with some wading shoes. The trail to the creek is in great condition. When you reach the creek (and the trail ends) there are tons of blow down or snowed down trees. I wish I would have brought my machete. Basically to reach the shelter you need to bush whack up stream for about 700 feet. and ford the creek where the creek looks like there are two inlets coming in. This is the best place to cross and once your out of the creek you will see the shelter. You have the option to tight rope walk across some logs, However the logs are at a height were you might be injured in a fall. I did it on the way back out because I did not want to put back on my wading shoes. The shelter was in great condition it was clean and somebody was nice enough to leave some mosquito repellent candles and a human dung scoop. I continued on the trail for about a hour and half on the (Skok River Trail dont know if it was lower or upper)for about a hour and a half and turned around due to the lateness of the day. I did some clearing of fallen trees and branches due to the fact you lost some of the trail at times. Again wish I would have brought my machete. (other hikers don't like see it and I get dirty looks)