Slaughter Gulch Trail near Cooper Landing, Alaska
This is an awesome trail. It felt exactly like I’d imagine hiking in Hawaii would (other than I assume it would be much warmer in Hawaii). It’s a roughly 5 mile trail straight up a small dirt path with lots of little scrambles that keeps you hanging off the sides of lush green mountains overlooking a bright blue lake / river. Very rainforest-like. Tons of wild blueberries, and hallucinogenic mushrooms along the path. One of my favorite trails I’ve ever hiked because it was a good workout, but not an excessive time commitment. Plus you get to the top quickly, then can walk around this large ridge for awhile if you want to extend the hike. Unfortunately, it monsooned at the top, so we didn’t get great photos, and I ended up in full ski gear headed back down. Womp! Our photos didn’t do the scenery justice due to the weather, so I stole some from Google so you can see how it looks in better weather. Note that August tends to be a cool, (40s or low 50s Fahrenheit) and rainy month in Alaska. To avoid the rain, you should try to arrive a bit earlier in the summer.
