With not a lot of snow lately, I figured I could probably make it to the Deer Ridge TH for a walk up to Blue Mountain today. The Slab Camp area is its usual cold, dismal winter self. The last one plus mile of the road is compact snow and ice, with occasional bare ground tire tracks The access roads are about as potholed as I've seen them in my five years of living in Sequim.
The parking lot and start of the trail at 2500' are completely snow covered. For comparison, I hiked up the Aurora Creek Trail (which is on the north side of Aurora Ridge) on Saturday and didn't walk on snow until 3700'. But, as usual for the Deer Ridge Trail, the snow disappeared as soon as I entered the forest. There was just a dusting of new snow above the benches and a few patches of older snow until well past the park boundary where the trail gets to more open ground around 5000'. Some post-holing (a foot or two deep at the most) ensued until the bottom of the steep slope up to the summit of Blue. A brisk wind chased me back down as soon as I reached the top.
I parked across the road in the pull-out. I assume that's legal, although that's only based on my not getting ticketed when I've done it. You could also probably squeeze off the pavement on the trail side of the road. Meck has posted about parking at the large pull-off farther east and walking the road.
I have parked right by the trailhead on the south side of the road several times with no issues. There is room for maybe two vehicles. One of my favorite springtime leg training trails.
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