Sunday, October 6, 2019
Today was supposed to be gorgeous so Greg and I decided to do the Table Rock hike. The trailhead is now 1.3 further miles back than it used to be before a 1996 landslide wiped out a big section of road:
You can tell this was once a road, but it is definitely being taken back by nature:
23 years on the landslide site is being consumed by trees and vegetation:
After 1.3 miles we left the road and got on the trail. We passed plenty of mushrooms:
There is a rocky point that is pretty easy to scramble up, which we did:
Mt. Jefferson:
Mt. Hood:
Back on the trail we continued on, crossing a huge rockslide:
Here is the final approach to the summit:
My family did this hike in 1987 and there is a picture of that same section of trail. The trees have grown up a bit!
We made it! From the rim of the table the views to the north, east, and south were incredible. Mt. Jefferson and the Three Sisters:
Eagle over Mt. Jefferson:
Mt. Hood:
Looking north into Washington we could see Mt. St. Helens, Mt. Rainier, and Mt. Adams:
Panorama:
There was once a fire lookout up here, but these days most of the summit is pretty grown up with trees:
There are campsites in the trees, but no water up here:
We could see the rock pinnacle we climbed up earlier:
While the mountain views up here are great, there are many many clearcuts scarring the hillsides. It’s hideous:
We sat up there for awhile soaking up the warm sunshine and the views. Then we reluctantly started hiking back down:
Road-hiking back:
About 7.5 miles with 1,500′ elevation gain.
