Little Mt. Adams – Hellroaring Meadows Loop
Posted: August 6th, 2013, 10:24 am
From the area near Sunrise Camp, Little Mt. Adams stands out down the Ridge of Wonders as an almost perfect cinder cone with its lava ramparts encircling a small crater.
Last Saturday, I motored through the bulldust to Tract D and paid the Yakama Nation’s $5 entry fee. At the trailhead languished the new footbridge over Hellroaring Creek, so when I got down there, I made the ford (There was a bridge when I was last here in 2006). Then I waded through boggy meadows swarming with mosquitoes to the junction with the Island Spring Trail. A portion of the sign lay against a tree.
Well, the Island Spring had not been maintained in 2006 and it has not had a smidgeon of maintenance since then. However, most of the route, although sketchy, is fairly easily negotiated through meadows, patches of dry montane forest, much blowdown, and ever expanding thickets of snowbrush, spiraea, bitter cherry, young aspen, etc. Yellow squares on trees also show you that you’re on the right track. Beyond the lower trail’s only switchback, the going gets easier in mountain hemlock/ponderosa pine parklands, also with much blowdown. The trail drops to a bench on the slope of the Ridge of Wonders and then wanders to a creek. The source of this creek seems the logical place for Island Spring itself, but maps have that feature placed lower down the slope.
After the creek, the “upper” Island Spring Trail resumes, but this section has been abandoned for even longer than the lower section and is not on current maps. The trail route heads up the valley side of the ridge, avoiding a lot of blowdown in the montane forest, but sometimes getting lost in thickets. In some places there is the vestige of a tread, but many of the yellow squares remained and somehow I was able to keep track of these (also there was red flagging in places).
At least the squares showed me to the cinder scree below Little Mt. Adams. There’s a choice here: you can traverse to the right through the subalpine woodland to a saddle and then slog up scree to the summit or you can go straight up to the base of the lava rim and walk along it. I went straight up the cinders and walked along the lava wall to a climbable nook leading to the “summit.” From here, one drops through whitebark pine krummholz to the crater itself, a quiet, sheltered spot dotted with alpine wildflowers. From the rim, there were views to Heart Lake in Hellroaring Meadows and the valley’s headwall. Everything above, including the high points of the Ridge of Wonders, was socked in.
I dined in the crater and then contemplated the bush/bogwhack to Heart Lake. In 2006, I had gone pretty much straight down the slope and slogged across the bogs almost directly to Heart Lake. This time, I decided to angle towards the head of the valley and cross it on the debris slope. As I got closer, however, with the Ridge of Wonders rearing above, I found myself up to my armpits in lush shrubbery (sawwort, wormwood, alpine knotweed, etc.) on a very steep slope with hidden snags gouging my legs. I realized I was doomed to the bogs again and headed down.
I tried to pick the least gooey line across the bogs but sucking goo alternated with willow thickets and then Sitka alder then islands of mountain hemlock and then more goo. Branches of Hellroaring Creek had gouged ten-foot canyons in the peaty valley floor and I had to find logs across. I had heard of a “climber’s trail” that went up the west side of the valley to Sunrise Camp, but found no such track on the other side. Once there, however, it was an easy lope down through the woods, crossing one old debris field, until I saw a wall of rock to my left.
I recognized this wall as a feature local climbers (Trout Lake/White Salmon) had spoken of, so I headed over there. A faint track led along the base of the wall to join the trail into Heart Lake. I visited the lake and then headed out on the Hellroaring Meadows Trail, one that actually is well-maintained. The trail turned at a talus slope squeaking with pikas and where a large spring pours from the base of the rock. Then the path traverses, mostly on the level, in mountain hemlock/huckleberry woods to the trailhead. It was about a mile back down the road to the Bench Lake Campground where I had parked.
Last Saturday, I motored through the bulldust to Tract D and paid the Yakama Nation’s $5 entry fee. At the trailhead languished the new footbridge over Hellroaring Creek, so when I got down there, I made the ford (There was a bridge when I was last here in 2006). Then I waded through boggy meadows swarming with mosquitoes to the junction with the Island Spring Trail. A portion of the sign lay against a tree.
Well, the Island Spring had not been maintained in 2006 and it has not had a smidgeon of maintenance since then. However, most of the route, although sketchy, is fairly easily negotiated through meadows, patches of dry montane forest, much blowdown, and ever expanding thickets of snowbrush, spiraea, bitter cherry, young aspen, etc. Yellow squares on trees also show you that you’re on the right track. Beyond the lower trail’s only switchback, the going gets easier in mountain hemlock/ponderosa pine parklands, also with much blowdown. The trail drops to a bench on the slope of the Ridge of Wonders and then wanders to a creek. The source of this creek seems the logical place for Island Spring itself, but maps have that feature placed lower down the slope.
After the creek, the “upper” Island Spring Trail resumes, but this section has been abandoned for even longer than the lower section and is not on current maps. The trail route heads up the valley side of the ridge, avoiding a lot of blowdown in the montane forest, but sometimes getting lost in thickets. In some places there is the vestige of a tread, but many of the yellow squares remained and somehow I was able to keep track of these (also there was red flagging in places).
At least the squares showed me to the cinder scree below Little Mt. Adams. There’s a choice here: you can traverse to the right through the subalpine woodland to a saddle and then slog up scree to the summit or you can go straight up to the base of the lava rim and walk along it. I went straight up the cinders and walked along the lava wall to a climbable nook leading to the “summit.” From here, one drops through whitebark pine krummholz to the crater itself, a quiet, sheltered spot dotted with alpine wildflowers. From the rim, there were views to Heart Lake in Hellroaring Meadows and the valley’s headwall. Everything above, including the high points of the Ridge of Wonders, was socked in.
I dined in the crater and then contemplated the bush/bogwhack to Heart Lake. In 2006, I had gone pretty much straight down the slope and slogged across the bogs almost directly to Heart Lake. This time, I decided to angle towards the head of the valley and cross it on the debris slope. As I got closer, however, with the Ridge of Wonders rearing above, I found myself up to my armpits in lush shrubbery (sawwort, wormwood, alpine knotweed, etc.) on a very steep slope with hidden snags gouging my legs. I realized I was doomed to the bogs again and headed down.
I tried to pick the least gooey line across the bogs but sucking goo alternated with willow thickets and then Sitka alder then islands of mountain hemlock and then more goo. Branches of Hellroaring Creek had gouged ten-foot canyons in the peaty valley floor and I had to find logs across. I had heard of a “climber’s trail” that went up the west side of the valley to Sunrise Camp, but found no such track on the other side. Once there, however, it was an easy lope down through the woods, crossing one old debris field, until I saw a wall of rock to my left.
I recognized this wall as a feature local climbers (Trout Lake/White Salmon) had spoken of, so I headed over there. A faint track led along the base of the wall to join the trail into Heart Lake. I visited the lake and then headed out on the Hellroaring Meadows Trail, one that actually is well-maintained. The trail turned at a talus slope squeaking with pikas and where a large spring pours from the base of the rock. Then the path traverses, mostly on the level, in mountain hemlock/huckleberry woods to the trailhead. It was about a mile back down the road to the Bench Lake Campground where I had parked.