Wonderland Trail

The temperatures are what demand your attention. Highs only reach 27-28°F across all three days, and nights drop to 17-23°F. There's no thaw cycle here — everything stays frozen. That's actually fine for travel conditions on the ground, but it means any moisture management mistakes compound fast. Wednesday night into Thursday is the real weather event: 98% precip overnight with light snow and winds picking up to 16 mph. Plan to be camped and sheltered before that hits, not grinding out miles in it.

The Wednesday snow event is the key logistics pin. Tuesday is your cleanest day — partly sunny, nearly calm winds, good visibility. If you're starting today and pushing miles, use Tuesday aggressively. Wednesday shifts midday with snow becoming likely by afternoon (57% precip), so treat Wednesday as a short-mile or camp day. Thursday has a chance of morning snow clearing to partly sunny, so you may have a reasonable exit window if you're patient.

Stream crossing data is flagged as elevated, but the USGS gauges in the dataset are all in central California and have zero relevance to the Wonderland Trail. Disregard that data entirely — it doesn't apply here. With overnight lows well below freezing all week and no significant melt inputs, stream flows at Rainier should be at or near seasonal lows. Crossings that are typically problematic in summer and fall should be manageable. Carbon River, Tahoma Creek, and Kautz Creek are the ones worth scouting, but late-season frozen conditions typically make these straightforward.

Daylight is tight: 9 hours 56 minutes with sunset at 4:50 PM. That's your hardest constraint for daily planning. Camp selection needs to happen by 3:30-4 PM at the latest to get tents up and water sorted before dark. Build your daily mileage targets backward from that cutoff, not from sunrise. Headlamp in your hip belt pocket, not the lid of your pack.