Hiking Covel Creek
Aug. 10th, 2022 07:08 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
canyonwalkerLast Friday was our first day of hiking on a three-day weekend trip to Washington. After we left our hotel in the small town of Chehalis, WA we drove first to the Covel Creek trailhead northeast of Mt. St. Helens in the Gifford Pinchot National Forest. We'd cross referenced hiking descriptions for a couple of waterfalls on this trail between various sources— including, yes, Professor Smedley Q. Boredom's Very Dull Book of Waterfalls. But really it was the hiking website AllTrails.com that was the most lucid. ...Which was helpful, because this hike was pretty far out in the boonies.
Despite being "out in the boonies" there was some kind of event people in the area were preparing for. Some kind of leadership event. All we encountered were people who were clueless, unfriendly, or both. People who think that a stupid little placard reading "RIGHT TURN to some waterfalls" is a way to mark a trail. I'm not sure what these people are going to be leading. I'm pretty sure, though, I don't want to be a part of it.
Weird and marginally unhelpful signs were kind of a theme on this trail. In addition to multiple of those "some falls" signs printed out by someone who apparently thinks they're being really funny (they're failing at it) there are also several signs stating the trail is closed because the bridges are removed. "Bridge Out Ahead" would be a reasonable warning... if it were at the start of the trail. Instead these signs are posted a mile in from the trailhead. WTF?
Well, we decided, "Bridges? We don't need no stinkin' bridges!"
This reminded me of another set of signs we saw on a different waterfall trail in Washington years ago— "TRAIL CLOSED to weaksauce city folk".
Fortunately the dry creek that was easy to cross had plenty of water flowing not to far upstream.
We passed a number of small waterfalls on Covel Creek.
Neither these two waterfalls (last two photos above) nor other small ones we passed on the trail as we climbed have names. That meant the two named waterfalls, Covel Falls and Angel Falls, would have to be even better, right? Stay tuned for the next blog to see!
Update: In the next blog we not only get to Covel Falls, we walk behind it!
Despite being "out in the boonies" there was some kind of event people in the area were preparing for. Some kind of leadership event. All we encountered were people who were clueless, unfriendly, or both. People who think that a stupid little placard reading "RIGHT TURN to some waterfalls" is a way to mark a trail. I'm not sure what these people are going to be leading. I'm pretty sure, though, I don't want to be a part of it.
Weird and marginally unhelpful signs were kind of a theme on this trail. In addition to multiple of those "some falls" signs printed out by someone who apparently thinks they're being really funny (they're failing at it) there are also several signs stating the trail is closed because the bridges are removed. "Bridge Out Ahead" would be a reasonable warning... if it were at the start of the trail. Instead these signs are posted a mile in from the trailhead. WTF?
Well, we decided, "Bridges? We don't need no stinkin' bridges!"
This reminded me of another set of signs we saw on a different waterfall trail in Washington years ago— "TRAIL CLOSED to weaksauce city folk".
Fortunately the dry creek that was easy to cross had plenty of water flowing not to far upstream.
We passed a number of small waterfalls on Covel Creek.
Neither these two waterfalls (last two photos above) nor other small ones we passed on the trail as we climbed have names. That meant the two named waterfalls, Covel Falls and Angel Falls, would have to be even better, right? Stay tuned for the next blog to see!
Update: In the next blog we not only get to Covel Falls, we walk behind it!
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Date: 2022-08-10 03:31 pm (UTC)I quite like the shot of Hawk picking her way across the creek. I'm a big fan of Climbing On Things, and fallen trees definitely count. And lovely waterfall pictures!
~Sor