Tuesday, June 14, 2016

Waterfall Hike on Mt Rainier's Eastside Trail

 We went to the east side of Mt Rainier to go on a waterfall hike on a wet spring day. This is a 7 mile round trip hike with about 800 ft elevation loss/gain to see 3 waterfalls. We started at the trailhead of the Owyhigh Lakes trail on Hwy 123. A short 0.2 miles down the trail, we could see the 62 ft Deer Creek Falls on Deer Creek.

 A little further down the trail, a better view of Deer Creek Falls.

0.4 miles from the trailhead, Owyhigh Lakes Trail crosses the Eastside Trail. To see the other two waterfalls, we would take the Eastside Trail to the left/south. But first, we decided to walk a short ways further on the Owyhigh Lakes Trail to a bridge over Dewey Creek. Here looking upstream:

 Looking downstream on the bridge over Dewey Creek.
 We then returned to go south on the Eastside Trail to the next 2 waterfalls. There are lots of huckleberry bushes along the trail.

 About 0.75 miles or so the trail crosses Chinook Creek on a bridge.

















 View of Chinook Creek upstream from this bridge:
View of Chinook Creek downstream from this bridge:
 a short ways down the trail, we found a boot path to some boulders on Chinook Creek to see the cascade coming down from the bridge.
 Another 0.75 miles or so down the trail, we could hear the falls, and looked for a boot path leading to the 25 ft Stafford Falls on Chinook Creek


 1.5 miles down the trail a bridge goes over the Ohanapecosh River and Ohanapecosh Falls. Looking upstream from the bridge over Ohanapecosh River and Falls



From the bridge looking down of Ohanapecosh Falls




 About 200 ft down the trail there is a boot track leading to an overlook of the 50 ft Ohanapecosh Falls

 a view of the beautiful Chinook Creek


some of the wildflowers and other flora we saw along the trail today: 




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