href="#ulink_17d71131-2995-55b4-b713-6c597e886f9e">▸2 the path crosses Clematis Creek a couple of times on wooden footbridges as it climbs into shady mixed spruce–fir forest. Ignore the Howard Eaton Trail, which cuts uphill just before the second bridge, and continue to your right across the creek.
Steep
Beyond this bridge, the trail swings away from the north bank of the creek and switchbacks sharply around a juniper- and sagebrush-studded ridge to the Howard Eaton–Golden Gate Trail junction ▸3 after 0.3 mile. Keep right to finish the calf-stretching 350-foot climb up to the Beaver Ponds Loop Trail junction, ▸4 0.7 mile from the parking areas.
Starting from Mammoth Hot Springs Hotel
If you’d rather not start out with the steepest part of the hike, you can do the loop in reverse with no difference in elevation gain.
Map Room, Music, and Espresso at Mammoth Hot Springs Hotel
If you have a few minutes to spare, check out the Map Room off the Mammoth Hot Springs Hotel lobby. Constructed in 1937, it features a unique map of the United States fashioned from 16 types of wood from nine countries. The map was designed by architect Robert Reamer, who also envisioned the Old Faithful Inn. If you’re staying in the area, check out the schedule of evening talks, slide shows, and live piano music. In the morning (6:30–10 a.m.), there’s an espresso cart in the lobby to get you going.
Old Gardiner Road
If you’re headed north out of the park after the hike, consider taking the scenic, 5-mile gravel stagecoach route down to the North Entrance station in Gardiner.
Male grouse court mates in spring with low-frequency drumming noises they create by rapidly vibrating their wings.
Viewpoint
Beyond this junction, views of Mammoth Hot Springs, Bunsen Peak, and the Lava Creek Bridge on the Mammoth–Tower road open up to the east, with Mount Everts (7,842 feet) tilting to your left in the north. Watch and listen here for strutting sage grouse alongside the trail, especially in early spring.
Birds
Wildlife
The slope eases up as it rolls through sagelands and bird-rich meadows accented by stands of aspen that exhibit the telltale blackened, head-high browsing marks on their trunks, left by sustenance-starved ungulates each winter. As the trail flattens out, it parallels, then passes under, some power lines. Ignore the numerous game trails that branch off the main route here. Where the trail swings east and the views really open up, watch for elk, mule deer, and prong-horn grazing in the sagelands below to your right.
Stream
After passing several mature stands of heavily browsed aspen and crossing a National Park Service service road (which leads up the hill to a radio tower), the trail descends gently through meadows and spruce–fir forest. You cross a seasonal stream via a bridge before reaching the first of several shallow, cattail-fringed beaver ponds ▸5 after 2.5 miles. Look for evidence of the amphibious, hydrological engineers in the form of gnawed-down logs around the shore. The paddle-tailed rodents lie low during the day and are busiest in the late afternoon. Moose are also occasionally spotted browsing nearby in the willow thickets.
Wildlife
The trail undulates and meanders past a couple of small, marshy ponds and crosses four seasonal streams on footbridges over 0.5 mile before arriving at the last and largest of the unnamed ponds. ▸6 Listen for birds as you approach through the trees. The edges of the mixed forest are also a favored haunt of black bears, so make plenty of noise to avoid unpleasant surprises. The trail loops around along the shore, passing a variety of idyllic spots to stop for a picnic lunch. At the outlet, you can admire some of the beavers’ handiwork before carefully crossing over the stream on a simple bridge.
Historic Interest
The trail climbs away from the ponds through open grassland and shady forest, back under more power lines, and past the ruins of an old log cabin before entering a wide-open plateau known as Elk Plaza and more rolling sagelands. Here you get an eye-level view of the geologic layers of the ridgelike Mount Everts across the Gardner River Valley to the north (left).
Geologic Interest
Beyond the Mammoth Area Trails notice board, a trailhead sign ▸7 announces your return to civilization. Continue straight ahead at the old service road intersection, ▸8 and drop down 100 yards on a narrow, rocky trail to the beginning of the gravel, one-way Old Gardiner Road, ▸9 an early stagecoach route that drops 1,000 feet in 5 miles to the park’s North Entrance station.
To return to the trailhead parking areas, ▸10 walk behind the Mammoth Hot Springs Hotel and left out to the main road. Then turn right and head for Liberty Cap.
▸1 0.0 Start at Sepulcher Mountain/Beaver Ponds parking areas
▸2 0.1 Sepulcher Mountain/Beaver Ponds trailhead
▸3 0.3 Right at Howard Eaton–Golden Gate Trail junction
▸4 0.7 Right at Beaver Ponds Loop Trail junction
▸5 2.5 First of several beaver ponds
▸6 3.0 Last and largest beaver pond
▸7 5.0 Beaver Ponds/Clematis Creek trailhead
▸8
