The Creaky Knees Guide Washington, 3rd Edition: The 100 Best Easy Hikes

by Seabury Blair Jr.

Overview

Explore the beauty of Washington's natural landscape with this fully updated guide featuring the 100 best low-impact day hikes in the state—perfect for aging baby boomers, seniors, those traveling with small children, and anyone else interested more in a stroll than a climb.


From the Olympic Peninsula to Mount Rainier and Snoqualmie Pass, The Creaky Knees Guide Washington is a day-hiking guidebook filled with kinder, gentler trails, featuring 100 of the best easy-to-walk hikes throughout the state. Written in an informative style that will appeal to anyone, regardless of age, this helpful guide includes trail ratings from 1 (worthwhile) to 5 (spectacular) based on water features and other enjoyable factors; topographical maps with elevation profiles; and information at a glance, such as recommended seasons, estimated hiking times, permit and parking fees, and distance and elevation gain.

HIKES INCLUDE:
▪ Bridal Veil Falls
▪ Rialto Beach
▪ Beacon Rock
▪ Ginkgo Petrified Forest Trails
▪ Painted Rocks
▪ Chain Lakes Loop
▪ Middle Fork Snoqualmie
▪ Hyak Tunnel
▪ Turnbull National
▪ Wildlife Refuge
▪ and many more!

Other titles in Creaky Knees easy hike series include Creaky Knees Oregon, Creaky Knees Northern California, and Creaky Knees Arizona.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781632173546
Publisher:	Blue Star Press
Publication date:	02/01/2022
Series:	Creaky Knees
Pages:	320
Product dimensions:	5.51(w) x 8.52(h) x 0.60(d)

About the Author

SEABURY BLAIR JR. spent many years as the outdoor columnist for The Bremerton Sun, where one of his most popular features was the “Hike o’ the Month.” He is an avid backcountry skier and hiker, and lives in Spokane, WA.

He is also the author of Wild Roads Washington; the Creaky Knees Guide series of easy hiking books (titles cover Washington, Oregon, and Pacific Northwest National Parks and Monuments); the Day Hike! series of easy hikes that you can do in a day (titles cover the Central Cascades, the North Cascades, Mount Rainier, the Olympic Peninsula, the Columbia Gorge, and Spokane/Coeur d'Alene).

Read an Excerpt

Introduction
As you read these lines, I’ll be celebrating my eighth decade on this planet by taking many of the hikes outlined in this book. I’ve been incredibly lucky to have avoided most of the maladies and ailments that cause those of us who love nature to curse our joints and bones for keep-ing us from the wild places, the places our hearts yearn to see once more. Yet I’m not immune to the greatest handicap of all—advancing age—and that has altered my approach to wilderness pathways, both mentally and physically.And it has changed the way I reviewed the hikes in this, the third edition of The Creaky Knees Guide: Washington. With few exceptions, the hikes and trails have not changed, but I’ve tried to look at them from the standpoint of a wilderness pedestrian who can no longer hike 3 miles an hour for 17 hours straight across the Olympic Mountains, which I did three decades ago; or climb 8 miles and 3,700 vertical feet up Scotchman Peak, which I did four years ago. Both are but minor accomplishments compared to the many folks, older than me, who gallop from one side of the Grand Canyon to the other in a single day, or zip up Denali with minimal support. Still, we all tend to accept the reality that we can’t enjoy our wild world the way we used to, while clinging to the wish that we could.So that was my focus in revising this guide. Wherever I thought it necessary, I mentioned the fact that you needn’t walk the trail as far as I suggest. In most cases, it’s an arbitrary destination and has little to do with the scenery, flora, or fauna you’ll see along the way. Far more important, it seems to me, is getting on the trail, no matter the distance you travel. The forest you enter at the trailhead is the same as that five miles away; the river you walk beside is no wilder a half-mile from the parking area as it is three miles up- or downstream. All of our wild places are just as beautiful, just as magnificent, just as wild a few hun-dred steps up the trail as they are a few miles along.It doesn’t matter how far you walk or how fast you walk, or even if you walk—I’ve paid special attention to pointing out accessible trails— I think what really matters is that you walk. Or hobble, limp, wheel, or—my favorite mode of trail travel these days—waddle.Since I started hiking Washington’s wilderness pathways, shortly after the last ice age, I’ve been both encouraged and saddened by the fact that more people are using the trails these days. In 1968, it was a surprise on a summer weekend to find more than a dozen people hiking to Snow Lake from Snoqualmie Pass, although the trail at that time was a couple of miles longer. Today, you are fortunate to find a parking space in the huge lot near Alpental. Some trailheads are so crowded that hikers are forced to park parallel along the approach road, forcing forest managers to enforce limits or require permits.What good can come of overcrowding? Every person experiencing a wilderness outing for the first time could become an advocate for trails in the future. I hope they will join a growing constituency of users, folks dedicated to improving trails and managing our wild pathways in a manner that alleviates the impact of increased use. Such organi-zations at the Washington Trails Association, The Mountaineers, Sierra Club chapters, Back Country Horsemen of Washington, and Evergreen Mountain Bike Alliance all join with national and state wilderness managers to improve and protect our trails.Washington trails provide rare diversity in the places we can hobble, limp, wheel, or waddle. As diverse as they are, they all share at least one element: exceptional beauty. The mossy, fern-festooned rain forests of the Hoh. The receding glaciers of Mount Adams. The alpine meadows of Hurricane Ridge. The sage and sand of the Columbia Plateau. The ocean-like expanse of the Palouse. All of these places look about the same from mile marker one to mile three and perhaps beyond.The pedestrians who ply our pathways from west to east and north to south are pretty much the same. They all know and love the country at their back door—be it forest or flatland, mountain or meadow, desert or river. I’ve waddled beside a 95-year-old hiker on a Mount Baker trail, encountered a 52-year-old woman jogging through pines along the Spokane River, and passed Real Mountain Climbers toting a football to the summit of Mount Adams for a pickup game. All told me about their favorite trail or hike and spoke about the beauty of the country around them.All the people I met who hike the wild pathways of Washington—from the college kids climbing out of the Salmo-Priest Wilderness to the 89-year-old hiker on the Chain Lakes Trail—will tell you the same thing: walking is the best thing you can do for your soul and your body—especially if you are surrounded by the beauty you can find around our neck of the woods. Age and physical condition are sim-ply not as important to them as getting outside to see what surprises Mother Nature has for them. It is in that spirit that I offer this guide to all of you. Sooner or later, we all realize that “easy hike” is a relative term. What might be an easy hike when you are 22 years old is not likely to merit that same adjective when you are 52 and the vigor has morphed into varicose veins. So while the 100 hikes outlined in this guide are all labeled “easy,” you are likely to find yourself wondering at least once if I am already senile. If you feel—as I often do when trying to keep up with my wife, B. B. Hardbody—like a leaking hydration pack, I’ll be happy. In fact, if you don’t curse your humble correspondent at least once while sweating up a hill or limping back to the trailhead, I have failed in my mission. Don’t be fooled by the title. Unless you are a retired Olympic athlete or can still jog a dozen miles in under an hour, you’ll find plenty of hikes in this guide to keep your heart rate up and your lungs sucking harder than a Dyson. I’ve been lucky in my eight decades on this planet to stay healthy enough to keep walking, and in those years, I have met hundreds of people on the trail who aren’t as fortunate as me. My recent hiking partners include a woman who speeds through the forest on an artifi-cial hip and a group of Washington Trail Association volunteers who appear to take great pleasure in lifting heavy rocks and digging path-ways along basalt cliffs. The important thing, it seems to me, is that regardless of age or physical condition, you try one of the trails out-lined here, walking, wheeling, limping, hobbling, or even waddling through rare beauty and solitude.

Table of Contents

Hikes at a Glance vi

Acknowledgments xi

Introduction xii

Using This Guide xv

Be Careful xix

The Cascades 1

Mount Baker Highway (State Route 542)

1 Hannegan Camp 3

2 Chain Lakes Loop 6

3 Ptarmigan Ridge 8

4 Heliotrope Ridge 11

5 Twin Lakes Road 13

6 Winchester Mountain Lookout 15

7 High Pass 18

North Cascades Highway (State Route 20)

8 Baker Lake 22

9 Sauk Mountain 25

10 Thunder Creek Trail 27

11 Lake Ann 29

12 Blue Lake 31

13 Cutthroat Lake 33

14 Tiffany Lake 35

Stevens Pass Highway (US Highway 2)

15 Bridal Veil Falls 38

16 Barclay Lake 41

17 Iron Goat Trail 43

18 Tumwater Canyon Trail 46

19 Little Eightmile Lake 48

Snoqualmie Pass (Interstate 90)

20 Rattlesnake Ledge 52

21 John Wayne Trail, Cascades 54

22 Hyak Tunnel 57

23 Middle Fork Snoqualmie 60

24 Talapus Lake 63

25 Snow Lake 66

26 Squaw Lake 69

Chinook Pass Highway (State Route 410)

27 Naches Peak Loop 72

28 Noble Knob 75

White Pass (Us Highway 12)

29 Deer Lake 79

30 Tieton River Nature Trail 81

31 Hogback Ridge 84

32 Dark Meadow 87

33 Yellowjacket Pond 89

34 Walupt Creek 91

Mount Rainier 95

35 West Side Road 97

36 Eunice Lake 100

37 Berkeley Park 102

38 Paradise Trails 104

39 Pinnacle Saddle 108

40 Spray Park 111

41 Glacier View 113

42 Comet Falls 116

Mount Adams 119

43 Round the Mountain Trail 121

44 Takhlakh Lake Loop 124

45 West Fork Trail 126

46 Killen Creek Trail 128

47 Indian Racetrack 131

Mount St. Helens 135

48 Coldwater Lake Trail 137

49 Windy Ridge 139

50 Norway Pass 141

Olympic and Kitsap Peninsulas 145

Olympic Peninsula

51 Lower Skokomish River 147

52 Spike Camp 149

53 Dosewallips Road 152

54 Mount Townsend 155

55 Marmot Pass 158

56 Camp Handy 161

57 Dungeness Spit 163

58 Maiden Peak 165

59 Hurricane Hill 167

60 Elwha River Road 170

61 Spruce Railroad Trail 173

62 Rialto Beach 176

Kitsap Peninsula

63 Port Gamble Trails 179

64 Green Mountain Trail 181

65 Gold Creek Trail 184

Central Washington 189

66 Umtanum Canyon 191

67 Manastash Ridge 193

68 Ginkgo Petrified Forest Trails 195

69 John Wayne Trail West 197

70 John Wayne Trail East 200

71 Cowiche Canyon Trail 202

72 Ancient Lake(s) 204

73 Umatilla Rock Loop 206

74 Billy Clapp Lake Wildlife Area 208

75 Swakane Canyon Road 211

76 Potholes Dunes 213

Columbia River Gorge 217

77 Hardy and Rodney Falls 219

78 Klickitat Rail Trail 221

79 Beacon Rock 224

80 Dog Mountain 226

Spokane and Northeastern Washington 229

81 Columbia Plateau Trail North 231

82 Columbia Plateau Trail South 234

83 Turabull National Wildlife Refuge 237

84 Shedroof Mountain 240

85 Sullivan Lake Trail 243

86 Columbia Mountain 246

87 Painted Rocks 248

88 Dishman Hills 250

89 Liberty Creek 253

90 Centennial Trail West 256

91 Centennial Trail East 259

Southeastern Washington 263

92 White Bluffs 265

93 Columbia Plateau Trail 268

94 Boyer Park 270

Urban Trails 273

95 Olympic Discovery Trail, Port Angeles and Sequim 275

96 Chehalis Western Trail, Olympia 277

97 Burke-Gilman Trail, Seattle 279

98 Boulevard Park, Bellingham 282

99 Apple Capital Loop, Wenatchee 284

100 Yakima Greenway, Yakima 287

Index 291

Editorial Reviews

"[The Creaky Knees Guide will] help you get started in exploring the Evergreen State."
—The Columbian

“You’ll soon find that [The Creaky Knees hiking books] will be your go-to guides for enjoyable jaunts in the great outdoors.”
—Trailblazer Girl

From the Publisher