Last Monday I woke up with a little craft-beer headache and decided the only way to beat the blues was to climb a mountain. I grabbed my pack, a stack of Dead discs, and drove out to Hamilton Mountain in the Gorge.
Hamilton Mountain is in Washington, just west of Bonneville Dam. The four-mile trail leading to the summit is stocked with waterfalls, wildflower meadows, and towering cliffs with killer views of the Gorge. Mt. Hood, Mt. Adams, and Mt. St. Helen’s all make appearances, nearly overwhelming nearby Table Mountain and Beacon Rock.
The trail starts in a picnic area accessible by a short road across from the Beacon Rock trailhead on SR 14. It climbs moderately through forest and under a set of power lines that offers a nice view of the summit. It doesn’t look so daunting from here – not until after the falls.
I skipped the side-trail leading down to the Hardy Falls viewpoint and continued to Rodney Falls and the Pool of the Winds. Rodney Falls is pretty enough, but the Pool of the Winds above it is spectacular. The creek falls 50′ into a pool almost completely enclosed by rock walls and pours out through a narrow chute that breaks over the rocks to form Rodney Falls. It’s breezy, misty and beautiful, and though the spray wet my glasses and made taking a good photo difficult, it sure was refreshing.
The trail then crosses the creek on a photogenic bridge and climbs to a signed intersection. The sign for the left trail says “Difficult.” The sign for the right trail says “More difficult.” Either trail will get you to the top, but go right – the views are much better and the “difficult” descent is easier on the knees.
This leg of the trail is one of the steepest in the gorge, switch-backing relentlessly up the edge of the mountain. I took a number of 10-second breaks (okay, a large number) to stare at the trail snaking down the hillside below.
Despite being a little worn out, I leapt around like a mountain goat when I hit the meadows. Although the main trail stays fairly steep and skirts the cliffs, the many side trails are worth exploring, just to wander among paintbrush and shooting stars and gaze out over Beacon Rock, Bonneville and the steep cliffs on the Oregon side of the river. Some of these trails are quite narrow and go right to the edge of the cliff. I followed one uphill as it wove around cliffs and ravines and in and out of trees, and eventually intersected the main trail again.
The summit was closer than it was at the power lines and suddenly looked quite daunting. The trail re-entered the forest and – somehow ? quickly switch-backed up to the brushy summit at 2,488′. The brush limited the views somewhat, but I still enjoyed a “summit high” as I stood above the other ridges and forests and traced my route up the mountain, looking up and down the river for miles and seeing Mt. Hood and Mt. Adams lurking under high clouds. I exalted there for a while in the wind before a swarm of ravenous predators viciously attacked me in my moment of peak-bagging glory.
After the climb, I was the brightest infrared target in the state ? and the mosquitos knew it. I think they were bigger than the bald eagle I saw floating over the valley, and there were more of them. We all wanted to eat, but I’d just climbed 2,100′ and decided to part ways and lunch alone near a well-marked intersection with several abandoned logging roads. I headed downhill through flowering thimbleberry patches and the occasional columbine until I reached a perfect lunch spot: a little plateau, unmistakably open and flat, with plenty of room to sit and enjoy the great views to the east and west. Thankfully, it was also mosquito-free.
After my break I followed the left-most logging road as it dropped back into the forest. The walk was highly enjoyable, with talus on my left, trees on my right, and a nice country vibe from the flowers growing alongside the old road. Eventually I entered the forest again and, a mile after the plateau, I reached an intersection in a little meadow with a picnic table by a creek. I turned left and followed the “less difficult” Hardy Creek Trail one mile to the intersection with the main trail. From there it was just a quick mile and a half back to the trailhead, for a round trip of just over seven and a half miles.
After all the flowers, ridges, waterfalls and panoramas, my headache was gone, I was mentally buzzing, and I felt fantastic. There?s nothing like a solitary walk in the woods to lift your spirits and cleanse your mind, even when the lower trails are crowded ? but that?s the advantage, and the beauty, of a well-placed ?More Difficult? sign.
Article By Jason Weeks, Borrowed Times
