These are Toutle Trekker's top 5 Spirit Lake Highway Hikes.

Best with Children:  Seaquest Park.  The mile or so wetland stroll along the Silver Lake Boardwalk is a great way to share nature with little ones.  The surface is stroller compatible and offers great birdwatching, bugwatching, and listening to nature (including bullfrogs).  For a longer walk, the tunnel under the road to Seaquest Park trails and playground is fun, too.   Park the the Mount St. Helens Visitor Center or at Seaquest Park.  

Best Day Hike: Hummocks Trail.  A two mile loop through the land that was once the summit of Mount St. Helens, complete with many ponds filled with life and peek-a-boo views of the volcano.  The Hummocks Trailhead is currently as far as you can drive.

Best Long Hike: Coldwater Loop.  With the road still closed to the South Coldwater Trail, so start at the hummocks parking lot, walk the road to the South Coldwater Trailhead then climb to the blasted logging equipment.  Keep going looping up to the Coldwater Trail, then drop down toward the lake.  Connect with the Lakes Trail and fish your way back to the Coldwater Lake parking area.  A short road walk completes this day-long loop (about 13 miles)

Best 'Secret' Hike: Green River junction.  Heading east, just past Sediment Dam Road, cross the North Toutle River then look for a wide spot on the left with a green gate on a closed road.  Park here and follow angler trails to the junction of the Green and North Toutle.  A bit of bushwhacking may be required.  Bring your license and fishing rod and regulations!  Another secret hike takes you across the sediment dam.  Follow Sediment Dam road to the large trailhead. This is a great place to view elk and waterfowl in the winter.

Best 'In Town' Hike:  Top the Rock in Castle Rock.  Start at the trailhead at the entrance to town.  Follow the path along the Cowlitz River, past the bike skills park, and then take the gravel trail to "Top the Rock".  Turn around or end at Lions Pride Park.

Yesterday evening my family drove up the Spirit Lake Highway to check out the snow level and go for a hike up the ridge.  The snow is deeper than it was a month ago, but we did hike up the the logging equipment on the South Coldwater Trail.  What a treat!  We were the only people up on the ridge at this time, and the animals were out everywhere.  We saw, on the drive and hike, nearly 200 elk.  The elk must be migrating up from the valley to the ridges toward the snowline.  Of all the elk we saw moving, only one bull was limping, a sign of "hoof rot disease" that is plaguing our herds.  The sooty grouse (aka blue grouse) were whooting and whopping all around.  Often they are heard but not seen.  I did track down and watch two roosters strutting their stuff.  The violet-green swallows and yellow-rumped warblers were back for the summer.  A pack of coyotes yipped down by the lake, and a pair of black-tailed deer watched us trek by.  Of all this wild activity, the highlight of the hike was the beautiful, shiny black bear that we watched as it wandered down an old road.  The bear would stand up on its hind legs and scratch its back on alder trees.  It had been hunting ants and winter killed carcasses, no doubt, and we found where it tore into an ant hill by the trail.  

Wildlife Viewing Pointers: Hike in the morning or evening on a non-weekend day, stay quiet and keep alert, listen for wildife which are often heard before they are seen, and don't forget binoculars (like we did).  All these critters are spooky, so don't get too close, just watch quietly.

Where is the missing top of Mount St. Helens?  Many people think that the top of the volcano was blasted into the sky and became the cloud of ash that circled the world.  But that isn't true.  The ash that was erupted was "new" material from deep within the earth.  The "old" top of Mount St. Helens slid into the Toutle River Valley.  This landslide filled the valley up to 300 feet deep with chunks of the old summit.  The material consisted of loose layers of rock and ash along with pieces of glacier.  The largest mudflow resulted from the de-watering of this huge landslide. These "lahars" inundated all the low lying areas along the Toutle, filled the Cowlitz, and clogged the Columbia River shipping channel.  

In response, mass-dredging ensued. The Army Corps of Engineers also quickly built a sediment dam across the North Toutle valley in an attempt to hold the material in place.  This first dam (called N-1) was quickly overwhelmed.  Over the years, the Toutle River has continued to erode this material downstream, creating big problems for people along the river.  The sand along the Toutle and Cowlitz Rivers is old ash and rock from volcanic activity.

In 1990 the Corps came up with a solution.  They would build one huge sediment dam on the North Toutle and stop the erosion! The idea was simple; slow the river down with a shallow lake behind a big dam.  The sand drops out, and the water flows out over a spillway.  Now towns could be safe. Cowlitz County lifted the building moratorium on mudflow areas and housing developments popped up along our rivers, protected by the dam and higher levies. 

Anyone could see, however, that this "solution" didn't stabilize the river or get rid of the landslide material, it just held it in the upper valley a little longer.  And that is where we are today.  The dam is full, the river above the dam has become a shallow bay of mud, and the Cowlitz River is still clogged with sand.  The Toutle has no stable channel, and wanders over the sediment plain, now picking up material and moving it downstream.  The spillway on the dam has already been raised once to hold more material, with two more raises planned.  Oh, and the dam has no fish ladder.  Returning endangered salmon must be trucked around the mess.  Baby salmon (smolts) must navigate a web of shallow muddy channels downstream on their way to the ocean. Recently, agencies have tried a few creative ideas to hold sediment in place and to reduce the erosive action of the river.  You can see log dikes and piles along the Toutle River in places like Harry Gardner Park or the Mudflow Wildife Area.  These features are designed to improve fish habitat and hold the loose material in place long enough for vegetation to establish.

Learn More: https://www.nwp.usace.army.mil/mount-st-helens/overview/

See it:  Harry Gardner Park is the best place to see the erosion control and habitat enhancement structures.  Along Interstate 5, north of Castle Rock, you may notice large piles of dredge spoils along the Toutle and Cowlitz River.  Some of these sites are publicly owned.  In the upper Toutle Valley,  scan the sediment plain with binoculars for log structure and other erosion control measures. From the Hoffstadt Bridge area the remains of N-1 dam are visible in the valley.  

Hike it:  From Kid Valley travel east on 504 to Sediment Dam Road, which is actually the old Spirit Lake Highway.  Travel about 2 miles to the parking lot at the end.  The trail starts past the restroom, and leads to a dam viewpoint and continues to the dam itself.  It's a nice walk, half on dirt trail and half on old road.
The view from the dam shows the massive expanse of sediment held in place there.  Elk are also common, so be aware.  Sometimes herds of elk graze in the grassy field around the dam.  If you follow the signs and the old roads, the hike makes a nice 1.2 mile loop.  

Most mountain trails are still buried in deep snowdrifts, but the trails near Coldwater Lake melt out early because of their treeless, southern facing slopes.  Today, my family hiked to the Loowit viewpoint from the Hummocks trailhead via the Boundary Trail #1.  Its a great get-in-shape for the summer hike, and we've done it twice in the last few weeks.  The entire hike, up and back, is about 8 1/2 miles with 1500 feet of elevation gain.  It was spitting snowflakes, but the Hummocks parking lot was snow free, as was the trail until the creek crossing 20 minutes from the top, where snow lasted a few hundred yards.  Often, on sunny spring days, many hikers head to the Lakes Trail along Coldwater or the 2 1/2 mile Hummocks Trail loop, but usually the Boundary Trail has little traffic.  It is a climb afterall.  The trail is in good shape, with only a few bushes leaning into the tread, along with the one spot of snow.   To get to the Boundary trail, travel SR 504 to the Hummocks Trailhead parking lot just past the outlet to Coldwater Lake.  First, starting at the information sign boards, follow the Hummocks trail for 1/2 mile to the junction with the Boundary trail.  Follow the boundary trail left (east) until it intersects with SR 504 at the Loowit Viewpoint.  Currently the highway is gated until May.  When the snow melts, the Boundary Trail can be followed all the way to Council Lake by Mount Adams. 

Besides great exercise, the trail often provides unique wildlife watching.  The migrating birds are starting to arrive, and we heard a few western meadowlarks and warblers.  The mountain bluebirds are also returning.  Nearly every pond that we hiked past on the Hummocks Trail had a pair of buffleheads swimming side by side.  Once on the ridge, we spotted a few elk in the valley below.  On the return trip we noticed, just below the snow patches, two mountain goats.  Goats have been making a spectacular comeback at Mount St. Helens, and in the summer they can be seen in the Mount Margaret backcountry, on the volcano itself, and in the cliffs by Castle Lake.  They drop lower in the winter, and one even showed up just outside of the town of Toutle!  This is the first I've seen them on Johnston Ridge.  Goats in lower right of photo.

Fall is a wonderful time to visit the Green River Fish Hatchery--with or without a pole!  Last week I took my two year old nephew to see the salmon.  We saw mommy salmon, daddy salmon, and piles of baby salmon.  We walked down an anglers' trail and waded in the water where several spawned-out Chinook lay dead, their nutrients adding to the next generation.  Because it was the middle of a warm, fall day, the anglers that sometimes flock here to catch returning salmon, were gone for the day.  

The Department of Wildlife places a barrier across the Green River to direct salmon to the ladder leading to the hatchery holding ponds.  Several pairs of Chinook were guarding their "redds", or salmon nests, just downstream of the barrier.  The salmon are easy to see, even for a toddler, as they zip back and forth.  The concrete holding areas were full of salmon, too, and my nephew had a blast watching these huge Chinook leap and splash.  Other rearing areas held thousands of young salmon that swam close in swarms, no doubt looking to be fed.  

Visiting the hatchery is a fun way to spend an afternoon for wildlife viewing, hiking the road along the river, or trying your hand at catching a salmon.  Check the fishing regulations and the emergency rules.  The Green River is closed to Chinook retention, and several areas right near the hatchery are always closed to fishing to give returning salmon a safe area, but Coho fishing and steelhead fishing is currently open.  An access road follows the river upstream and makes a nice hike.  

The trick here is actually finding the fish hatchery.  Start at the 1900 logging road that loops below Kid Valley Campground.  Stay right and cross the North Toutle River below 19 Mile House restaurant, then stay to the right on the open (ungated) gravel road.  This 1901 logging road has side roads gated, requiring an expensive Weyerhaeuser permit.  Follow the gravel road uphill to the big yellow gate, which may be open or closed.  Do not go past the gate, but stay to the right and on the "main drag".  Several other logging roads intersect, but they are either gated or signed with Weyerhaeuser's permit required signs.  Stay on the road that has been used the most (508), which winds gradually down to the hatchery.  At one point you will be tempted to go straight, but the 508 main road turns left.  In 1.8 miles you reach another yellow gate that is open with a sign describing rules for using the hatchery area.  Go past the sign and drop down to the hatchery parking. A state Discover Pass or a vehicle access pass that comes with your fishing license is required for parking here.  The best place to see salmon is to the right, past the hatchery buildings, just below the ladder.   Short access trails lead to the river.  

Before the eruption, a paved road crossed the Toutle River and went to the hatchery.  I even rode the school bus here one time to visit my uncle who was working the salmon, and one of my school buddies lived in one of the homes that stood here.  All that changed on May 18, 1980, when the area was inundated with mud.  Later, the mud was scraped away, some of the better homes were moved, and the hatchery restarted.  The county road was not rebuilt, so, like much of Southwest Washington, Weyerhaeuser controls access now, and could shut off public access to the hatchery at any time. 

If you do not want to drive on logging roads, and aren't afraid to get your feet wet, you can also wade across the Green River to the hatchery.   From Kid Valley, head east on SR504.  As soon as you cross the North Toutle River, look for a green, gated road on the left.  Park along the highway near here.  Hike past the gate and down an old road that follows a finger ridge between the dirtier North Toutle and the clear Green River.  This road is lined with some remant old growth and is worthy of its own trip (and its own Blog post).   It might take some bushwhacking, but angler trails are usually abundant.  This time of year the Green River is low, and a wader usually doesn't get wet past the knees.  Work upstream until you reach the trail from the hatchery.  If you come to the cable across the river (that marks the edge of the no fishing area) you've come too far.  Look for trails up the bank that lead to the hatchery.  

The Department of Wildife just obtained ownership of the wedge of land between the rivers here and the should be incorporating it into the St. Helens Wildife Area.  Perhaps better public access will be incorporated into any future plans.