Day Hike - Cascade Pass & Sahale Arm

We parked .8 miles before the trailhead due to seeing the massive line of cars already parked along the road and assumed the trailhead parking was 100% full (at 8am on a Wednesday!!!).  This turned out to not be the case as it was due to road conditions most of the cars had elected to park on the side and not go to the trailhead.  However, if all of them had made it to the trailhead there was more cars than it could hold and they would still be parking on the side of the road, just not as far down.  One large sprinter type van had veered off the road just past this run, likely from hitting them wrong. it was half off/half on the road nearly tipping over and clearly stuck.  

After walking the .8 miles we arrived at the trailhead.  The trail is in very good shape the entire way up the arm and views were as amazing as always, although with mobs of people.  There were 10-15 goats along the way, some sitting just 10' on the side of the trail ignoring the vast number of hikers passing them and taking a plethora of pictures.   There was running water 1 mile before the pass and again about 600' below the terminal moraine camp.  

Returning to the cars  in the afternoon the road down was blocked at the sprinter van by a park service vehicle and a tow truck attempting to get the van back on the road without it rolling down into the valley.  We did not see if they were successful as our cars were parked out of sight from this.

Sadly, after 35 years of hiking Sahale, this will be the last time I ever personally will go back. The crowds and road conditions with everyone parking on the side of it make getting there/back to be significantly challenging even on week days now.