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Even in May, take the time to dawdle on Old Sauk River Trail
By KAREN SYKES ![[Bio]](../image/bio_bttn.gif){kind=small}
SPECIAL TO THE POST-INTELLIGENCER
Although May weather can be capricious, spring reigns over the lower-elevation trails. You'll leave winter behind if you hike The Old Sauk River Trail. Dawdle with a field guide or bring the family -- it is an easy hike with no elevation gain.
Plan to linger and look. If you stroll slowly enough, you can almost see the ferns uncurling and when the sun comes out, it's warm enough that you might even discard your parka. Can you tell the difference between mosses, liverworts and lichens? The Old Sauk River Trail is a good place to try.
There are many places to stop along this three-mile long trail that follows the Sauk River before ending at the Mountain Loop Highway near Murphy Creek. I recently led a Mountaineers group there and as one hiker said, "It's like walking through the Hoh Rain Forest." We peered at mushrooms and looked them up in our guides and took turns naming the flowers.
The deciduous trees are just budding out and we saw yellow violets, huge trilliums, salmonberry, bleeding hearts in bloom and false Solomon's seal just starting. We watched brightly dressed river rafters tackle the Sauk and a pair of harlequin ducks (the river rafters were working a lot harder than the harlequins), listened to chattering birds and the mournful song of the varied thrush. Come any time of the year. In summer and fall you may see salmon and steelhead going up the river to spawn.
The Sauk, now designated a wild and scenic river, has not finished telling its long story. The Sauk, as were the Stillaguamish and Skagit rivers, was once a highway for the Sauk-Suiattle Indians who used cedar dugout canoes for their travels and portaged from the Stillaquamish to the Sauk.
These Indians were part of the Upper Skagit tribe and practiced primitive agriculture at Sauk Prairie, burning grasses and ferns each year to prevent the forest from taking over. Nothing went to waste. The white interior of the bracken fern was pounded into flour and fibrous plants were used to make ropes and fishing nets. The Sauk-Suiattle were not a large tribe and by 1915 many of them had been turned off their lands. Eventually descendants of the tribe were awarded compensation for their lands but at present very few Indians live in the Darrington area.
If you visit the Sauk step softly and be grateful for the gifts the mountains and rivers have given us and honor the Sauk-Suiattle tribe who lost their land, who wove their lives and legends around the rivers and the ancient trees.
Getting there
Drive north on Interstate 5, turn east (right) on Exit 208 and follow Highway 530 through Arlington to Darrington and the Mountain Loop Highway. The north entrance to the trail is 0.7 mile beyond the bridge over Clear Creek and Clear Creek Campground.
Trail detail
The trail starts from the parking area (600 feet), and follows along the Sauk, wandering across a flood plain created hundreds of years ago by the river. You'll notice how green the Sauk is in contrast to the waters of the Suiattle which are muddy colored from glacial silt. As the Sauk heads toward the Skagit it is joined by the White Chuck River and comes close to the Stillaguamish where the Indians portaged as late as 1887.
The river names were derived from changing Indian dialects -- Sauk comes from Saakw but it has also been called the Sah-kee-me-hu branch of the Skagit. White men first surveyed the Sauk in 1867 and the Sauk and Stillaguamish quadrangles were mapped in 1897. The trail passes through groves of old growth forest with hemlock and cedar as it parallels the river and you'll come to a footbridge about half-way.
A little further past the bridge is a permanent camp site. At about 2.8 miles, the trail leaves the river and follows along Murphy Creek passing a fish habitat area, before ending at the Mountain Loop Highway. Hike back along the highway or retrace your route. If you'd like an additional short hike in the area try the Frog Lake Trail, a 1-mile trail which begins from the Clear Creek Campground (presently unsigned), but there is a slippery footlog which is not suitable for young children.
Trail data
Old Sauk River Trail: six miles round-trip, no elevation gain. Frog Lake Trail: two miles round-trip, 400-foot gain. For further information refer to "Best Short Hikes in Washington's North Cascades and San Juan Islands," by E.M. Sterling, the Mountaineers ($12.95, 240 pages).
Karen Sykes is a Queen Anne resident and avid hiker who has been traveling Northwest trails for 27 years.
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