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 | Mount Hood Things To Do | Tips 1 - 10 of 14 |  |
These whole area doesn't have a name, but what is in a name? The area is magical with glacial creeks, vast snowfields, tiny tarns, grand vistas, magnificent flower gardens. Towering above all, is the glory of the mountain, bedecked with hanging glaciers and roaring waterfalls emanting from lower snows. Plus, it is easy for the average hiker to get up into.
The main access point is the Top Spur Trail. From here you can easily gain the NW section of the Timberline Trail (#600) which encircles the mountain - 4-5 day hike to complete. Hiking up the Top Spur Trail takes you to the Pacific Crest Trail where you turn right (south) for 20 yards or south to the junction of the PCT with the Timberline. Head east of the Timberline and you will slowly ascend a long forested ridge. At about a mile and a half, you come to a grand viewpoint amidst flower gardens. Here it is easy to sit and just look at the magnificence: the mountain, glaciers, waterfalls, canyons, flowers.
From here you can continue to many different spots - some on the trail and others not. Read William Sullivan's 100 Hikes of NW Oregon for more information (www.oregonhiking.com) - see the hike entitled 'McNeil Shelter'.
Enjoy. Leave a Comment Address: NW side of Mt HoodDirections: East of Portland/Gresham on US 26 to store at Zig Zag. Left (NE) on Lolo Pass Rd to pass. Right (south) on paved road for several miles til sign for 'Top Spur Trail'. Good gravel road - left about a mile.
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For a nice and easy dayhike, join the dozens of cars that are pulled up on the south side of US Route 26 just as the highway turns to enter the Government Camp area from the west. It is one of the most popular trails in the Mt Hood area of only 1.2 miles. The lake is very pretty and Mt Hood is, appropriately, 'mirrored' in the lake's surface. The lake is best experienced during the week as it does get crowded on the weekend. Leave a Comment Address: Mirror LakeDirections: 8 miles east of Rhodendron and 1 mile west of Government Camp on US 26
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Join the many on their way to the top! If you don't have the experience, but are in decent physical shape, there are guides available. Don't go up if you are not comfortable with glacial travel or in weather that is not settled. Too many people have died up here when they should not have.
The main route is out of the Timberline Lodge ski parking area. You need to register in the Daylodge building on the west side of the parking lot. Current weather and climbing conditions can be obtained from there. There are many other routes on the mountain of varying technicality. Remember that the rock on a volcano is not solid. It is best to start very early in the morning to avoid the constant rockfall that can be present.
Whether you go up the main route or another, you should have some company on top. The views are great, especially airy is the view off the headwall to the north where that first step down to Elliott Glacier is a looonngg one!
For a virtual climb of the mountain, see the travellogues. Leave a Comment
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Not as well-known as the Government Camp and Timberline Lodge area on the south side of Mt Hood, the north side is much more dramatic and wild. Here are the largest glaciers, the tallest cliffs, the best chance to experience the true beauty of the mountain. You access the area up the gravel road that ascends from the little ski area at Cooper Spur - just off Oregon route 35, about 25 miles south of the town of Hood River. There is a campground - Cloud Cap - at the end of the road. You can access the Timberline Trail and go south or west from here. Or you can wander up to the top of the Cooper Spur, overlooking the awesome north wall of Hood and the Elliott Glacier. This walk takes 2-3 hours and goes up to Tie-In Rock at 8500 feet where the Cooper Spur climbing route begins. Leave a Comment Address: Cloud CapDirections: Follow signs off OR 35 to Cooper Spur; gravel road 10 miles to Cloud Cap campground
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The south side climb is amazing with all of the different groups that you pass, that pass you. Everyone going up the mountain, becasue it is there? The south side climb is a bit of a slog until you round the east side of Crater Rock and enter the old caldera - the south side caldera wall blew out long ago in a smaller scale of what happened to the north side of Mt St Helens. From Crater Rock, you pass above a large fumarole that will grab equipment you are careless enough to let slide into it. Next, comes the bergshrund that you pass over or around depending upon conditions, and up the 35 degree caldera wall to the top. Return is the same way.
For a virtual climb of the mountain, see the travellogues. Leave a Comment Address: South Side Mt HoodDirections: Hike straight up from Timberline Lodge - register for your climb first at the Wy'East Daylodge on the westside of the parking lot
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There is something very magical about wandering through alpine surroundings in the early summer, wildflowers of every color blazing away at you. There are several flower areas on Mt Hood. You will wander by many of them if you take the Timberline Trail around the mountain. Areas with names like Paradise Park, Elk Cove, Cairn Basin. Some of the best flowers are to be seen on little sidetrails that take you higher, above the Timberline Trail to places like McNeil Shelter. For more ideas about the hiking possibilities, get William Sullivan's hiking guide to the Northern Oregon Cascades - www.oregonhiking.com Leave a Comment
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This is one of the most fantastic spots in the Oregon outdoors. You sit atop a small rocky flat spot surrounded by glaciers. A cliff drops away on the east to the Coe Glacier. Above on the south, the awesome north face of Mt Hood rises. You have about 0.1 miles of easy rock scrambling at the top - this, plus the fact that the route up is not an 'official' trail, ensures some amount of privacy. You access the bootpaths off the Timberline Trail bygoing up from the Wy'East Basin - near where the Vista Ridge comes up to meet the Timberline Trail - or you can follow bootpaths that go past Dollar Lake, near Elk Cove, and ascend an obvious ridge above the little tarn. Leave a Comment Address: Barrett SpurDirections: Up about 1.3 miles above the Timberline Trail from Wy'East Basin or Dollar Lake near Elk Cove
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Here in Paradise Park, there used to be one of the several trail shelters that were built by the CCC during the Depression. Only a few still stand. Sadly, the one here burnt a few years ago leaving only the foundation stones behind. Several campsites exist nearby on the forested island above Lost Creek. The Park and the shelter remains lie on the Paradise Park loop trail which parallels the Pacific Crest Trail about a half mile below. For someone doing the PCT to miss and not come up here would be like committing a sin in itself ;-] Leave a Comment
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There are several well-known flower-filled meadows lying alongside the base of Oregon’s highest mountain - Elk Cove, Yocum Ridge, Cairn Basin, etc. - but one of the most glorious is Paradise Park on the southwestern base of the mountain. Paradise Park lies about a half mile above the Pacific Crest Trail at timberline and during the all-to-brief wildflower season of mid-July to mid-August, the name of the park is truly apt!
There are large florally decorated meadows on the southern slopes of Mt Rainier which are also know as Paradise - those meadows are much larger than here on Hood, but everything about Rainier is larger - but to reach that Paradise, you need only find a parking space - easier said than done on the weekends when literally thousands come up. To gain Paradise on Mt Hood, you must work a little harder. No deathbed salvation here, you have to walk. Leave a Comment
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Paradise is normally reached by day hikers from Timberline Lodge in a little over five miles. The trail offers wide views to the south as it wanders around the 6000 foot level before dropping 700 feet into the awesome Zig Zag Canyon - the lava cliffs of the Mississippi Head towering high above. The day hiker will regain the lost elevation to attain Paradise - he will lose and regain the elevation, again on the way home. The Little Girl and I chose the little-used Paradise Park trail which ascends some 3000 feet in 6 miles through dense forested ridges to the southwest - fewer people to watch us huff! Leave a Comment
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on July 2, 2003
