It's that time of year again to find loops around the Issaquah Alps. Today we linked 8 trails to make a pleasant little 5.7 mile/1400 foot loop in Squak Mountain. Parked off Mountainside Drive (Squak Mountain Loop) which got us above the morning fog. Still chilly and I hiked in light gloves most of the way.
All trails in good condition with few or no obstacles. Started on Bulitt Fireplace Trail (wide, gravelly), turned left onto East Side Trail (pleasant level traverse), right onto Old Griz (steep but pretty well graded), after the 1/2 mile switchbacked ascent on that bore left onto Phil's Creek Trail (perfectly nice as it traverses a very steep east facing forest mountainside), took a right onto the Summit Trail (steep! 900 ft/mile gradient), brief right onto the South Access Road to the big fenced in towers of Central Peak. From there we used an unmarked but apparently maintained trail (blowdowns were cut and cleared, etc) that is a slight shortcut to the Bullit Fireplace picnic table where we had lunch. Then down the Bullit Fireplace trail to the West Peak Trail (rooty, quite steep up, then steep down then steep up then down again, all in a 1/2 mile), to the wide intersection where Margaret's Way/Debbie's view/Chybinksi Loop trail converge. We decided not to go out to Debbie's View as we were enjoying the solitude so far and we saw several dogs heading that way so figured we would not add another dog to the scene there. From this intersection we looped back to the car on the "lower" (further west) portion of the Chybinksi Loop - this is an amazingly lovely trail and one of my favorites in the Issaquah Alps, beautiful forest, smooth tread, a couple little bridges, and I always hear ravens along it.
Comments