Dow Creek is in the foot hills of the Olympics and offers a nice launch point for other adventures in the mountain areas in the neighborhood. We went specifically to visit Staircase loop trail.

RV Camping Dow Creek

Dow Creek, seen on some maps as Sunrise Resorts Campground, is just west of Hoodsport on the Hood Canal in Washington State. Hoodsport is on 101, when you hit the town just head west (away from the water) on N. Lake Cushman Rd., Dow Creek will be a couple of miles up on the right. When you see the Lake Cushman Grocery on the right slow down or you will pass Dow Creek.

This RV park is nice enough though it does not appear a lot of money has been reinvested into the facilities. In our case we don’t need much, just typical hookups which we had: power, water, sewer and cable. Dow Creek has areas for both RV and tent camping and I bet gets quite busy in the summer time. We enjoyed this trip because there were not a lot of people around, we went in October. Unlike some RV campgrounds we have visited, this gives you a real feel like you are camping, lots of trees, some privacy between spots and a place for a camp fire.

Our typical three day routine is travel and setup on Friday, explore on Saturday and break camp and head home on Sunday. For exploring the Hood Canal area and the eastern Olympic Penninsula this is a perfect routine for us.

Saturday we drove up to Staircase to explore. There is a campground right on the river that accommodates smaller trailers, RVs and tents but there are no hook ups there which is why we opted for Dow Creek.

The Staircase ranger station was closed for the season though there were quite a few hikers walking the trails. The campground at Staircase was maybe 10 to 15% full.

Suspension bridge over Staircase

Overall the Staircase Loop trail is somewhat easy though there are some challenging, rock stepping slippery spots. We are not “strong” back country hikers by any stretch, but by taking our time we were able to work our way around the loop.

There are a lot of great places to take pictures and observe birds. We found a large pileated woodpecker by following the sound of chopping wood.

It had been many years since I’d hiked this trail so it was fun to see the new (well new to me) suspension bridge that had been built across the river.

This time of year the evenings get a bit crisp so back at the camp site I was happy to stoke up our campfire in the SoloStove. It burns hot and clean with very little smoke. A great place to enjoy a drink and reminisce about the days adventures.

Solo Stove Camp Fire

We would come back to this site again, but next time we will explore the town a bit. There are some small shops, a winery and a museum that might be fun to check out.

Happy camping………