Two days of day hiking in the Columbia River Gorge Area (21-22 May 2011)
a. Hamilton MT (8.2 miles with 2100 elev gain (2438 ft highest))
b. Dog Mt (7.3 miles with 2900 ft elev gain (2945 ft highest))
Side Trips to
c. Mitchell Point (2.6 miles with 1050 ft elev gain) and visited Rowena Point
(Tom McCall Nature Reserve).
This was my third trips to Columbia River Gorge (located at the border between OR and WA States) since Nov 2010: Hiking Eagle Creek, Biking Klickitat Trail, and hiking Hamilton, Dog Mountain, & more. I have enjoyed every trip to the Gorge Area. For this trip, the main attraction was the spectacular waterfalls, Spring blooming flowers, and the mighty Columbia River. The Gorge area is truly beautiful and very unique compared to the other areas (Olympics & Cascades in WA).
The trip was sponsored by a Peninsular Wilderness Club (PWC) member and the webmaster, Jay Thompson who are intimately familiar with the area and already made a few trips this year. In fact, all my trips to the Gorge were sponsored by Jay. A total of 10 PWC members and their friends participated this year flower fest in the Gorge: a decent turn out.
The main goals were to hike probably two most popular hikes in the area:
Hamilton MT and Dog Mt. And added little hike on the first day if we had time and we did. Both trails are well informed in the worldwide web. Jay posted an excellent trip report at the PWC website. Check it out at http://www.pwckitsap.org/trip-reports/703-columbia-gorge-weekend-may-21-22-2011-a.html.
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Day 1: Drove down to the Hamilton Mt Trailhead and hiked the Hamilton Mt. After the hike, we drove to our camp site to check-in, setup tent, and ready for another hike. Jay and I hiked another short trail (Mitchell Pt), visited Rowena point, and returned to the camp site. Huddled around the camp fire, relaxed, and replenished our body for the next day.
0730: Left Bremerton at 0730.
1000: Arrived at Hamilton Mountain Trailhead.
1030-1600: Hiked the Hamilton Mt. 8 of us hiked the trail. 2 of them came with a
RV and rode bikes.
1700-1800: Checked-in Camp site (Timberlake Campground and RV Park).
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1830-2030: Jay and I hiked more. We hiked the Mitchell point (2.6 miles with elev 1050 ft gain) and stopped by at Tom McCall natural reserve for the Spring blooming flowers.
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Day 2: Hiked the Dog Mountain.
0700: Hikers wake-up call.
0915 - 1400: Hiked the Dog Mountain.
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In summary, it was another excellent weekend trip to the Columbia River Gorge area.