What overnight backpacking trails are clear of deep snow now (or likely to be in the next two weeks) in northwest Washington?
I am looking for an overnight backpacking trip to do in the next few weeks somewhere in western Washington. But I am worried about deep snow remaining on the trails. Based on last winter's snowpack, the rate of melting this spring, and on prior knowledge of the trails in that area, can anyone here suggest a trail or trails, or even a local area, that would have good hiking conditions and possibly, although not necessarily, a few places snow-free places to camp? For example, should I be looking at places below N feet in altitude?
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This forum is worldwide, you're not going to get a good localized answer. I do have two suggestions, though:
1) Look at local hiking groups. I suspect you have Meetup groups, there might be others, also. See where they are scheduling hikes, and see what people are saying about past events. There is no substitute for eyeballs on the trails. (Just yesterday we got a surprise. We were on a loop that doesn't have a lot of elevation change. The first 4 miles have little shade, we saw the occasional mass of snow in shady spots off the trail. The last two have a lot more shade--and even those of us with poles and microspikes decided it was unsafe to continue.)
2) Ask the rangers in the area(s) you are considering what the conditions are. It's unlikely they have eyeballed everything but plenty of hikers will let them know about problems they found on the trails so they will have a reasonable picture of the trail conditions in their area.
This post was sourced from https://outdoors.stackexchange.com/a/22255. It is licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.
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