Herman Creek - Pacific Crest Trail Loop

Who Would have thought that we would be able to do this in the Mid-Fabruary without going though few feet of snow on the ground and heavy route-finding to be on the correct trail. Well, with the winter being well below par, this was nothing more than a summer hiking. We ran into couple of snow patches, the biggest one being couple of feet wide. Very Sad!

Now, on the hike part - 

Day 1 - We started form Herman Creek TH and followed the Herman creek trail down to the PCT, going through the bridge on the herman creek. After taking PCT, We had long switchbacks with occasional views. At 4.5 miles, we got to a pretty decent size opening. That was our lunch break. After soaking in the views, It was time to put the packs on march upwards towards Benson Plateau. For the remaining 4-5 miles, there aren't many views. At 10 miles, ~4000 feet of elevation gain, we reached Camp Smokey. That was the goal for the day. We setup our tents and went down to the spring to get water for dinner. 

Camp Smokey

Day 2 - Our plan was to go further south on PCT towards Herman Creek trail with couple of detours up to Chinidere Mountain and Tomlick Mountain. Trail was very easy to follow. A mile further from Camp Smokey, views opened up for a while. We were able to see Mount Adams across Herman Creek. Views from Tomlick Mountain were amazing. Day 2 wasn't easy with those two detours. After getting down from Tomlick Mountain, it was all downhill. We took that very gladly. Crossing Herman Creek wasn't a big problem, We were able to cross it on a log with dry feet. We decided to get to Camp Smokey and spent the night.

Tomlick Mountain

Herman Creek Drainage from PCT

View from a side trail after Camp Smoky

Day 3 - Time to head back out to the TH. We crossed handful of creeks - mostly dry feet crossings. In the past I have had to turn back from one of those, because I wasn't going to be able to cross it dry feet. So, I was a bit concerned this time.

All in all, this was a bonus because, I have never backpacked in the Columbia Gorge before, because it is so close to home and typically when I can backpack in summer, I would want to go further out from home and higher in the Alpine country.

Dog Mountain

I don't have to describe this hike here or I don't have to say how steep it is, but the views from the top is worth the workout. There is already enough description everywhere else. This is probably one of the hike that everybody should do if you are coming to Portland. Excellent views to west towards columbia gorge and to East towards Mount Defiance and Mount Hood!

We took a "hard" way to go up and Augspurger trail down. There is a "harder" way to go up, which is half mile shorter.
Trail stats -- 7.5 miles, 3000 feet Elev. gain.

Devil's Peak Lookout - Mount Hood

Devil's peak lookout is an abandoned fire lookout in the Mount Hood area. It hasn't been manned for several years and now maintained by volunteers and open to visitors. There are many ways to get to the lookout. Hunchback Mountain Trail, Kinzel Lake, Cool creek trail to name a few.
We took the cool creek trail to the lookout tower. Finding the trailhead was our first challenge. We had a clear direction, but somehow we missed the trailhead and went past it crossing the creek. We soon realized that and turned around to have a second attempt. This time we saw the trailhead.
I read it earlier that this is a very steep trail, climbing over 3300ft in ~3.5 miles. I didn't realized that fact until I was on the trail with an overnight pack with 5 liters of water. I also had a tent in case we don't get to sleep inside the lookout. We ran across one stream at 2 miles from the trailhead, but other than that there was no water along the entire ridge. There is a year-round spring somewhere around the lookout, but we didn't want to rely on that.

There aren't many views along the trail, as it stays in the forested area pretty much the entire time. Just before we reached the trail junction with Hunchback trail (going down to Kinzel Lake), there was a stunning viewpoint towards Mount Hood and Zigzag mountain.

Once we got to the lookout, we dropped our packs and explored inside the tower. I was surprised to see the items stocked in the cabinets there. We later chopped some wood to get wood fired stove going for the night.

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