July 10, 2015.

2.2 mi. | 300′ ele. gain | 1:10 hr.

Just the place for an afternoon stroll. We chose a campsite at Marion Forks to spend the weekend. Wanting to do something active, we walked up the road to the Independence Rock Trailhead.

According to cascaderamblings.com, Independence Rock was named by a survey party in the 1800’s who just happened to be by this rock on Independence Day. In other words, there’s nothing terribly special about this place.

The trail was nice enough, traveling over soft dirt through an evergreen forest. The views would probably be great on a nice day, but we were in the clouds today. The hike is over just after you start, so it’s not a destination in and of itself. I’d love to know why there’s even a trail here. Maybe the people at the Fish Hatchery needed something to do on their lunch break.

Whatever the reason, it was a good excuse to stretch the legs before settling down to attempt cooking cedar plank salmon over the campfire…