Joined: 15 Aug 2006Posts: 2666Location: No Fun Town, USA
Just FYI: my family rode up the Westside Road in Rainier for a quick bike/backpack trip. Westside Road is maybe a mile east of the Nisqually (SW) entrance. You can drive it for about 3 miles, but then it's gated at Dry Creek at a big parking lot.
Most people hike up the road from there; we took our mountain bikes about 4 miles to Round Pass (about 1100 of elevation gain). At Round Pass, there are trailheads to Lake George/Gobblers Knob to the west, and east to South Puyallup Camp and the Wonderland Trail. We hiked 2.2 miles to the east and camped at South Puyallup, which features some crazy columnar lava flows (right next to the toilet!). From there it was 2 miles to Emerald Ridge, which has an unimpeded view of the west side of Rainier. You could also hike north up Klapatchie Ridge, but that seemed much steeper so we skipped it.
The Westside Road keeps going (total 9+ miles past the gate, descending and ascending), and it's all rideable gravel/dirt roads, except for just past the Dry Creek gate, where there's one of those crossings on a log with a railing. Getting a loaded bike across this solo would be very difficult; either you'd have to unload your stuff or (what we did), have 2 people cross with each loaded bike, one handling the front and the other the back.
There's a bike rack at Round Pass, and camping either direction, so that's a good spot to stop. I don't know if there are bike racks beyond that, but most people stop at Round Pass so theft risk at more northerly stopping points is probably low. There are trails east to various access points on the Wonderland Trail all along the road; otherwise the only access to this area is hiking north on the Wonderland Trail from Longmire, south from Mowich Lake, or from the west via the Lake George Trail. So biking is a quick way to get to what is otherwise a very sparsely populated area of the park.
Carbon River is an easier, flatter bike to backpack access to the park, at least as things stand now (the Carbon River access is supposed to all be redone in a few years). And Carbon River is open year round (Westside Road turns into a snowshoeing route in the winter). Still, Westside is a good alternative if you want to bike into the Rainier wilderness.
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Ductape
Posted: Mon Aug 13, 2012 12:37 pm
Joined: 06 Mar 2010Posts: 200Location: Suburbia
Carbon River is an easier, flatter bike to backpack access to the park, at least as things stand now (the Carbon River access is supposed to all be redone in a few years). And Carbon River is open year round (Westside Road turns into a snowshoeing route in the winter). Still, Westside is a good alternative if you want to bike into the Rainier wilderness.[/quote]
Close to home, have done the Carbon a few times with the wife already this summer. Exploring the different trails from Ipsut campground.
Beautiful Old growth forest:
About as bad as the trail ever gets:
Came across this feller a few weeks back:
gsbarnes
Posted: Mon Aug 13, 2012 8:36 pm
Joined: 15 Aug 2006Posts: 2666Location: No Fun Town, USA
Some photos:
Columnar andesite:
West side of Rainier from Emerald Ridge:
All the ingredients to make the South Fork of the Puyallup River:
_________________ I have always thought in the back of my mind: Cheese and Onions
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Joined: 15 Aug 2006
Posts: 2666
Location: No Fun Town, USA
Joined: 06 Mar 2010
Posts: 200
Location: Suburbia
