Salmon Mountain: Humboldt County high point

Six Rivers National Forest

Klamath National Forest

DAY 1 | DAY 2 | DAY 3 | DAY 4

Pink line for day 1. Click for map.

(Day 1 of 6 4.) I decided it was time to get out to the Humboldt County high point! The weather machine at NOAA said there would be a cooler week coming although the boffins there also have a chart indicating the highest temperature of the year is likely to happen the last week of the month of July. There's a trail short enough to day hike, but I wanted to have a big trip. The first big plan got discarded because it was way too hot for the lower elevation (~2000 feet) parts. A second plan would stay high along the ridges and do a loop through what was the big population center of what is now designated Wilderness and was Primitive Area before that. (The plan can be found here to import into Caltopo or Google Earth or similar.) As near as I could tell after researching my route, it wouldn't get far because "the trail is impassible east of Rock Lake". The information did not include what makes it impassible, so I had a little hope. One person's impassible is another person's annoying inconvenience. I would try it and if blocked, I might wander down Devils Backbone instead. Then I called up the Orleans Ranger District of Six Rivers National Forest (which is also the Ukonom Ranger District of Klamath National Forest) to find out where I can pick up the free permit required to hike Trinity Alps Wilderness only to find out they can't be bothered with the things. You can pick one up outside Lower Trinity Ranger Station in Willow Creek, but I suspect the western users of the wilderness are getting undercounted. I did find out that the Devils Backbone would likely be fine because "there's no trees to fall on that". So I had places to go and things to do and headed out to Orleans, crossed the bridge and took a right onto an unsigned road. After mostly paved miles and 3 good gravel miles trimming yellow flowers down the middle with my 6 inches of clearance, I was at a major entry for the western Trinity Alps.

trailhead sign — A signed trailhead and a really obvious trail.

Unfortunately, it does seem to have become smoke season. I passed the Milepost 21 Fire and fire crew setting up on CA-96. It started Monday and closed the road a little on Tuesday and they're figuring to start actually fighting it at noon since it is on the way to high value timber. There's a lot of back roads between and the breeze was faint, so it wasn't a real worry. The smoke still made me worry. The information board had actual trail information posted on it. The trail to Red Cap Lake was logged out in 2019 and the trail out the other side is "hard to find". A pair in a Subaru stopped to chat saying they'd had Red Cap to themselves the last several days and not found the trail out after two days of searching. I decided sidestep that difficulty by going after the peak first instead of leaving it as a sort of desert to the end when it might well be a lot smokier. Also, it makes more logistical sense with the thought that I would probably be hiking a bit of the Devils Backbone Trail instead of getting a lot of the long ridge followed by Salmon Summit Trail as it goes east.

trail and trees — Old growth trees for a bit of shade. There's some very big ones further along.

The trail starts off among big old trees with plenty of shade. There is a corral off to the side after just 100 feet. There is trail to Orleans Mountain and rumor has it the trail past the corral will get there. A signed junction is further up where the map indicates, but I didn't see the sign. It looks a bit like a signed junction for something next to the wilderness boundary where there is a camp, but only Red Cap is noted on the sign. I did notice the second signed junction for Orleans Mountain just past the wilderness sign, but very little of a trail there.

umbrella wintergreen, Chimaphila umbellata — Pipsissewa or umbrella wintergreen. (Chimaphila umbellata.) I think I may have passed these by for years, but am glad I've finally given them a harder look.

boundary sign for Trinity Alps Wilderness — Trinity Alps Wilderness sign although the map shows the wilderness going almost to the road.

The trail breaks out into the open along the ridge. There's old fuel break line between the peaks and it looks like people sometimes go off up Whitneys Peak along it. It was hot out on the bare ridges, but it also tended to be downhill or short.

ridge line trail — A section where trail follows the ridge line.

little white flowers on a tangle of stems from a patch of furry leaves — There's flowers out on the scorched and barren rocks, too.

storm clouds over mountains to the east — Watching storm clouds form. There's actually a huge area in red flag alert that ends a few miles to the east.

smoky domes northeast — Smoky domes seen through a break, northeast-ish.

The mountain comes along quickly enough. Some people just putter up the steep side. I doubt it is all that hard. I planned for the easy side with less gain required from trail. I wasn't feeling very pressed for time.

Salmon Mountain is mildly rugged from this side.

more weather — More to see from more open ridges.

junction with Salmon Summit NRT on left and Red Cap Lake on right — The junction between Salmon Summit (left) and Red Cap (right).

The trail junction is obvious, but it is quickly clear that the trail clearing only goes to the lake rather than along Salmon Summit, national recreation trail or not. I rather suspect it was just several weeks ago rather than last year, too. It doesn't matter so much since none of the downed trees is especially hard to pass.

valley southwest — At least some of the murk in the air is smoke from the southwest.

burst of orange flowers — Grand collomia with some sort of bee fly pollinating.

honey bee doing its thing — The traditional, but non-native, honey bees can be found pollinating too.

trail through the manzanita — The higher mountains to the east are almost lost in smoke and, probably, a little rain.

First look at Red Cap Lake. The ridge behind is where Devils Backbone Trail traverses. There are a few trees to fall on it after all.

There's no sign to show the split for trail that passes High Spring and drops to Red Cap Trail below and trail that stays high. I wanted to check on the spring because I might want to use it later, so I started poking around to find it. The map shows the split a little early, so it took a little while to find that it leaves at a line of rocks. It took additional poking to find that it passes above the spring. Except for the area directly below the spring, the area is open enough to easily wander. The slightest bit more poking and I found the camp as well.

water at high spring — There is a small and steady flow of water with a dug out hole just below the source. A shovel with no handle is at the camp if one wants it deeper. It probably gets dug from time to time to look like this.

trail and road bed — Junction of the trail downward with the old road bed (bulldozer path according to the reach for the benchmark on Salmon Mountain) followed by Salmon Summit Trail.

I dropped off some heavier gear near the spring and started for the peak. At the high point for the trail, which is an old bulldozer path there, just before a pair of large fallen trees, is another track starting up the mountain. That was my path to the top. Around a small tree, I found a large cairn because it has been the path for many others, too. The track faded in a large meadow. I climbed a little more steeply across it to a flat area toward the top and found more cairns. At the top, there seems to be an old established trail. It's a pretty easy walk to the top.

upward as I go — Wide path for starting upward to bag Salmon Mountain.

clear ridge top to go — Somewhere around here, there ought to be an azimuth mark. I didn't find it. It's clear walking with slight oscillations all the way to the peak ahead.

remains of a 6 foot carin at the top — The top of Salmon Mountain. The description for the benchmark includes a six foot cairn. These rocks seem to be the remains of that cairn.

At the top, I set about a rather fruitless search for benchmarks. I ranged far and wide among the outcrops of rocks. I had to get to the next outcrop north to get past a couple trees and really get the view anyway.

rocky shoulder to the southeast — Three counties and three national forests meet on that shoulder to the southeast.

north along the ridge — That northerly-ish view along the ridge from the rocky point past the top.

clown shoes by the station stump — There's very little left of the benchmarks to find. This was the station. These clown shoes are taking on the fire damaged trails very well, but speed laces and narrow feet don't mix well.

I sat at the top near the edge of the blue sky watching the storm. I'm not sure how heavy, but there was certainly some rain in places, sprinkling in others. I watched lightning come down and even tried to take a picture. Of course, I'm way too slow. (The storm set off 15 fires, mostly tree fires and all small.)

light and heavy rain — Salmon Summit Trail keeps on going a long way east along that ridge. There's a bit of rain and my forecast was all about the sunny days, so that's a little worrying.

I headed back down, wandering a bit onto the shoulder where counties and forests meet, but then turned back to drop along the meadow like my path up. I decided to make use of the camp and spring this evening, so picked up my stuff and brought it the few feet to the camp. It had a nice flat area dug out, but also had a number of old trash caches all around. That plastic certainly didn't look that old and, frankly, neither did most the cans. There were bits of ripped tarp and plastic sheeting down the hill. Someone put little dead trees along the edge of the tent space as if to make a blind looking out over the trail to the spring. I've had at least one hunter tell me that sort of thing is illegal, but the rest of the camp doesn't exactly indicate an individual who cares. On about the fourth time past, I finally noticed that the trail was flagged with a translucent orange ribbon or two near the spring. I hoped those weren't the same ones used in whatever area I might actually need them.

flat spot — The camp at High Spring. The little trees are along the wall behind the tree.

I had a lot of time to wonder if I actually had time to continue on the Rock Lake over about three miles of uncertain trail. (There probably was just enough time.) I also wasn't certain what the weather would bring me and my only rain protection was the tent. I set it up. The air got very cool in the evening and the sun set apparently over the ocean, so it wasn't all bad. No rain came that far west.