[Pribbs]

GPS track. Shoot me a PM with your email if you want the file: http://www.movescount.com/moves/move230677779 The road up the Cle Elum River is in great shape aside from some nasty washboard in the beginning. Last year when I was up there at the beginning of July I remembered it being brutal. The Scatter Creek trailhead is located just before the road crossing of Scatter Creek on the right side across from a campground area. There is a small sign marking the trail. I started at 9am up the steep but nicely maintained trail. I did encounter bear droppings on the trail throughout the day, so I recommend carrying bear spray. At 1.5 miles is the first creek crossing. Right away I will say all crossings are easy and done without getting wet. At 1.85 miles I reached the junction with the County Line Trail. There used to be a sign on a tree but it is now gone. I turned left here to stay on Scatter Creek Trail.

At 2 miles the trail crosses a creek again, and then things get interesting. This trail is unmaintained (abandoned actually), overgrown, and forgotten. Sometimes there is flagging or cairns, but most of the time you will find yourself eating up a ton of time routefinding. The trail arrives at the first of several meadows, where it completely vanishes. Proceed NW ish through this meadow and search for the faint track in the woods on the far end. The trail can be hard to follow through this patch of woods. At about 2.4 miles come to another meadow and traverse uphill and look for the cairn marking where the trail is in some young evergreen trees. Once you pass through these young trees there are several blowdowns to climb over. There will be more alternating between forest and meadows. At about 3.2 miles you will come to a large meadow containing a bunch of fallen trees obscuring the route completely. Here I went uphill a bit to go up and over the worst of the fallen logs. On the far side of this tedious meadow, the trail re-enters forest and crosses the creek twice more before beginning a steep climb up through a headwall before again crossing the creek (LAST water source) and arriving at one last upper meadow to cross, before one last climb up to Scatter Creek Pass at about 4.5 miles/6150 feet.

The pass itself it a worthy destination for hikers, offering a great view of Mt. Stuart and Jack Ridge, with Scatter Peaks rising to the south and the ridge leading to Solomon to the north.

I turned north and ascended the ridge toward Solomon. For the most part I stayed directly on top of the ridge, scrambling over some rocks and going around to the left of others.

At about 6600 feet is when the route gets steeper. I alternated between rock scrambling on the ridge and avoiding some cliffy stuff by staying left. Soon I came to the false summit consisting of darker colored rocks and a lot of goat droppings. Completely avoid this last obstacle by going around to the left, and then the summit is straight above. About 5.5 miles and 4 hr 45 min to the summit. Great views of Stuart, Ingalls, Scatter, Hawkins, Adams, Rainier, Lemah, Chimney, Summit Chief, Daniel, Cradle, Glacier, Harding, Cashmere, Jack Ridge, Dragontail.

And then I dealt with the Scatter Creek meadow madness all over again. Ended up being 10.5 miles, over 4000' of gain, a bit over 8 hours.

[RichP]

It's kind of a shame that the trail is so covered in avy debris and brush higher up. It takes one up to some nice areas. It does make it lonesome up there for those who brave the entryway. I've hiked this trail twice and it's actually quite a bit easier after the annual greenery dies out. Last time I was up there I came across a group of hunters with their horses building a shelter in the base of the upper valley. they had logged the trail out up to where they were camping. Probably the only maintenance that trail has seen in years.

[Pribbs]

[zephyr]