ragman and rodman Member
Joined: 28 Apr 2005 Posts: 1219 | TRs | Pics Location: http://rgervin.com/ |
Mount Scott is the high point in Crater Lake National Park.
The northern entrance to the park is a 90 minute drive from our home in La Pine, Oregon... and with the East Rim Drive opening up two days earlier, it was time to revisit the park after a 25 year hiatus.
We arrived at 8:00am and stopped at the first possible viewpoint of the crater which just happened to be directly above Llao Bay... giving us a distant view of our destination peak directly across the crater as well as a photo op that contained every shade of blue imaginable!
The drive along the east rim to the Mount Scott Trailhead took awhile because there is a pullout virtually every 3 minutes that offers views that are hard to pass up.
Finally it was time to park (~7680') next to the road and start hiking on a nicely graded and well-traveled trail that began on the north side of the mountain before quickly taking us over to the snow-free south side of the mountain... where it remained until near the summit lookout (8929').
Magnificent views in all directions!
Denali Girl decided to trace her steps back to the car while I opted to make a loop out of the hike by returning via Scott's north ridge... a route that I would not recommend to my worst enemy... steep and loose terrain with a couple gnarly rock formations to deal with along the way.
Hey... my loop saved me a mile of hiking... and just because it took me 40 minutes longer than Denali Girl shouldn't enter into the argument for it being poor shortcut!
The loop was 3.6 miles, gaining 1540 feet of elevation... while Denali Girl's trail route was 4.6 miles roundtrip, gaining ~1300 feet of elevation.
Photos, trailhead directions and downloadable GPS track of our trip to Mount Scott.
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