Pine Creek-Badger Butte Loop Hike

Overview

This loop in an almost forgotten corner of the Badger Creek Wilderness involves four very lightly traveled trails: Post Camp, Pine Creek, Mud Spring, and Three Mile. Since there are no extensive views to be had from the loop, a short off-trail extension to the top of Badger Butte (about 1.5 miles round-trip) is also an option. Also, two of the trails, Pine Creek and Mud Spring, have been abandoned, so you need excellent route-finding skills if you want to complete this loop - it is only for the experienced abandoned trail aficionado. (A detour option for the Mud Spring Trail is described below.) Both the Post Camp and Three Mile Trails are mere remnants of much longer trails. (Three Mile doesn’t touch Three Mile Creek anymore and Post Camp is way down in the valley.) The only guidebook reference to these trails is Ken and Ruth Love’s little gem A Guide to the Trails of Badger Creek (1979, revised edition). From the parking area, take the Post Camp Trail #467 past the junction with the Three Mile Trail #466 down the slope into the Pine Creek drainage, switchbacking once in an 80-year-or-so burn. At the wilderness entry sign, a rocky outcrop gives a view across the Badger Creek valley to the Divide Ridge from Lookout Mountain to Palisade Point and Flag Point. This is mixed coniferous woodland of Douglas-fir, grand fir, mountain hemlock, noble fir, western white pine, western larch, Engelmann spruce, and silver fir. Chinquapin, grouseberry, and huckleberry form the understory. Keep traversing down the slope and enter cool old growth with some large Douglas-firs and western red-cedars. There are seven springs on the trail in this section. Reach the Post Camp-Pine Creek Trail Junction before the wide footbridge over rushing Pine Creek. WARNING: The entire Pine Creek Trail has not been maintained for several years. As of May 2016, there was frequent deadfall on the trail, especially at the upper end. In the small, open glades, the trail trace is sometimes lost as it is overgrown with forbs. The trail is best hik

Trail Stats

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