Creating and using highly available transaction logs in a distributed storage system is described, where the storage controller functions of the distributed storage system are separated from that of distributed storage system storage media. In an exemplary embodiment, a storage controller server receives a transaction entry at a first storage pool of the distributed storage system. The storage controller server further looks up a transaction log to store the transaction entry, where the transaction log is associated with a second storage pool. The storage controller server routes the transaction entry to the second storage pool, wherein the second storage pool stores the transaction entry.