People attempting the Wallace Lake / Wallace Falls loop should be aware that, as of Saturday Nov. 15, a significant stretch of the section linking Wallace Lake and Upper Wallace Falls is under a foot or more of water. A beaver dam is likely to be the culprit (a number of trees, including some conifers, were sticking out of the sizable "lake", indicating that it is not a normal feature), possibly in combination with the heavy rains of last week. Perhaps in a few more days enough water will drain to make the trail normally passable again; perhaps not.

Much nearer to Wallace Lake in this same segment, a small bridge has been washed perhaps 10 feet off its foundations - just a nuisance at present.

Greg Ball trail is in good shape, but there are a couple of impressive mudholes on the last half-mile of old road connecting its upper end to Wallace Lake.

Given the recent heavy rains, we called the Skykomish Ranger Station to make sure the West Cady Ridge trail was still accessible. The lady we talked to said we should probably be able to get to the trailhead. Not sure how, as when we reached Index, we found that the road was closed due to flooding. Our guidebook calls it the North Fork Skykomish Road, but apparently it's really the Index-Galena Road.

The same ranger assured us that we should have no trouble getting to the Barclay Lake trailhead, so we drove on a few miles to Baring and turned off onto the forest road. After a couple of miles, the road was blocked by logging activity, so we had to turn back. Not a very useful ranger.

We finally ended up at Wallace Falls State Park and hiked up to the Middle Falls (2.1 miles one way). The trail was delightful. We only encountered five or six other parties(rainy November Thursdays have their uses).

We had some rain, some sun, and some of both at the same time. There was even a rainbow that reached down between us and the far bank of the river - absolutely stunning.

All the recent rain has made the river and waterfalls quite spectacular. There was occasional shallow water on the trail, but the trail is in wonderful shape otherwise.

Saw a woodpecker, a pipsissewa and a zeller's bolete. Back at the trailhead, we noticed that one of the signs has a nice summary of mushrooms on the trail. We hadn't seen it heading it out, because it was on the back of the sign.