Umtanum Creek Canyon — Monday, May. 21, 2001

Central Washington > Yakima

We accessed this trail from the Umtanum Creek footbridge on Yakima River Canyon Road. Shortly after you cross the bridge and the railroad tracks, you turn left; the right turn takes you along Umtanum Creek. The left very quickly goes up a steep climb along a rocky trail. (This is described as an ""old bulldozer track"" in the ""55 Hikes in Central Washington"" book, but looked like it had not seen a bulldozer for at least 30 years.) At about a half mile, you encounter a trail junction. We first took the trail to the right. This takes you away from the river view but rewards you with a fabulous 270 degree view eastward towards I-82. You can also see a peekaboo view of Ellensburg through an opening in Manastash Ridge, and a drop-dead view of the entire Stuart Range. We went up for approximately another mile from the trail junction. After we sidehilled along a burnt portion (burnt some years ago), we got up to a plateau. The trail gets faint and then disappears altogether. We scrambled up a small hill to see the fabulous view. We were still not at the very top of the ridge. We saw another hiker going up further, but we don't think he was following a trail. By that point, it is mostly grass (as opposed to sagebrush), so it is not bad bushwhacking. We returned down to the trail junction and took the left fork. After only about 10 minutes up a not-very-steep grade, we reached the views of the river. (This trail is described in ""55 Hikes"" as a 4-WD track. Again, it's been many, many years since this was driveable--and there's no way you can reach it by vehicle anyway--although it is more road-like when you get up on top.) The trail continues around the ridge for more river viewpoints, but we turned around at this point. Still wildflowers on both trails, surprisingly more than along Umtanum Creek.