One
of the hikes we remembered best from our previous trips to Custer State Park was
the Grace Coolidge Walk-in Fishing Trail. The name dates from when the
President and his family used Custer as the site of the summer White House,
attracted in part by the reliable fishing nearby the State Game Lodge. We
remembered it as a beautiful canyon cut by lovely stream, with a wide, easy
trail. I’d ridden the trail back in the days when it was open to mountain
bikes, but it is now open to foot travel only to preserve its wild character.
Elk along US Highway 16A
The
trail may be the most popular trail in CSP, excluding the routes around Black
Elk Peak, Little Devils Tower, and the Cathedral Spires. Packing up before the
hike we were reminded of the trail’s 15 odd creek crossings, which might be an
issue with the park’s wet spring. We arrived early enough to get the first spot
in the parking lot. I was taking a GPS route and noting landmarks in case an
opportunity arose to update my old Black Hills trail guide.
Along Grace Coolidge Creek.
Luckily,
the first crossing of Grace Coolidge Creek had a wooden plank bridge and the
second was an easy rock hop. All subsequent crossings were bridged, part of an
effort started the previous year. Without having to worry about keeping our
feet dry we turned our attention to the canyon around us. Though only a few
hundred feet deep, it offered cliffs of Harney Peak Granite mixed with open
forest. There are six small Civilian Conservation Corps built dams along the
way, each which its own small pool and secluded fishing spot.
Beam bridge over Grace Coolidge Creek.
Just
as the canyon began to open up we came to a bench placed in memorial to park
advocate Sue Brown. Next we saw our first hiker of the day; amazingly enough
the same mushroom hunter who had helped us out the previous day in finding the
Barnes Canyon Trail. We had another long chat about hiking trails and water
quality issues, but sadly neglected to get his contact information.
Granite outcrop and pond along Grace Coolidge Creek.
Just
beyond the bench was the junction with the “Lost Trails,” which we planned to
use for our return route. The Grace Coolidge Trail ends at Center Lake (home of
the Black Hills Playhouse), at the south end of the campground road. We planned
to turn the hike into a “lasso” by adding the trails on the east and west sides
of the lake, making the Lost Trails the loop, and using Grace Coolidge as the
stem.
Just
across the parking area was a signboard at the trailhead for the west side of
the Lost Trails. The signboard explained that the Lost Trails were likely built
in the 1930s by the CCC, but were only recently found and rehabilitated. The
trails were then added to the CSP system in 2020..JPG)
Map at Lost Trails Trailhead.
However,
the west side trails were previously known as the Center Lake Trails, and were abandoned
after the devastation of the 1988 Galena Fire, along with the short hiking
trails at the park’s Blue Bell Area. The west side Lost Trail matches the
descriptions and sketches in Fielder’s 1973 “Hiking Trails in the Black Hills”
and in Brandt and Jorgensen’s 1981 “Family Hiking Trails in South Dakota,” with
the exception that both sources show a heart shaped loop, rather than the
current spur, loop, and overlook configuration. The Center Lake Trail is also
mentioned Baskett and Sanders 1977 “An Introduction to Custer State Park and
the Southern Black Hills” and matches some brief notes I made on a 1987 hike.
So, it was likely that the west side Lost Trail was well known park trail from
at least 1973 through the 1988 Galena Fire, when knowledge of the trail faded
from the park’s institutional memory.
Center Lake from the Lost Trails Overlook.
The
descriptions of the old Center Lake Trail do not rave about the trail’s
features. We found it’s reincarnation as a nice open walk through open forest
on a single track dirt surface. The overlook is the trail’s redeeming feature,
with a beautiful vista over Center Lake. After a quick 1.2 miles we were back
at the bath house.
We
picked up the east side Lost Trail to the north, just after the campground road
crossed a small stream by following the blue diamond blazes. The trail starts
by hugging the lakeshore near the campground and passes a small dock. Beyond,
the trail leaves the campground development behind and makes a couple steady
climbs aided by stone stairways. The east side area is not mentioned in any of
the four sources cited above, and is likely the ‘lost” part of the trail, The
stone stairways have the look of CCC-era construction, and likely date to that
era. Perhaps the same 1988 Galena Fire that so devastated the west side trails,
had burned over, and eventually opened up, the ‘lost” CCC trails on the east
side.
CCC-era stone steps on the Lost Trail
Circling
around, there are views of Center Lake and scattered granite slabs. Next, the
trail passes below the outlet for the lake’s dam, which the park markets as a
waterfall. After a mile and a half, we were back at the intersection of the
Grace Coolidge Trail by the Sue Brown bench. We shared the return hike with a
steady stream of other hikers, including one family with Tennessee ties.
Second set of CCC-era stone steps on Lost Trails.
Since
it was still early in the day we headed over to Legion Lake for another hike. We
hiked the Legion Lake Loop, added a series of spurs to the Badger Clark
Trailhead, and then went on to the Centennial Trail at its junction with Horse
Trail 1, where we saw a rare group of CSP backpackers. 
Legion Lake.
