From Redtown TH at Cougar, head up Cavehole trail. Turn R on the Coal Creek Falls. Turn L on Quarry. Turn R on Fred's. Turn L on Shy Bear. Turn L on Wilderness Peak.
Drop down Wilderness Cliffs Trail, then L on Squak Connector Trai down to highway.
Go L on highway for 100 meters and cross highway to Squak West Access Trail. Continue to follow this trail until it merges onto a larger road (I forget what it is called). Head R and continue to climb. Follow signs at this point to Central Peak.
At the peak, head down the gravel road for 200 meters and then take a L onto Summit Trail. Take a R on Phils Creek Trail and follow this trail contouring and descending south then west all the way to the South Access road. Turn L down the road and follow it almost all the way to the main road. When you can see the parking lot for the Squak Mtn Trailhead through the trees on the left (there are bathrooms there, by the way), turn R onto trail that says "Central Peak 3.2". If you go a little too far and turn R at the trail just beyond this one, you will end up doing a loop on a short interpretive trail.
Follow this trail (Bullit Gorge Trail) back up the mountain. There are a couple intersections where a right turn will take you quickly back to the South Access Road, whereas the left turn will keep taking you up the mountain. Stay left on these - they should probably be marked with a sign saying that the Central Peak is to the left. There is also one unmarked intersection 10 feet after crossing a bridge over a large creek in which you should turn right and head up the mountain, where a left turn takes you who knows where, probably eventually into a housing development or something.
Higher up, you will come across a sign for the Perimeter Loop Trail. Go L here, following the Perimeter Loop Trail around the west side of Squak West Peak. At the next intersection go L on Chybinski Loop Trail. After a very short uphill, this trail drops all the way back down to the
West Access Trail. Turn L and follow West Access Trail back down to the road.
Cross the highway back to Cougar Mountain and back up the Squak Connector Trail. At the intersection where you earlier turned onto the Connector Trail, go straight/leftish onto Wilderness Creek Trail, and stay R a short while later, heading back up Wilderness Creek. The trail climbs for a mile back up to the upper intersection of the Wilderness Peak/Wilderness Creek loop. Turn L here onto Long View. There are a couple of intersections with access trails that I do not remember very well. Stay on Long View (R at an intersection or two), then turn R on Deceiver, then follow this to Shy Bear. L on Shy Bear. L at intersections with Far Country Viewpoint. Drop down to Indian Trail road at bottom of hill. Turn R. Turn L at De Leo Wall Trail, then immediate R onto Wildside. L at junction a half mile further on with larger road, then continue fairly straight through many intersections, following signs for Wildside for another half mile. When trail exits onto gravel road/trail, jog L, then R onto trail again and go over creek. L onto another gravel road/trail which takes you quickly back to Redtown.
It is best to take the Greentrails map for Cougar and Squak. There is usually also a decent trail map at the trailhead for Cougar Mountain, but you will need the Greentrails map for Squak.
Total Distance: 19.5 miles (I added a little to GPS measurement of 18.7 miles due to small twists and turns on the trails that GPS doesn't pick up)
Total Elevation Gain/Loss: 5370 ft (verified by both GPS and altimeter watch)
2 comments:
Which GPS did you use?
Garmin GPSMAP c60CS + some extra processing. The out and back sections did not map up quite right so I did massage the GPS file to make the return trip exactly match the outward bound trip where they shared a trail.
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