Henline Mountain Hike

Overview

NOTICE: Trails in this area were affected by the 2020 Beachie Creek Fire. Please check current closures in the Willamette National Forest before planning an outing. A switchbacking trail, which once began at the Pearl Creek Guard Station, leads up through montane forest carpeted with bear-grass to the Henline Mountain Lookout Site, which offers expansive views south along the Cascade crest past Mount Jefferson as well as west across the Willamette Valley to Marys Peak in the Coast Range. The lookout site is the end of the official trail, but a narrower volunteer-maintained pathway continues one mile up the spine of the ridge to the true summit, from which views are a little more restricted. Little rock gardens along this part of the route bloom with phlox, paintbrush, and larkspur in late spring. Part of the Opal Creek Wilderness, created in 1996, Henline Mountain is named after a 19th century settler who also prospected in the Little North Santiam Mining District. The trail is across the road from the parking pullout. Head up a scree slope and note poison oak sprouting trailside. Switchback under Douglas-fir and western hemlock with vine maple, salal, bracken, Oregon grape and hazel forming the understory. Manzanita grows in the openings. Switchback three more times and note burned snags from a long-ago fire. Traverse up and cross a talus slope and head back into the woods to switchback and reach a rocky lookout point above the talus slope with views across to the Elkhorn Ridge. Switchback twice more and come to the top of a rocky cliff and another viewpoint over the Little North Santiam drainage. Manzanita and oaks rim this open space. Switchback four times after this, noting rhododendrons, chinquapin and bear-grass, and come to an open area with several manzanita bushes. The trail rises and then you switchback at a view of a rounded cliff face across the way. Traverse and then switchback three times before the trail turns to the left to head up the ridgeline. The trail levels across a scree slope below ro

Trail Stats

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