More specifically, logistically, the main high point for bicycle loop-backs in this area is road 5603, AKA Potato Hill Road, which happens to be a two mile long "island" of paved surface reachable only via gravel roads. It crosses the PCT on it's way eastward into the Yakama Indian Reservation. Gravel Road 2329 parallels the PCT generally downhill in both directions, north to Wallupt Lake, and south to Takhlakh Lake, connecting there with partly gravel Road 23 that continues south past Mt Adams to the town of Trout Lake. The PCT crosses road 23 between Mt Adams and Trout Lake, during it's short eastward jog across several small ridges from Mosquito Lake north of the Indian Heaven Wilderness. A web of paved and gravel roads crisscrosses the PCT during this eastward jog. This web allowed me to conveniently subdivide this jog into short loops during the spell of thunderstorms: a loop from where the PCT crosses Road 8810 to it's junction with Road 23, a short out and back between roads 8810 and 88, a loop from Mosquito Lake and the PCT junction with road 88, and a loop between Mosquito Lake and Road 24 at the Berry Fields in the Indian Heaven Wilderness. (From there I thought I'd scout as bit further south, driving down gravel Road 24 through the Indian Heaven area, intending to go west on Road 60 to investigate the Crest Horse Camp PCT crossing as a bicycle loopback point, but since I was running low on gas, I instead went west to Trout Lake, stopping at the Ice Cave and Natural Bridges roadside attractions on the way, getting gas and provisions and using the wifi and shower in town, before returning north.)
North of Potato Hill Road, I did a larger bicycle loopback north down gravel Road 2329 then east, unfortunately steeply up paved Road 2160 to the Coleman-Weedpatch trailhead just short of the Walupt Lake Horse Camp, hiking up from the trailhead to the PCT then south with an overnight back to the car at the Potato Hill crossing. (If I had to do it over again, I might leave my bicycle at the junction of Roads 2329 and 2160, just walking up the steep road to the trailhead.)
Lastly, with my car back at the Coleman-Weedpatch Trailhead near Lake Walupt, I did a multi-day hiking-only loop north on the PCT around the lake and up into the Goat Rocks wilderness, with an out and back slackpack to Old Snowy Mt where the PCT splits into a Stock and hiker-only trail, returning with backpack via the Snowgrass and Klickitat trails to the car. (If I had to do this over again, I might consider returning via the Nanny Ridge trail to Walupt Lake and a roadwalk or short hitch to the C-W trailhead rather than the mostly viewless Snowgrass and Klickitat trails. I'm glad however that I decided to do this loop, which was mainly motivated as a "filler hike" that I could do before my scheduled meetup at the Gorge, but happened to also whittle off the problematic portion of my next planned rather ambitious bicycle loop.)
I did finally meet up with Stephen's family for a short picnic at the green below the library in downtown Hood River, then drove east and then north, restocking my camping food economically at a Food For Less in Yakima, then west back to Packwood, which had sort of been my "base town" along with Trout Lake for my series of short hikes around Mt Adams.
As hinted at above, I had been struggling a bit to come up with feasible logistics for the PCT section from Wallupt Lake through the Goat Rock Wilderness, past White Pass, to Chinook Pass. At first I had in mind a rather ambitious, gruelling bicycle slog along severely washboarded Road 21 from Packwood to Lake Wallupt. The only alternative I could think of would be a long, probably headwinded ride westward along hwy 12 from Packwood to Randle, then southeast along the Cispus River up paved Road 23, then up mostly gravel Road 21 to another curious short island of pavement: Road 2160 to Walupt Lake, which unfortunately is very steeply uphill as well. Fortunately, I chose to do that last loop hike around Walupt Lake with an out and back "arm" to Old Snowy Mt in the heart of the Goat Rocks. Because I could then trade the gruelling bike ride south from Packwood to a simple 5 mile roadwalk or hitch from Packwood to the Packwood Lake trailhead and a rather longish hike to and around Packwood Lake and up from there to the PCT at Elk Pass, then another out and back slackpack south along the PCT to Old Snowy Mt where I left off last time.
On the map, it seemed I might in fact be able to bicycle all the way up to the lake, along an OHV trail that paralelled the hiking trail from the trailhead to the lake. But that was proven wrong upon my first "groundtruthing" of Road 1260 from Packwood to the Lake Trailhead.
This groundtruthing happened to be on the evening when I was setting myself up to do this hike, which happened to be the end of the long driving day north from my meetup with Stephen in Hood River, via Yakima to White Pass, where I left a food cache, then continued down to Packwood and up to the packwood lake Trailhead to leave much of my backpacking gear: my tent and sleeping bag and clothes and food for the first few days, and water, all of which I packaged into garbage bags and hid in the bushes. It's at this point I realized I would be leaving my bike in Packwood not at the trailhead. Then on to overnight with my car at Chinook Pass.
Next morning, pack my camera & accessories and electronics and a bit more food and water for the day in a my backpack, and bicycle with that light pack back down to Packwood. There I asked the RV camp host if I could leave my bicycle with them for 5 or 6 days. They pointed out that next weekend, labor day weekend, would be a zoo in that town - a twice-annual flea market event billed as the biggest in the world going on. But since I would be back by Wednesday, it would be OK. (I gave them $5, which is what they charged me the last time for a shower (and I had paid another $5 to do my laundry there.)
Walked on to Road 1260, held my thumb out to a few cars going up the hill, but walked the first 2 or 3 miles before someone gave me a lift. He was a young logger getting over a knee injury, meeting up for some logger-related event that from signs I later learned is called "Man Camp" (?). Re-shuffled my stashed stuff into my backpack, leaving behind a few things. Headed up the trail, raching the lake to find a number of families camped & swimming in quite a clean-looking lake. At a trail junction around the side of the lake, I chose the brach that went up, assuming the oterh was a local trail. Turned out I was heading up the ridge a bit sooner than planned, not to the end of the lake, which I think turned out to be a good choice with better views than a trek through the bottom of the valley. Camped first night maybe 1/3rd way up the ridge. 2nd day just to the PCT at Elk Pass, with thunderstorm threatening, found a grassy swale in the first saddle south of the Pass, spectacular vantagepoint. A minor sprinkle overnight. Next day still mostly cloudy, quite hazy, nevertheless slackpacked south to the "loop" where the Stock and Hiker-only alternative PCT's diverged, and scrambled up the spur trail atop Old Snowy Mt, talked to a couple one from Australia the other from San Francisco, took a pano that included them at the peak. Back down to the south branch of the alternative PCT's, noting that the rockfall that had obliterated ther stock trail last time I was there, had been cleared. Those trail maintenance crews are sure on top of things! Returned via the Stock trail, missed where I had stashed my pack, had to do a little backtrack back down to the grassy saddle. Onwards along the knife-edge early afternoon with a thunderstorm brewing. Made it just below the glacier/snow field to a meadow whn it started pouring. Quickly set up my tent in the meadow. Lasted less thn a half hour. Filtered some water and was ready to break camp when it started raining again. Waited another half hour and sun peeked out again. headed on, but another half hour later anoterh storm developed, decided to try walking through it with my poncho, but didn't have my rain pants handy so decided just to pitch the tent again. an hour later that had ended, and still three hors efore dark, so moved on. In the woods now and another sprinkle developed, I just used my poncho. Spent the night in a damp dark woods. Next day mostly in the woods but skies cleared. Made it to White Pass, got my food stash, stopped at the camper of the "Pop Up Trail Angels" chatted about the Didgery Doo and Native American Flutes they had there on display, tried the didg - no luck making music, had some lemonade, went on to the Crackerjack store a quarter mile west, bought some more peanutbutter & snickers bars, continued on ack into the woods. The next day mostly passed hundreds of little lakes and pools and wet meadows before climbing out of that swamp, with some views back on Mt Adams. Made it to the edge of the Mt Rainier park, spent the night right at the edge of a cliff with east-facing view, would have first sunlight in the morning. Heard elk all night. Next day traversed mostly east of the ridge line, yielding disappointingly few views of Mt Rainier, though the topography north and east was still striking. Got to Dewey lake, early afternoon, with a 3 mile climb left to Chinook Pass. I took the time to take a swim, the lake had a nice beach, thought it would save me a from buying a shower at the RV camp before I could use the library. The early afternoon light approaching the final descent into the pass slowed me down a bit for pictures. On the road overpass/park boundary marker, I photographed a biker climbing up the road. He stopped at the top, I chatted with him briefly about how I had just coasted down that road but preferred hiking uphill. He had bicycled over several nearby passes that day, I mentioned the Death Ride I had witnessed at Carson Pass. He'd ridden in that before. On to the car. Changed clothes, plugged in my battery chargers, drove down to Packwood. What a zoo! orange cones everywhere, vendor's tents everywhere, people everywhere. And only Wednesday before the weekend! Went straight to the library, transferred my picts, my new Toshiba 1gb working drive is full, used the Mybook backup only so only really have partial backup til I shuffle things around (hopefully this evening still, though it's getting late, been typing longer here than planned.) Chatted with the librarians - hours had changed, would be closed tomorrow through the weekend due to the event. Randle library would be open tomorrow. Fetched my bicycle, chatted with the CG host a bit, off to fetch my things at the Packwood Lake trailhead, then resupplied food at the Packwood market, got gas, then on to the White Pass trailhead to fetch the small cooler I had my food cache in, and the garbage I'd left in it. Overnighted there, not sure which direction I might head next day. Next day (this morning) decided I'd head for Enumclaw, use the library there, with some logistical scouting on the way.
So, I think Chinook Pass is a good loop-end-point because the long downhill coasts both north and south are nice perks, and to the north there is likely public transportation would get me at least part way back up I90 to the PCT at Snoqualmie Pass, even though to the south it was a bit more problematic. No public transportation in this valley. Trying to use White Pass as an endpoint would not have helped, it would split the section into rather small pieces at great effort without solving the main problem. In fact, I shouldn't have left a resupply there - or at least not left anything I'd have to retriever, like a cooler, to save me the extra trip to fetch it afterwards.
Enumclaw is at the southeastern edge of the Seattle/Puget Sound urban sprawl, North of Mt Rainier, on route 410, which I drove westward this morning from the Chinook Pass area, east of Mt Rainier. On the way I did a little bit of scouting of possible mid-way bicycle access points between Chinook Pass and Snoqualmie Pass, specifically FS route 70 to Naches Pass, but that would be an almost all uphill ride, about half on gravel, too much work with no real need to split up that 70 mile section of PCT. It's looking like I'll probably hike that section southbound from Snoqualmie back to Chinook, after a bicycle coast down from Chinook to Enumclaw, then take the King County Metro bus route 143 from Enumclaw to Seattle. I may then have several choices: I could take Metro 215 from Seattle to North Bend, then hitch the rest of I90 to Snoqualmie. Greyhound, if it will whistle-stop at the pass, would be a possibility from Seattle paying a fare between $27 - $44 depending to a scheduled stop in Ellensburg near Yakima. There may also be an airport shuttle along 90 from Seattle to Ellensburg/Yakima that might whistle stop at the pass.
But I might not do this section next. It might be more critical for me to do the two northernmost sections K and L while the weather still has a good chance of being agreeable. So I plan to focus tomorrow on working out possible logistics with bus and bicycle that I can "ground-truth" with my car during the next few days of forecast wet weather. It may be a bit probelematic using Enumclaw as a library-base, as it may be a longer distance getting to some free place to overnight. Especially with this this holiday weekend. Would have been better to have been on the trail deep in the wilderness. Don't have a specific plan though. Still have a lot to research this evening before the library closes at 9pm today, tomorrow it's open from 10-6. Need to line up a direction to head in the dark tonight.
So far, logistics-wise, for furtehr north, I found what seems to be a year-round $22 bus connection from Seattle to Stevens Pass via Amtrak Thruway Connective Services. Still need to verify I could take this by itself without actually having to bundle it with an actual train ride.
Need also to groundtruth the feasibility of bike-llooping to the southeast end of Lake Chelen for the section involving Stehekin. Oh, and importantly, I'll probably be actually mailing myself a resupply to Stehekin - not going to pay for a round trip ferry just to deliver a resupply there in person.
Lots more to sort out before I can move forward.
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