Olympic Mountains Trail Guide. Robert Wood
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the Wilderness Coast, in the Royal Basin/ Royal Lake area, Enchanted Valley area, and the Sol Duc River/High Divide Loop (including Mink Lake) area, Cat Basin, and all other backcountry areas in the Main Fork Sol Duc River drainage. Bear canisters are also required in areas where it is not possible to hang food at the prescribed height. That likely could involve just about any trip that includes a high-elevation campsite (loosely defined as any site higher than 4500 ft/1371 m).
Bear wires, which use a simple pulley system to hoist food bags up to a secure height, are found in some of the park’s most popular backcountry campsites (check with a Wilderness Information Center for a current list). They’re a wonderful creation. Claim a hook early in the day on busy weekends.
If you don’t own a canister, the park has a limited supply available for loan at the Wilderness Information Centers, located in Port Angeles, Hoodsport, and the South Shore of Lake Quinault. Keep in mind that on busy weekends they may run out of canisters. The park website has a list of area locations where canisters can be rented or purchased (see Appendix 2).
Overnight Use of Shelters: Olympic National Park prohibits the use of these backcountry shelters except in the case of an emergency:
•Lyre (Lake Crescent): Spotters Cabin on Pyramid Peak
•Elwha: Michael’s Cabin, Humes Cabin, and Remanns Cabin
•Quinault: Trapper, 12 Mile, and Low Divide Shelters, and Enchanted Valley Chalet
•Hoh: Happy Four, Olympus Guard, Elk Lake, and Glacier Meadows Shelters
•Sol Duc: Sol Duc Falls Shelter
•Coast: Toleak Shelter at Toleak Point
Wilderness Backpacking Reservations and Quotas: A wilderness camping permit is required for all overnight stays in undeveloped (backcountry) areas of the park. Within Olympic National Park, many camp areas are reservable year-round, but reservations for high-elevation areas are typically in effect only from mid-July until mid-October; these high-elevation areas may be available on a walk-up basis outside of that season. Wilderness permit reservations can be made up to six months to the day in advance on a rolling basis. Reservations are accepted online at www.recreation.gov or in person at a park Wilderness Information Center (see Appendix 2 for contact information).
Some wilderness camp areas within the park limit the number of reservations available to help minimize human impacts and preserve a quality wilderness experience. Quota areas, subject to change, are Flapjack Lakes, Grand and Badger Valleys, Hoh Lake and C.B. Flats, Hoh River Trail, Lake Constance, Ozette Coast, Royal Basin/Royal Lake, Sol Duc/Seven Lakes Basin/Mink Lake area, and Upper Lena Lake. Some of these quota areas allow 100 percent of the quota to be reserved in advance, while others allow 50 percent to be reserved in advance, with the remainder of reservations available on a first-come, first-served basis at a WIC during business hours up to 24 hours in advance. Within quota areas, camping is permitted only in designated sites. Campsites at larger camps are not individually assigned; they are available to permit holders on a first-come, first-served basis. Deviating from a permit’s itinerary within a quota area is not allowed, except in an emergency.
Outside of quota areas, permits are not limited and can be picked up at a permit office the day of or day before your hike, and all campsites in these areas are first-come, first-served. Refer to the Olympic National Park website for more information about reservations and quota areas. If you have questions about trails, permits, reservations, quotas, food storage requirements, weather, or other wilderness-related questions, contact a park ranger or one of the Wilderness Information Centers.
High alpine lakes and dramatic scenery abound in the Olympics (Hike 97).
PART I
LEEWARD OLYMPICS
The northern and eastern slopes of the Olympic Mountains constitute the leeward side because the prevailing winter winds at this latitude in the northern hemisphere come from the southwest. Accordingly, the leeward side is sheltered from storms by the Windward Olympics, the mass of peaks to the south and west. As a consequence, since they occupy what is called the rain shadow of the mountains, the northern and eastern slopes receive much less precipitation. The northeastern Olympics—or the Jupiter Hills as they were once called—have the lightest precipitation, from 20 to 30 inches yearly. As one goes west or south from the northeastern apex, the annual precipitation gradually increases (at the rate of about one inch per mile). Although these slopes lie within the bounds of the Leeward Olympics, they gradually phase into the windward belt at the western and southern extremities. Of course no sudden break occurs—one cannot draw a line and call one side the windward, the other the leeward. The boundary is approximate.
Because the northern and eastern sides of the Olympics are steeper than the southern and western slopes, the Leeward Olympics constitute only 40 percent of the total area included in the mountains. However, the peaks are generally higher in this section; therefore, the area contains as much if not more of the high country as do the Windward Olympics.
Lyre (Lake Crescent)
Lake Crescent, the source of the Lyre River, lies 579 feet above sea level and forms a narrow arc at the northern edge of the Olympics. Almost 9 miles long and about a mile wide, the lake covers slightly more than 5000 acres, making it the third largest natural lake in western Washington. Originally called Lake Everett, in honor of John Everett, a Hudson’s Bay Company trapper who sought furs along its wooded shores, the lake was renamed because its form roughly resembles a crescent. The largest lake in the Olympic Mountains, it occupies a trough deepened during the last ice age by the Cordilleran Ice Sheet, which moved westward down the Strait of Juan de Fuca. Except at its two ends, the lake has a precipitous shoreline and is bordered by steep, forest-clad mountains. On clear winter days, the snowy slopes cast silvery reflections in the intensely blue waters.
The lake is suited to various activities, including swimming, boating, fishing, and water skiing. At one time anglers trolled its waters for the Beardslee trout, a variety of rainbow. This fish, named for Leslie A. Beardslee, its discoverer, was declared by ichthyologist David S. Jordan to be a new species. However, it no longer exists in a pure state because it has crossbred with hatchery-raised fish. The lake also contained the crescenti trout, a unique type of cutthroat. But it, too, has been hybridized.
Lake Crescent is paralleled on the south by Aurora Ridge, the divide between two rivers, the Lyre and the Sol Duc; on the north by a lower ridge that culminates in Pyramid Mountain. Near the lake’s eastern end, Mount Storm King rises 4000 feet above the water. Mountain goats clamber on its cliffs, and it was here in the 1920s that the animals were introduced in the Olympics. Since then they have spread throughout the mountains.
About a dozen creeks flow into the lake from the bordering ridges and keep the water level constant. Barnes Creek, the largest, has built a small delta at its mouth. The lake has its outlet in the Lyre River, which flows from the northernmost point to the Strait of Juan de Fuca, only 5 miles distant.
Geologists believe that the lake originally drained to the Elwha, via Indian Creek, but that a slide pinched off the eastern part