Last weekend I went on my first Kevin and Maria sponsored backpack with the Peninsula Wilderness Club. We headed up the West Cady Ridge trail in the Central Cascades off of Hwy 2 near Skykomish. I had a lot of fun on this trip and got to meet some new friends. The group consisted of 8 people, Kevin, Maria, Julie, Julie's friend Jenna, Kevin's friends Luke, Sherilyn, Paul and myself. We hiked up the ridge and Kevin found us a great camping spot just below the summit of Benchmark Mountain. I also got to meet some people doing their own hike that I know of through trip reports I read on the NWHikers forum. I met trailpair, JimK and kathyb/oldgrrrl and a couple of her friends (I go by the trail name Tagman on nwhikers). trailpair and JimK stayed on the summit while kathyb and friends were doing a dayhike. A report of their trip can be read here.
In the morning we had breakfast and headed out. The day was to be longer in distance but downhill the whole way. The plan was to do a big loop consisting of part of the PCT and the Pass Creek Trail. We had a few miles of snow to hike through and Kevin did an outstanding job keeping us on the correct path. The Pass Creek trail was badly overgrown and there were a few down trees. As with the Cady Ridge Trail, Kevin did a good job of clearing the trail of the smaller trees with his WTA saw when he could, but some of the trees were just too big and will require a full crew to clear. The Pass Creek trail also had a couple of Bridges that were washed out necessitating a couple fords. Luckily we were able to take advantage of a couple trees that we used as a bridge to cross Pass Creek itself, but unfortunately we had to get our feet wet crossing the NF Skykomish (this all just added to the fun and adventure of the trip 
). Once we got back to the cars, it was a mad dash to get our packs off and stashed so we could escape the wrath of the trailhead mosquitoes which were pretty ferocious. This was an excellent trip and I am looking forward to hiking with Kevin and Maria again soon.
Trip Stats: 19 miles (or thereabouts) and 4000' elevation gain (with all the ups and downs)
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