Conrad Meadows
Scott Mclean
Now for Conrad Meadows.
My family has a history with the South Fork of the Tieton area. After all, Cowiche and Tieton are just over the Ridge and down a few miles.
Grandpa McLean used to take my Dad up the there to visit Dad’s Uncle Jet. They would meet him at a lodge near the end of the South Fork. Remnants of the lodge’s chimney and fireplace still exist.
Jet and Arne Arneson broke trail for the forest service including the 10 day trail out of Conrad. We had a favorite campsite below Conrad meadows. My first time camping that area was when my folks let me go up there with my Uncle Gale when I was about 13.
Gale was on a temporary layoff from H and H and was earning some extra money helping his friend Art cut right of way. They spent a couple of hours showing me how to fell trees. They then sat around the fire drinking beer while a 13 year old was dropping trees.
Those old saws were heavy! I had already dropped about 8 trees when a branch from one flew over their heads making Art spill his beer. My uncle had a flicker of common sense then and decided it wasn’t the safest job for me to be doing. I was relegated to trimming and delimbing after that.
Gale asked me not to tell Mom and I never did.
I’m going to fast forward a bit now. Steve and I went up ahead of time for a family campout to make sure we had our campsite saved. We drove my 47 Jeep loaded with camp gear.
I was a wrestler but Steve played basketball. The Sonics were in the NBA championship series and Steve was frantic to hear scores. I couldn’t have cared less but sought to make little brother happy. I drove that old Jeep up some trails a goat would have looked at warily to get to the top of a Ridgeline where we got a weak radio signal. I went out and target practiced with my .44 magnum while Steve listened to the game. I had to drop over the side of the hill because my shooting was interfering with him hearing the game. The Sonics won and Steve was happy.
Going back down that trail in the dark was an adventure!
Backing up again. I had forgot about where I had camped with Gale and then my Uncle Stan rediscovered the spot. We met them up there to camp one time and things had changed in the intervening years but it began to look familiar.
It’s a great area.
In one direction you have Conrad, the 10 day trail and Surprise lake. We used to love fishing for cutthroat up there in August and September.
Downstream you have the falls on one side and Phantom lake on the other. Phantom lake used to be a favorite for a few locals for fishing early in the season and swimming after that. It sits in a rock bowl only 1/8th of a mile from the road but unless you’d been shown you’d never know a lake was there.
A lot of people have driven to Conrad without knowing there was a waterfall there. It too is unmarked and only a shoulder pullout exists. There is a switchback trail going down to the falls. There are actually two falls with a pool between them. They are fairly impressive and quite pretty. On a hot summer day, the cool mist down there can be quite refreshing.
Below the falls the river goes through a fairly shear walled rocky gorge. Fishing can be good there but you have to be half mountain goat and all crazy.
Back to camping. Tim and I got the idea to make a log and driftwood raft. The water there is damned cold and we realized it was time to abandon ship before we got to the bridge at the lower end of camp. Smart idea since the falls are not very far downriver!
I’m sure anyone admiring the falls would have been quite surprised to see a raft without Tom Sawyer or Huck Finn come over the falls. We camped there many times and took our boys camping there years later. I was sad to see that a logging crew out of Packwood had trashed the site and left a 3 foot tall pile of cans.
Hopefully it was cleaned up where families could enjoy it again.
More later.