Cecil Rhode Mountain towers over Cooper Landing Alaska. But the trail is not well known. Virginia and Dan of the Valley Wanderers had hiked it before so they lead us to the trailhead along Cooper Dam Road, to the narrow steep trail on our left a short distance past the locked gate, just before the road starts downhill. The trail is very steep and basically travels straight up the fall line. There are no comfortable switchbacks to ease the steepness. The bottom half goes through a lovely hemlock forest, and is somewhat overgrown with vegetation. But it was very obvious and easy to follow. We were accompanied by thousands of nasty little black flies that even occasionally bit us. The upper half is a little more gradual and climbs a ridge with a combination of tundra vegetation, loose scree, and broken pieces of shale. The upper ridge is very sharp rocks but we didn't need to actually walk on the rocks. The view was spectacular of the Kenai River and the little town of Cooper Landing below. It was 75 degrees down in town so the hike was very hot as we climbed the 3000 feet elevation gain to the 4400 foot summit. There is a nice memorial to Tico, a beloved lead dog, on the top. The flies made us all walk a lot faster than expected on that steep descent. I just wanted to get down through the trees and away from them! We had a nice breeze above the trees. There were wildflowers everywhere. It was a beautiful trail that showed little sign of frequent hikers. We had the whole place to ourselves.
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