Elk Mountain

Elk Mountain is one of the more difficult hiking trail in Oregon. Elk Mountain trail is located in Tillamook State Forest Park. It is about an hour East from Portland. The trail itself is only 1.6 miles long but has over 2000ft of elevation gain. Thus this trail is rated as a difficult trail. The trail is located conveniently just beside Elk Creek campground and many campers make this climb while enjoying their stay.


We left home around 7AM in the morning and headed East towards Elk Mountain trail head. We took Highway 26 and turn onto Highway 6. When we go to the trail head at 8AM, many of the campers just woke up and not many people were doing the hike due to its difficulty. We parked the car and got prepared to do the climb.

We got to the trail head and the sign clearly states that it is a difficult trail. The trail started to climb steeply and kept going upwards. It was just minutes later we were already starting to get exhausted. The trail was also quite narrow with overgrown shrubs on the trail due to not having much traffic along the difficult trail. Sometimes the trail would elevate steeply and required us to climb over rocks and trees. For the entire trail, we only saw 2 other hikers. Thus we can easily conclude that this is not a popular trail due to its rated difficulty.

Although the trail isn't popular, the view at the summit was still gorgeous! We got to the top by around 9:30AM and the view was stunning. We could see King Mountain and the entire Tillamook Forest. At the summit of Elk Mountain, there was a box where we could open. There was a note book in there with a pen where we put down our name to show that we have completed this hike. make sure you sign this notebook when you complete this difficulty hike!

Elk Mountain trail also loops around to King Mountain, however we did not do this loop this time due to errands we had in the afternoon. Thus we went back down the same way we came up. Going down the mountain is not as easy as we thought. The trail was quite slippery due to the small rocks. We slipped few times and had to go slow.

Overall, Elk Mountain is not a trail for beginner hikers. It is a short trail with excessive elevation gain and people doing this hike should wear proper hiking shoes to prevent slipping on the trail.

Tom Dick and Harry Mountain

Tom Dick and Harry Mountain is located about an hour away from Portland. It is very close to Government Camp in Mount Hood National Forest. The trail to Tom Dick and Harry Mountain summit starts right off Highway 26. The trail head is the same trail head as the Mirror Lake trail.  In face, half of the trail to Tom Dick and Harry Mountain summit is the same trail that goes to Mirror Lake. Once you reached Mirror Lake, Tom Dick and Harry Mountain trail branches off and goes on for another 1.6 miles. It is not a difficult trail and the elevation gain is not substantial. It is definitely a good day hike to reach the top of the mountain.

Similarly, when doing this trail, it is the best to get there early before 8 so that you can secure a parking space. Otherwise you will have to park your car at Skibowl and walk 1 mile back down to trail head. Once we reached Mirror Lake, we went onto Tom Dick and Harry Mountain trail. We did not see anyone when we walked on this trail. We were thinking that most people probably just enjoyed their time by the lake. Some parts of the trail here are actually quite narrow and we had to be a bit careful when walking on the rocky trail.

After about a mile of climb, the trail makes left turn onto the ridge of the mountain. This part is super easy and the trail is almost flat to walk on. There were a lot of flies and bees buzzing around, which was extremely annoying. About 20 minutes later, we got to the final part of the trail where we had to climb over the rocky hill to reach the top. Once we got to the top, we saw quite a lot of people are already here enjoying the view.

The view from the top was simply amazing. We could see Mount Hood, of course. We could also see Mount St. Helens, Mount Adams, and Mount Jefferson. The view was just unbelievable. We could also see Mirror Lake down below.

Overall, this is an amazing trail. Not only that it provides amazing view, it is also a fairly easy trail to reach the top of the summit. We highly recommend people to do this trail!