Trip Report
Day Hike - Cleman Mountain–Hardy Canyon Loop
Flower extravaganza in the shrub-steppe and two volcanoes plus lots of other peaks out.
Brian Carpenter
- Sun, May 13, 2018
- Day Hike - Cleman Mountain–Hardy Canyon Loop
- Cleman Mountain–Hardy Canyon Loop
- Day Hiking
- Successful
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- Road suitable for all vehicles
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Based on a recent WTA trip report describing the road up Hardy Canyon as overgrown, covered in blowdown and full of blood sucking fiends (aka ticks) we chose a route up the ridge to the west of Hardy Canyon. We broke off to the right about 3/4 of a mile in and before the road enters the canyon and followed the ridgeline up to the top of Cleman. It's like walking a long ramp, some sections are steeper than others. We came down the same way. The shortage of vegetation in the area makes it easy to travel cross-country.
We hit the flowers at their peak. It was warm but occasional breezes on the way up cooled us down. A continuous breeze on top of Cleman was very pleasant on this warm day. Adams, Rainier, Goat Rocks, Stuart Range and other peaks were visible, as well as down to Naches and Tieton, Yakima, etc.
We used the ridgeline directly west of Hardy Canyon instead of the canyon based on a recent WTA trip report about the road being overgrown, covered in blowdown and lots of ticks. We had no troubles navigating up the ridge to the top and did not have any tick problems.
Lots of signs of deer and elk but none spotted. Lots of flowers: balsamroot, lupines, lomatiums, brodeia, larkspur, pucccon, phlox, grass widow, yellow bells, springbeauty, shooting star, serviceberry, hawkweed, oregon sunshine, agoseris, hooker's balsamroot and even some bitterroot.