5.5 miles of hiking • 2250' elevation gain •
This was an unplanned trip. After oversleeping for a previously scheduled scramble, I found myself without a planned outing for today. Scrolling through the trips off Mountain Loop Highway, for no other reason then it was fairly close, I stumbled upon Eight Mile Creek Trail. With a decent elevation gain for the short distance, the promise of autumnal colors on display, and the anticipation of awe-inspiring views of Three Fingers, among others, not to mention it is a trail I had never been on before, I set out mid-morning. After a rock and pot holed drive up Froggy Lake Road, I arrived, bones jarred and teeth on edge, at the trail head. It was not an inspiring site. No other cars were present, the hoped-for sun expected by late-morning had not arrived, and the trail started out looking like the remnants of a day at the quarry for Fred and Barney. Still, the forest was quiet, subdued by living green spread profusely over rock, tree, and trail. The trail is easy to follow, though not always apparent. At about a mile come to a big rock slab, a monolith begging to be climbed and conquered. Passing on the opportunity to do so, continue up the trail, loose rocks prepared to twist an ankle and wet roots knotted in the earth to ready to grasp your foot in nature's toe hold for an easy take-down. All the while the monolith reveals her upper reaches and, like the siren, calls for you to climb, prepared or not, a slide to the bottom with a crashing end awaiting the unlucky who answer her seductive call unprepared. Onward and ever upward, passing through an avalanche field littered with moss covered remnants of mountains once mightier, passing over slabs of rock slick with water from sources unseen, one comes at last to a meadow and the impressive Three Fingers, adorned in fresh snow as if a titan unseen sifted powder sugar on a misshapened meringue too long in the oven. All around one sees the spectacle nature reserves for those who cast an open eye upon that which awaits unseen from below. And with mouth agape, I can only say, "Wow."
