Pacific Crest Trail & Cispus Pass Backpacking Trip – Goat Rocks Wilderness

One of my favorite places to backpack is Goat Rocks Wilderness. On this trip, we had cooler temps and foggy conditions, saw shooting stars during the Perseids, and day hiked on the Pacific Crest Trail.

TRIP PLANNING

• best months: mid-July to September
• location: Goat Rocks Wilderness; nearest town: Packwood
• land management: Gifford Pinchot National Forest: Cowlitz Valley Ranger District
• trail conditions: Snowgrass Trail #96
• hike description: Washington Trails Association – Snowgrass Flat
• wilderness permits: self-issued at the trailhead
• parking pass: NW Forest Pass required

ITINERARY

• day 1 – Snowgrass trailhead to campsite: 5.5 miles, 1,640 ft. gain
• day 2 – day hike to Cispus Pass: 5.7 miles roundtrip, 730 ft. gain
• day 3 – day hike north on PCT towards Old Snowy: 5 miles roundtrip, 800 ft. gain/loss
• day 4 – hike out to Snowgrass trailhead: 5.25 miles, 150 ft. gain, 1,724 ft. loss

Goat Rocks is usually quite crowded on summer weekends, so we started this trip on a Sunday morning to avoid the crowds. As we hiked in, we passed at least 30 backpackers hiking out. A few years ago when I was here, the temps were in the 80s and there were tons of black flies and mosquitoes that were biting for pretty much the entire trip. This time, the weather was much cooler and we didn’t have any issues with bugs. The warmest day was on our hike in, about 65 degrees. The rest of the trip was much cooler, with foggy conditions on our third day and overnight temps in the low 40s. For me, this is perfect weather for backpacking.

Wildflowers that were near peak on this trip included a lot of red paintbrush, purple asters, bistort, lupines, lousewort, yellow arnica, pink heather, and gentian just getting started. And lots of western pasqueflower in its seedhead form, also known as “hippy on a stick”.

Day 1 – hike in to campsite on PCT

Starting on the Snowgrass trail, we turned onto the Bypass Trail and followed it to the Pacific Crest Trail. The Bypass Trail isn’t as heavily traveled as the Snowgrass Trail, but can still be popular for camping. It is mostly forested, but has pockets of meadows and a lovely creek winding through the camp area.

The creek is unbridged, so we crossed on logs. I usually prefer to wade through instead, but this was an easy crossing.

From there, we headed north on the PCT to locate a campsite.

Two years ago when I was backpacking here, I checked out all of the campsites along the PCT and waypointed them in my GPS app. I was hoping to get a site about halfway between the Bypass junction and the Snowgrass junction… and we did. The campsite is hidden from the trail but easy to find via side trails that lead to it. With views of Goat Rocks and Mount Adams, and easy access to water, this was the perfect site for exploring Goat Rocks along the PCT.

After I setup my tent, I was typing a message on my InReach Messenger when I saw something moving in the trees. A black fox walked right past me, then stopped to look at me before hiking his leg over a plant in the campsite. I’ve heard of black foxes stealing items from backpackers in Indian Heaven Wilderness, but this was the first time I’d seen one. Black foxes (also known as silver foxes) are actually endangered Cascade Red Foxes, with variations in fur color ranging from red to black to silver. This fox was shiny black with a white-tipped tail.

For water, we headed up the trail a short distance to natural springs flowing on the west side of the trail. With multiple spots where the springs come burbling out of ground, they form two creeks that run down the hillsides. Two short side trails lead to the springs from the PCT.

After dinner, we hiked up the PCT for sunset views of Mount Adams and Goat Rocks.

The Perseids were near peak during this trip, and we heard there was a chance of seeing the northern lights, so we set our alarms for 2:00am. We took our chairs to sit next to the meadow for bigger views of the sky and were excited to see quite a few shooting stars. We couldn’t tell if the muted sky color variations we saw were the northern lights, although we later heard from other backpackers who took pics with their phones that showed them. After the last time I tried to shoot the Perseids, I missed seeing almost all of the shooting stars while adjusting my camera, so I decided not to take any photos of the night sky on this trip and just enjoy the show without distraction.

I was testing a couple of pieces of gear on this trip for reviews – the REI Magma 30 Down Quilt and the Zenbivy Ultralight Mattress. With temps expected to be near 40 degrees on one of the nights, it was a great test for warmth since I normally use a quilt rated to 10 degrees, or a 0 degree sleeping bag when it gets below 45 overnight. The new Zenbivy mattress has an R-value of 4.8 and sleeps much warmer than what I’m used to. I think that made a big difference in terms of overall warmth – I usually feel the cold coming up from the ground, but with this mattress I never felt any cold spots. Overall, the combo of this quilt and mattress kept me plenty warm on all three nights of this trip. Reviews of both items are coming soon.

Day 2 – day hike to Cispus Pass

The second day of our trip had perfect conditions: temps in the mid 50s and partly sunny skies… and no bugs. 🙂 We headed south on the PCT to spend the day in Cispus Basin and hike up to Cispus Pass.

The hillsides in the basin were filled with purple Douglas asters, and every stream we crossed had a mix of bright wildflowers.

We stopped at a campsite with cliff-edge views of the basin and could see across to the pass we’d be hiking to.

More of the basin comes into view just before a water crossing at the base of a waterfall.

The Cispus River didn’t have any snow around it and was super easy to cross.

After crossing the river, the trail winds up via switchbacks and gradual inclines to Cispus Pass. Views from the pass include Yakima Tribal lands and the Klickitat River valley.

We sat at the pass for a long break and met several groups of hikers who also paused here for awhile. Heading back, we took our time to soak in the beauty of this area.

  

We could hear pikas “meeping” as we passed several talus slopes.

Day 3 – day hike on PCT north towards Old Snowy Mountain

On our third day, we woke up to heavy fog. My tent had quite a bit of condensation but all of my gear stayed dry in spite of it. While getting ready for our hike, it looked like the fog might clear, but the wind blew more fog in and it was thick for most of the day. And cold. These conditions make for interesting photography, so I was excited to focus on what we could see instead of what we couldn’t.

When we reached the junction with the Snowgrass Trail, we stopped to chat with several groups of hikers that had gathered here. There’s normally a great view of Mount Adams from this location, but not today.

We took our time hiking and stopped to check out side trails along the way as well as several marmots in the meadows and resting on rocks.

Cloudy conditions make the colors in the rocks and wildflowers stand out more.

A small side trail led to a viewpoint of this rocky area… and then I noticed the totally chill marmot hanging out below.

Leaving the areas with vegetation and trees, we headed through what looks like a moonscape full of rocks and small snowfields.

When we reached the snowfield that leads to Old Snowy, white out conditions made it impossible to see very far.

My friend decided to see what it was like and I could barely see her after she hiked about 10 feet on the snowfield. This is where we turned around for the day.

We were fascinated by the variations in colors and textures on the rocks through this section.

Hippies on a stick!!

We took a side trail to spend some time at two large split rocks.

Almost back to camp…

I used my backpacking chair to create a “lounger” in my tent. I set the chair with the back down, then placed my sleeping pad in it so I could sit up and journal. It’s quite comfortable!

Day 4 – hike out to trailhead

It’s always hard to leave the backcountry, but it was time so we packed up and hiked out the same way we hiked in but in much less time since it was all down hill. This was my sixth backpacking trip to Goat Rocks, and I’m sure it won’t be the last. There’s so much to see here and it’s always beautiful!