A 10.4 mile hike through old growth forests, rocky canyons, and past an impressive waterfall deep in the wilderness surrounding Mt. St. Helens. This hike is followed up by s scenic drive back through the Gifford Pinchot National Forest, and along the Columbia River Gorge with a stop at a small brewery in Cascade Locks, Multnomah Falls, and finishing with a sunset view from Vista House.
The Hike
-Blue Lake Trail Head. Part of this trail is also a horse riding trail-
The hike to Sheep Canyon begins at the Blue Lake Trail head, which is at the end of Rd 8123, on the west side of Mt. St. Helens. Our day stated off pretty clear, so we got some nice views of the mountain at the beginning. The hike starts off in a an area that has obviously seen several landslides and flooding.
-Start of the hike, there’s the volcano-
-Washed out area at the beginning/end of the hike. Almost got lost in here-
About a half-mile into the hike, we reached a small stream. At this point, it got a little confusing as to which ay the trail headed, as the whole area was relatively bare, and it appeared that there were several paths. We finally figured out that we needed to cross the stream to continue on our way.
This first part of the trail winds through a gorgeous old growth forest. These were some of the biggest pines we had ever seen. The trail here never got too steep, so it was a very pleasant walk. As the morning went on, a light misty fog settled in the area, which unfortunately limited our views of the mountain, but it created a very surreal scene in the forest. It reminded me of some of the scenes on Endor from Star Wars.
-Like a dream…-
A little over 2 miles into the hike, just before the trail junction at the bottom of sheep canyon, we headed left down a spur trail to a viewpoint of the waterfall at the bottom of sheep canyon. This is definitely worth the short side-trip to check out.
-Sheep canyon falls. Don’t miss this!-
After the waterfall, we met back up with the main trail, and headed across the footbridge. The trail continues for about another 1.5 miles down through the forest. The trail was a bit rougher through this section, and there as one point where we had to traverse across some fallen trees. Eventually we reached the first junction with the Loowit Trail. We took a right down the trail to check out the South Fork of the Toutle river. This part of the hike overlooks the river, and a wide open valley.
-South Fork of the Toutle River.-
When the trail started descending towards the river, we turned around, and continued back up the Loowit Trail towards the 1980 “blast zone”. The trail at this point ascends pretty steeply up towards the mountain. Unfortunately we didn’t get any great views of the mountain during this climb due to the cloud cover. Finally, the trail leveled out, then headed back down towards the top of sheep canyon. One of the coolest parts of this part of the trail for me was all the pumice stone just scattered about. It just kept reminding me that we were hiking along the slope of a volcano.
-Steep part of the Loowit Trail-
-Descending back into sheep canyon-
-And continuing down…-
-Big Trees!-
Once the we reached another trail junction, we split off from the Loowit Trail and headed back down the trail towards the footbridge, and finally retraced our trail back down to the trail head.
Total Time: Just over 5 hours
Total Distance: 10.4 miles
The Beer
We decided to take a more scenic route back to Portland (where we were staying for this trip) which brought us through the Gifford Pinchot National forest. There were some spectacular views along the way, and some pretty fun roads to drive on. On our way to Cascade Locks, we did pass by two other breweries, but unfortunately they were both closed on this particular day (it was a Tuesday). The first was Backwoods Brewing in Carson, WA. This looked like a pretty awesome place, with a nice patio out back. We’ll definately check this place out next time we’re out here. The second brewery we struck out on was Walking Man Brewing in Stevenson, WA. Again, this looked like it would be a nice place to stop for some lunch and a pint. At this point we were ready for food and a beer and we were starting to get a little discouraged that we wouldn’t find an open brewery. Luckily, we found a little gem just over the Bridge of the Gods in Cascade Locks, OR. Thunder Island Brewing is a small brew pub tucked away near the Marine Park. They have a small menu, and offer a tasting of all their brews, as well as pints.My favorite part of this place, however, was the view of the Columbia river. It was very relaxing to sit with our pints and watch the barges full of logs float along the Columbia river towards Portland.
-Can’t think of a better way of ending a day of hiking-
We finished our drive back to Portland with stops at Multnomah Falls and Vista house; two popular stops in the Columbia river valley.
-Multnomah Falls-
-View back east up the Columbia River Gorge from Vista House-
