[pct-l] Oregon Snow/Eagle Creek/Tom's question

[waynekraft at verizon.net (Wayne Kraft)]

Yesterday I took a little road trip up to Mt. Hood to check out the snow situation.  Here's what I found.  I stopped at the Frog Lake Trail Head where the PCT crosses Highway 26 about 5.5 miles south of Barlow Pass and a day's hike south of Timberline Lodge.  The elevation there is about 3960 feet and the temperature at 1:00 PM on my crude key chain thermometer (which I left on my bumper when I drove off -darn it) registered about 35 degrees.  It looked like it had snowed about an inch during the night and this snow had turned to slush anywhere it was exposed to sun.  I strolled about 1/2 mile nobo from Highway 26.  There appeared to be maybe 18" of snow on the ground with lots of bare patches. The green tufts of last year's bear grass was sticking up out of the snow.  The trail was obvious, well-trod and as easy to hike as bare ground.  I crossed the highway and hiked a few hundred yards sobo.  No one had been on this side of the highway for awhile excpet a snowshoe hare. The trail was obvious (because there is quite a lot of old blow down on this trail all of which is above the snow and you can just  follow the corridor of cut logs).  Although my feet sunk down a couple of inches, this part of the trail  was easily hikable.  The large parking area was mostly vacant.  There were a few people standing around with unnecessary snow travel equipment looking puzzled.  The trail up to Frog Lake Butte is open to snowmobiles and there were a few snowmobilers standing around.  It would be easier to drive up with a four wheel drive I think.  There were some mushers there with dogs impatiently waiting for the humans to repair a truck.

I then drove around to Barlow Pass which is just over 4000 feet. There appeared to be just a little more snow here. There was a very large group of dufuses (dufi?) camped here under a huge blue plastic tarp about 10 feet off the road.  They had huge mounds of heavy equipment, acres of plastic sheeting and enough propane tanks to power an aircraft carrier.  They were ambulating hither and yon, some on snowshoes, some on sneakers. Didn't seem to make much difference.  Looks to me like you could easily hike from Highway 26 to Barlow pass in flip flops.

I then drove up to Timberline Lodge at about 5800 feet.  Skiers and boarders were dodging around rocks.  Rugged mountaineers on snowshoes were heading up the mountain with little kids running ahead of them with their inner tubes. The parking area is usually surrounded in winter with impassable high walls of snow scraped off the parking area.  Right now these are 3 foot mounds.  The forecast called for light rain/snow flurries.  Dark clouds threatened, but it snoweth not. Creeks were running strong with snow melt.  

The long range forecast for Portland calls for no precipitation and near record high temps in the mid-60's.  At Government Camp (3900 feet) the forecast highs are in the high 40's.  I suspect snow will be melting off all south facing slopes all of next week and into the first part of March, after which the hope of a major weather reversal is dim.  Looking at the Postholer website and some of the other Snotel locations not included in Postholer, it looks to me like the further north one goes and the lower in elelvation, the less snow (as a percentage of the historical April 1 averages) there is.  Around Mt. Hood at 3000 feet there is basically no snow.  You could easily hike to Ramona Falls on little or no snow but for the fact that the access road is closed and USFS has removed a necessary seasonal bridge until April.   Above 5000 feet snow levels around Mt. Hood approach 30% of historical average April 1 levels and to the south at higher elevations (Crater Lake, for example) we are at about 50%.  I spoke last weekend to some Southern Oregon University students in Ashland who advised me that there is "plenty of snow" at the Mt. Ashland ski area and that it looks "normal."  These were snow boarder dudes who might very well carry their lunches wrapped in rolling paper.  Mt. Ashland rises to an elevation of 7500 feet and currently reports 61" at the bottom of the runs and 93" at the top.  Grain of salt, allow for some exaggeration, etc.

Regarding the Eagle Creek Trail PCT loop:  ECT is certainly open to Blue Grouse Camp (about 1200 feet) where the Eagle-Benson trail climbs up to the PCT near Benson Plateau and to the junction with Eagle-Indian Springs Trail (about 1800 feet)  which climbs to the PCT near Wahtum Lake.  I have never hiked the PCT through here, but according to my map the trail never quite reaches 4000 feet and the shorter Eagle-Benson cut-off appears to top out at 3600.  This is mostly north facing slopes and there's surely some snow, but i would guess not enough to make hiking very difficult.

Tom, when are you planning to hike this?  I will make some phone calls next week to see what I can find out.  I have been thinking about this same trip as a kind of open-ended weekend ramble where I could abort and head down if conditions became annoying or dangerous.  

Remember now, when you thru-hike past Frog Lakes this sumer, if you see an REI key chain thermometer it's mine and I'd like it back.

Wayne Kraft