Rampart Ridge Loop

A beautiful day to get views of her majesty! There are a couple downed trees on the trail. Not hard to cross over or under. The last half of the trail has a ton of ice. Micro spikes were a life saver ...

Note: This report only covers about first mile and a half of the loop (clockwise) starting from Trail of Shadows. Light dusting of new snow - unusual for this time of year. Some of the ground was froz...

The lack of snow atop Rampart Ridge in the middle of February is pretty remarkable, even at 4000’! Other than the previous night’s 1” dusting of snow that managed to find the forest floor through open...

Trail was snow free except for about 15 feet of snow/ice on the trail at the Mount Rainer viewpoint. Very easy to cross.A few easy blowouts. Bridges were fine and the trail for the most part dry.A rea...

Headed up to the park with intentions to go snowshoeing, but the park made a late call to leave the road to Paradise closed for the day. With the full day open for us still, we decided to head up anyw...

Rampart Ridge Loop (from Longmire MRNP) trip report for Saturday, January 24, 2026.Took advantage of a sun-filled, blue sky day to head up to the National Park. Parked at Longmire about 10:00am and pl...

Very small amounts of snow at Longmire, easy to walk.  We brought microspikes but didn't need them.  Temperature was in the 30s at Longmire, but after climbing about 200' up, the temperature rose rapi...

Arrived at Longmire knowing the gate was not to be opened, group decided to do Rampart Ridge as an alternate. Crossed the road and was on snow, put on snowshoes for climb. Except for a couple of locat...

Arrived at Nisqually entrance around noon, with a short line of cars.Road: light dusting of snow, easily drivable from Nisqually to Longmire. Chains were required for 2WD vehicles after that, to Parad...

Hiked Rampart Ridge starting from the Longmire Museum. It rained most of the day and there was protection from direct rain by the old-growth forest. There were many areas of standing water especially ...