Kyle Meyer went hiking June 23, 2011 10 miles 4,500 feet gained

Ruckel Ridge

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We planned to climb Hood on Thursday, but with clouds moving in the night before limiting the overnight low to above freezing, we thought it safest to postpone the climb. Instead, we climbed Ruckel Ridge! This is an extremely fun trail, full of ridiculous steeps, precarious foot placements, and plenty of exposure. The trail feels more like an adventure than a hike.

After getting to the top, we soaked beers in Ruckel Creek on the Benson Plateau (now devoid entirely of snow), drank and ate, and then walked and jogged down the Ruckel Creek trail back to the car.

View from Buck Point You can go around, but we wanted the Ridge Experience™ The catwalk: there's a hundred of feet of exposure on both sides of this rock path Benson Plateau is snow free

Trail Talk

Bosterson · June 24, 2011

Did you use a GPS for your mileage/elevation, or did you just mess around a bunch more on Benson? PH has this at 9mi and 3700 ft (which, according to the map, is the elevation of the Benson Plateau where the Ruckel Ridge trail crosses Ruckel Creek and meets the Creek trail). I'm curious if their figures are off.

Kyle Meyer · June 24, 2011

Yeah, we used a GPS. We also walked over to the Ruckel Creek trailhead before we realized our mistake and walked for a bit on the Benson, though. The 3700' figure seems modest for what is a very rolling hike. The proper measure is something above 4000', as there's easily 500' of descending on the hike up, the trailhead is at 200', and the top is 3700'.

Kyle Meyer · June 24, 2011

On the way up, we ascended 4,226' and descended 526', and there's 372' of climbing on the Ruckel Creek descent.

Eric Peterson · June 25, 2011

What?!? No piles of snow everywhere :)

Bosterson · June 26, 2011

Good to know. Was the mileage still around 9.6 or whatever?

Eric Peterson · June 26, 2011

Hey Kyle, also thanks for bringing back the per mile gain! :)

Kyle Meyer · June 26, 2011

My pleasure! It only displays totals for people over 100 miles FYI.

I just got a new tenkara fly fishing pole which is going to seriously hurt my mileage total. I may add a trout metric instead : )

Justin Wright · June 27, 2011

Haha, the feet per mile is officially back! Just curious, is there a way to see what place you are in for that stat like the other ones (the small text that shows up below the box)?

Eric Peterson · June 27, 2011

I have to try RR again, the first time I did it on July 4th '09, I barely made it, huffn' and a puffn'. Was my first big hike, probably just a breeze now, but have to check on that... heh

Kyle Meyer · June 27, 2011

We ran back down Ruckel Creek and my quads are still recovering as a result. I haven't been this sore from a hike in a long time. G'luck!