6.5 miles of hiking • 2000' elevation gain •
It's got to be one of the best sub-alpine hikes I've ever done. (alpine hikes are in their own category of course) You visit 2 mountains on this loop - Iron Mt. and Cone Peak, see old growth forests, dry and wet meadows filled with flowers, interesting geology. If not the clouds, we'd see most of major Cascade volcanoes, but even the views we got were great in all directions. These forests look much less clear-cut than around here, and with drier climate there's more open areas, meadows and viewpoints. Iron Mtn is very popular, but on the rest of the loop we didn't see many people.
