Trail Advocates

Key Stats for the Skookum Lake Trail - 542

About

Trail is accessed by way of Thunder Mountain Trail 543 or Baty Butte Trail 545.  A great trail and a great destination.  The mileage on the FS info sheet is incorrect.  The trail is approximately 1.65 miles in length (each way-round trip is about 3.3 miles).

When you come down from Thunder Mountain, below the rock field on the west side of the trail, you will arrive at a small meadow. Turn right here (east) to go to Skookum Lake.  The location of the trail junction is shown on the topo map, and a waypoint is included in the GPS track. Heading west from here will take you on a long abandoned route to Baty Butte.

Skookum Lake is named with the Chinook jargon word which originally meant a strong or powerful deity, and later came to mean simply strong or stout. When used in connection with localities, the word skookum generally indicated a place inhabited by a skookum, or god of the woods. It sometimes meant a place used as a burial ground.¹

Directions

Trail is only accessible from the Thunder Mountain Trail. Please see that page for directions.

¹Oregon Geographic Names, McArthur, Lewis.

Trip Reports

Photo	Date	Report Summary	Trail
📷	Sep 1, 2025	A visit back to see an old friend I took a friend out to check out this trail, as I hadn’t been in a number of y...	Skookum Lake #542
	Jul 19, 2025	Lots of brush work done recently Brushy areas near the lake have been all cut out. Trail is in really good shape...	Skookum Lake #542
	Oct 19, 2024	Post Sandstone fire updates Portions along the hill coming down from Thunder Mountain were affected by the S...	Skookum Lake #542
	Aug 18, 2023	Trail in great shape! Trail has recently been logged out and is in good to excellent shape. There are ...	Skookum Lake #542
	Jul 3, 2015	Brushy and quite a few down logs Trail is very brushy in spots and had quite a few downed logs on it. Most were e...	Skookum Lake #542