Table Mountain

Table Mountain.

Back in the early onset of the year, right as the weather started to clean up a bit, we set a goal for ourselves to hike as much as we could, and that we would build up to a final goal hike. That goal was Table Mountain.

Table Mountain is on the Washington side of the Columbia Gorge, right next to Hamilton Mountain and right behind Aldrich Butte. It's not the tallest peak in the gorge, but it is probably the most dramatic of the high peaks. Table has a giant sheer cliff face on the front, what remains of a massive landslide 300 years ago that temporarily damned the Columbia river and created the land bridge known by natives as "the bridge of the gods", which is now celebrated by a little truss bridge from cascade locks with the same name. The slide also created the islands that now house the Bonneville Dam complex. It's a very dramatic area. In the mist and fog this large mess of landslide and cliffs looks like Jurassic park. It's very picturesque and it always takes a good photo.

From Hamilton Mountain's summit

From Wauna Viewpoint, late afternoon in winter

From Buck point, early morning, mid summer

From the mouth of Eagle Creek. Table (left) and Greenleaf (right) in view. 

Table Mtn. is 3417 feet high, and most of that is elevation you climb. You can start in a few spots. One, the first option ever available, is to use the Bonneville Damn trailhead. This follows the Pacific Crest Trail (PCT) for 8 miles to the top, making it a 16 mile hike. Nope. The second option is the Aldrich Butte "trailhead", which is just a large spot of dirt near the Bonneville Hot Springs that leads you up an old fire road to the PCT and Table Mtn. This is the shortest way. We did option #3: park at the Hot Springs resort, and take the trail in the backlot to the Aldrich fire road. Both of these options cut the hike in half, a manageable 8-9 mile distance. Since this was to be our crowning achievement of the hiking season, we decided to go all out, rent a room at the hot springs resort for that night, hike the mountain early and come back to hot tubs and luxury for one last hurrah. This was going to be our biggest challenge of the year, lets come back to a place that can rest our legs in hot springs.

We got to the resort and checked in at 10am. A late start, but since we didn't have to drive back to PDX that night, it didn't worry me. We were on the trail at 10:08. It started off bad: the first 100 feet of the trail from Bonneville was overgrown with prickly blackberry bushes. I got a few scrapes, but since I had thick socks and tough shorts, only got about a 6 inch area below my knee cut up. Keeley had less protection and fared slightly worse, but we got through it. The connector trail from the Hot Springs goes up a hill for half a mile at a decent gain, then levels out for a wonderful stroll through a large expansive undergrowth forest. Here the humidity seems to lift a bit. After about 1.2 miles, you cross an old stream. Last time we were here, for Aldrich Butte, the log bridge was new and pretty. That was Easter. Now the bridge was broken and decomposing.

Taken in late April, bridge intact

Taken late august, bridge not so intact

Shortly after that we hit the Aldrich fire road. Turn right, walk a few yards, and follow the road to the left. A small user trail goes straight. Around the turn in another minute or so comes yet another "straight or left" choice. Aldrich is left, this time we go straight. And the second climb begins. The trail starts going up at a medium, Indian Point type steady incline, for about half a mile. Soon you hear the sound of a creek, and you are walking along a gentle ridge upwards at a slightly softer incline. The fire road remains wide and rocky. After about a mile+ from the junction you come across the PCT. The PCT and the fire road criss-cross several times until the fire road sort of vanishes and from here you follow the PCT. Now it feels like a classic Columbia gorge trail. Steep hill on both sides, big green mossy trees all over. Up to this point the climb hasn't been so bad. It hasn't been easy per say, but it's been easier than Dog/Hamilton/IndianPt/Hardy Ridge so far. This was...alarming. That elevation has to come sometime right?

After being on the trail for 2.5 or so miles, you come across a nice big sign showing you are entering the Table Mountain area. On the right is a smaller path heading straight up into the hill. to the left is a continuation of the more level PCT. This is the junction to the heartbreak ridge trail (the up one to the right). However it wasn't labeled, and a sign on the big sign said "table mountain" pointing along the PCT. All 3 guides I had took heartbreak ridge to the top, but I wasn't sure it was the spot. Then a runner came from the PCT side, I asked if she knew, she said she didn't, but the way she came from did go to the top. That was good enough for us. I'm glad we chose that way instead of HB Ridge, but I'll get to that.

We followed the PCT for another quarter mile or so until we hit another big sign for the Table Mountain area. this time we took the path up. This is when Table Mountain shows it's hand. Hiking stops being fun and you just want to die. Life sucks. Screw it all. Why am I doing this. This sucks this was such a bad idea. You see up to this point the elevation climb hasn't been hard. but past this junction...it gets horrible. Worse than the worst parts of Dog Mtn. And it would be like this for the next mile. Within mile 3-4 of our hike, we gained 1200 feet. The trail went up the western flank of Table, first in the forest but soon coming out onto exposed rocky slopes. On the plus side, you finally get a view here, and can see your progress so far.

Munra Point already looks tiny

Hamilton Mountain Summit

Hardy Ridge summit

wider view

very wide view

girlfriend view

 The trail gets hard to follow as you climb over rocks and around very thin edges. And it just keeps going up. On one side of "windbreak rocks" it is death. On the other side is a painful roll down a rocky hill. And you just go up. Up. Up. It felt like it would never end. After a while you leave the exposed ridge area and plunge back into the thick woods. The uphill evens out a bit as you cover more horizontal ground, with several spurts of painful climbing. It really wore on us. We had both fallen out of shape this past month due to workloads, and it was killing us. This was without a doubt the hardest hike I have ever done.

Then we saw it. A ridge up a hill with no trees behind it. At the top of the hill was a sign. This was it. I got a huge burst of adrenaline and suddenly none of the climb mattered. I practically ran the final tenth of a mile to the sign and leaped in the air to celebrate. We had done it. Our goal had been met. We topped the beast. The top is mostly level meadow on the western side, and we walked along the top of Table's majestic cliff. The drop was over 1000 vertical feet. We threw some rocks. In front of us we could see almost the whole gorge. It was a hazy, atmospheric day, which sadly prevented us from seeing the major cascade volcanoes but still gave us a unique view as the sun rays penetrated the thick air. We ate, took pictures, and just admired our accomplishment. It felt good. After a half hour of messing around, it was time to go home. It took us 3 hours to go 4.5 miles up, hopefully it would be less going down.

turkey vulture at the top

Greenleaf Peak to the east

Dude contemplates life at the top

Keeley at the top

facing northwest. You can clearly see where the park ends, ugh

Looking west

peak meadows

sitting at the edge of the sheer drop

feet and heartbreak ridge

Indian Point! We were up there!

heartbreak ridge and the gorge

pillar and a huge fall

heartbreak ridge

heartbreak ridge is very striking and you have no idea it's even there from the water levels. 

success feels great

Our path up. You can faintly see the trail

The air was thick with haze, but you could sort of see mount hood back there

heavily edited view to the east

rock in the river and Cascade Locks

Eagle Creek!

look at those socks

the sheer drop down

Going down we decided to take heartbreak ridge, and make a lolipop loop. We saw the junction at the top of Table, so we knew where it would link up. We began our descent.

The descent may have been worse than going up. Almost immediately we came down upon the heartbreak ridge "boulder field", a talus slope with no trail, you just had to climb the landslide following poles marked with ribbons. It was 400 feet down, and it took forever. The rocks were loose and a wrong step meant a broken ankle. It was the most focused and stressed I've ever felt on a hike (outside going down Munra Point). By the bottom we had to stop, simply from mental exhaustion of being so focused on our steps. After that the trail keeps going down a bit, then goes up a hundred feet or so, and you come face to face with the giant cliff of Table Mountain. The only reason to take heartbreak ridge is this view. The boulder field sucked, and what was incoming was even worse.

the boulder field from above -keeleys picture

the boulder field from below - keeley's picture

the only view from Heartbreak ridge that was worth it. The sheer cliff face of Table Mountain. We had just been right at the very top, not even big enough to be visible from here.

My picture of the boulder field from above

From that view on, it was downhill to the sign junction. it was about a mile to the sign. and it was 1600 feet of elevation down. The boulder field became a cakewalk as we had to slowly and painfully (my poor knees) go down a slope so steep that at several points, I crouched and did a controlled slide. All I could think on the way down was how awful this would have been to climb. But eventually we made it down the hill to the sign, and we took a long much needed break from the stress. From here on it was a 2 mile walk home, but the walk was far more level and while it took us a long time to reach the hot springs, we were happy. We had done it. Our goal had been defeated. Next year we may try for some of the longer, tougher hikes on par with Table, but for now, we came and we conquered.

We hung out in the hot springs soaking our tired legs, which hopefully helped a lot because even now as I write this a full day later, my quads ache like nobody's business. If it would have been worse than this without the springs, oof. Table Mountain is a worthwhile goal indeed, though you want to hit it on a nice day, maybe a slightly cooler day then what we did. I still don't see the argument for using Heartbreak ridge. If you really want a loop hike okay. The only thing it offers is a nice view of the cliffs, but the other back side also provides great views.

God bless the Columbia Gorge. We will be back. Too much left to see, but much has finally been seen.

Pink is our path up, blue our path down. If you look closely along the upper blue path, you can see the boulder field (grayish spot next to the trees and the blue line) That boulder field is roughly 400 feet tall, for scale.