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RPBrown
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PostSat Apr 28, 2012 8:04 pm 
Here's my 1930 Taplin map.
Note the "fine view of surrounding country"....referring to the then recently built trail up Karnes Ridge from the Dose side. This jibes with what I heard about the trail. Both the Dose and Tunnel Creek trails were built to fight the fire that burnt on the ridge in 1927. The map doesn't show the Tunnel Creek trail but that isn't too suprising. You always have to take maps like this with a few grains of salt.

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ranger rock
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PostThu Nov 13, 2014 12:39 am 
I see what looks like the Wagon Wheel Lake trail but it does not go to the lake instead it goes south of copper mountain and then works its way over to Mount Rose. Somewhere I read that the old mount rose trail went up bear gulch. I wonder if this is true?

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RodF
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PostThu Nov 13, 2014 3:16 pm 
Ranger Rock wrote:
I see what looks like the Wagon Wheel Lake trail but it does not go to the lake instead it goes south of copper mountain and then works its way over to Mount Rose. Somewhere I read that the old mount rose trail went up bear gulch. I wonder if this is true?
I'm not seeing that on the 1930 Taplin "Olympic Trail Guide" above, nor on Taplin's 1932 edition or the 1932 Olympic NF map. I just see what looks like most of the Wagonwheel Lake trail, with a "2" mile length. (I guess not completed as a "built trail" all the way to the lake, and leaving the last mile as a crosscountry route?) Bear Gulch to Mount Rose trail, yes, the 1938 and 1941 maps do show this, but not any earlier or later maps that I know of.
1938 Olympic NF map
1938 Olympic NF map

"of all the paths you take in life, make sure a few of them are dirt" - John Muir "the wild is not the opposite of cultivated. It is the opposite of the captivated” - Vandana Shiva
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ranger rock
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PostSat Nov 15, 2014 9:37 pm 
Thanks Rod, it would be neat to try that old route, but with the fires that have been through there it might be difficult to find.

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Chico
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PostSun Nov 16, 2014 12:33 am 
Hesman wrote:
Phil wrote:
As a sidebar I've always been puzzled by the judgments made by the expeditions, e.g., trying to raft up the Elwha, or going up the south/west side of the north fork skokomish instead of the north/east side. Or tracking through a swamp on the way from Hood Canal to Lake Cushman instead of following the boot trail. It always seems as if they didnt adequately consult local knowledge sources.
I've puzzled about this too. I've always wondered why O'Neil never went back to Hurricane Ridge area for his second expedition to the Olympics when, from what I have read, it seemed pretty easy (for the most part) for his first expedition to get up to Hurricane Ridge and explore from there. Plus it was close Port Angeles.
Keep in mind some of those fellows (maybe all of them) were pretty full of themselves and may have very well thought talking with the locals was beneath them. Especially so if they had a completed expedition under their belts and were now "famous".

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ranger rock
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PostSun Nov 16, 2014 6:21 pm 
I read that Lilliwuap was sold to them as the best way by folks who wanted Lilliwuap to grow, hence they went through the swamp with the bad information they were given. I know that one trip was done in winter because they were in a race with another group. I'm going to see if I can find any traces of the trail that goes up Rose from the bottom of Bear Gulch, but I'm going to start at the top where it is less burned.

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ranger rock
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PostMon Nov 24, 2014 5:17 pm 
I want to know more about the 4 stream trail. I hiked it to the end and beyond today. It is a very wide trail with clear switchbacks. Wide enough for a mule team I think. Who built this trail and why does the trail abruptly end with no clear destination? The trail is so wide in spots that it almost feel like hiking an old logging road. But it's not quite as wide as an old logging road. How wide is a mule trail? Did the O'Niel expedition start a trail up 4 stream and then abandon it? I had a theory that it was an old route up to Snow Lake but I could see no evidence of even a way trail after the really wide and clear trail abruptly ended. It's a beautiful area, I will be back.

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Phil
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PostMon Dec 01, 2014 7:52 pm 
I leafed through my N Fk Skokomish Mining booklet today and there was no mention of mining up 4 Stream. Just someone's idea for making a trail, I imagine. As I recall O'Neill stayed close to the main river thru 4 stream area.

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ranger rock
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PostTue Dec 02, 2014 11:17 am 
Phil wrote:
I leafed through my N Fk Skokomish Mining booklet today and there was no mention of mining up 4 Stream. Just someone's idea for making a trail, I imagine. As I recall O'Neill stayed close to the main river thru 4 stream area.
Thanks for looking that up Phil. Now I don't have to buy the book. You should go up that trail some time. The original trail tread is so wide, I think it was more than just a hiking trail at some point. The trail ends at a blasted out or chipped out cliff. The cut logs make the trail look very old as in pre ONP..

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PostTue Dec 02, 2014 11:49 am 
just a thought: A "pack trail" for stock animals would only have to be a couple feet wide. Most of the trails in the South Cascades were built with and for mules, and the trail treads vary from 12"-24". This is just my own assumption, but I would think a trail as wide as what you're describing would have been for some sort of wheeled vehicle, which shouldn't be discounted as too far-fetched; Oscar Smith had a crew punch out a wagon trail from just above Vic Andrews claim (near Coal Creek) up to his place on the Queets to haul people and provisions. (And that's about as far out in the middle of nowhere now as a guy can get.) Were there any mining claims or homesteads around that area?

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Phil
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PostTue Dec 02, 2014 12:03 pm 
Ranger Rock wrote:
You should go up that trail some time. The original trail tread is so wide, I think it was more than just a hiking trail at some point. The trail ends at a blasted out or chipped out cliff. The cut logs make the trail look very old as in pre ONP..
Yeah I did go up it some ways but not to the end, just to check it out, prior to heading off trail up to 7 stream. I started my route up the old Oneil trail not too far up from the 4 stream crossing. Ski I recall that the closest mine mentioned in the book was at Copper Creek. Then upstream is Darky and Hammer. Could be something else was registered but didnt make it into the small-press booklet.

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ranger rock
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PostWed Dec 03, 2014 6:55 pm 
I went up there again today and it did not strike me as being so wide anymore, not sure why, but this time it seemed more like a normal but very well built trail for mules and people. Only at the very end it's really wide where they stopped chipping at the rock ledge. I don't know why they made ten feet of the ledge so wide only to end the trail there. Maybe that was a mine, but not the tunnel kind. Funny that the trail ends like that. I wonder what the story is. Where was the trail going and why did the workers lay down their tools? My best guess still is that it was headed to Snow Lake. There is a road that gets you much closer to the lake now but a trail to the lake was never built. There is however a built interpretive trail that connects to the way trail to the lake. I did not have much time to poke around but I did not see any sign of mining up there. I did see a spot that had been leveled as if for a camp site or a very small shelter. It looked like it was leveled with a shovel ages ago. I did not see a campfire ring but some rocks had been thrown down that hill that might have been part of a campfire ring at some point. It was a kind of odd built camping spot with no water source. Also I lost my hat up there so if anyone sees a hat up there that looks really goofy it's mine.

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PostWed Dec 03, 2014 7:41 pm 
might have run out of power if they were blasting the rock... that's why they stopped on the upper Queets. * (* not sure if that's the Reed Marshall or Henry Kittredge interview.)

"I shall wear white flannel trousers, and walk upon the beach. I have heard the mermaids singing, each to each."
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RodF
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PostThu Dec 04, 2014 1:23 am 
The Four Stream Trail ends near the Park boundary on all the USGS maps (1947 Mt. Steel, 1957 Olympic NP & vicinity, and current maps). But it extended about twice as far (about 3-1/2 miles from the Staircase Rapids footbridge, and 2 miles past the Park boundary) on these maps: 1940 Olympic NP, 1941 Olympic NF, 1948 Olympic NF, and 1949 Quilcene Ranger District Olympic NF. I don't know if the Four Stream Trail was planned to continue to Snow Lake near Mt. Tebo, or connect through to the Steel Creek Trail to the S Fk Skok. In the 1960s, FS2451-100 logging road was extended up the south bank of Four Stream, and in 1he 1970s was extended around to the north bank above the former upper Four Stream Trail as the area was logged. I guess that's probably why the trail on its north bank was no longer maintained outside the Park boundary?

"of all the paths you take in life, make sure a few of them are dirt" - John Muir "the wild is not the opposite of cultivated. It is the opposite of the captivated” - Vandana Shiva
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ranger rock
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PostThu Dec 04, 2014 10:45 am 
Yeah this trail could be another victim of the Simpson / Green Diamond 100 year sustained yield Shelton unit. The Dry Creek trail was destroyed during the same time, it used to go from Staircase to Camp Comfort but it was severed twice and now part of it is the Shady Lane Nature trail. So maybe this trail was destroyed by logging before it was even built. ONP let ONF build the road to 4 stream across a corner of ONF land and in the process blasted rocks down onto the Shady Lane trail. See Robert Woods Olympic Mountain trail guide. The watershed was strangely divided between park and forest. Even now that area will be excluded from the wild Olympics if the Wild Olympics Bill ever passes.. So they must intend to do more logging up there, why else repair the culverts over Elk creek and Copper creek. I could see no sign of a built trail past the rock wall and that was still inside the ONP boundary on my map but past the ONP boundary sign, so either the map is wrong or the ONP sign is wrong as far as the boundary.
track-and-elevation
track-and-elevation
The built trail ends well before the line on my map showing the trail ends.. but also note that two of the switchbacks on the map are way off too.

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