Ancient Lakes 4-24-09
This was my 30th hike of the year, I’m half way to my goal and it’s only April. I choose this hike due to all the lakes and waterfall and easy elevation. My knees are still healing after Orcas weekend with the Barbies. I left my house at 7 and was at the TH just after 10. It was really out there in the middle of nowhere. I like these types of places because they are not as crowded. I saw two women with horses that were very friendly and a few guys looking like they packed enough gear for a month of camping. I chatted a second and then off I was. The ground was sandy and soft under my feet. I wore new shoes I was trying to break in and this did not turn out well in the end. Lesson learned, blisters recovering today. I took the fork left and headed to Ancient Lakes and soon saw a waterfall very small trickling down from the rock wall and thought that was “THE WATERFALL”. But I remembered from reading it went into a lake, so that couldn’t be it.. it was lovely and I kept walking and wild flowers were out and beautiful. I took tons of pictures and as I reached the crest of the trail where you could see 3 lakes at once and saw the actual WATERFALL into the lake, I felt like I was in prehistoric times. I could imagine the cave men & women and how they felt in those days. It was really breathtaking. This hike is now on my top 5 list! The colors jades, blues, butterflies, rocks it was truly fantastic. And I saw one tent, and only one person near a lake on my way out. Besides this two others were coming into trail when I got to my car. For only a 3 hour drive, the rewards were fantastic! And there were so many camp spots around the lakes, with fire pits already for someone. If I had gear, I would be backpacking here now! I’m sure it’s cold at night, but so worth it! I made my way around the lake with the waterfall along the edge is a trail, I saw what I thought was a marmot, but more round and flat tail..I couldn’t get a photo before he scattered off into the brush, but later I saw this tree and figured it was probably a beaver. I checked out each lake and the time flew by, I wished I had another 8 hours to explore this area. Next time I will take the right to Dusty lake and camp here. Truly an amazing day weather was perfect! My photos do not do this place justice, some are a bit washed out, must have been the light.
Stats 5 miles or so.

What a great hike! Hiked up on Saturday morning around 10:00 AM and got to the campsite within an hour. The lakes are beautiful and the waterfall is spectacular. The temperature was hanging around the low 70s F and there were a lot of people camping for the night.

At night the stars were spectacular, and it was around 40 F. Left around 10:00 AM on Sunday, and really enjoyed the hike!

Didn't get to the trail before noon (3 hour drive from Seattle)... There were maybe a dozen cars on the parking lot, but apart from a group of horse riders near the trailhead we didn't encounter anyone on the trail until we reached the lakes. There are several trails; keeping to the left (i.e. near the north wall of the coulee) got us to the lake at the back in about an hour, with lots of stops to watch the birds and look at the few flowers that were out. Temperature was pleasant, light breeze. Walked around the lake clockwise to the waterfall, which required scrambling over some loose rocks. Beautiful spot, unfortunately quite a few plastic bottles and other garbage has washed up there. Tried to climb up to the top of the waterfall, but gave up as the slope wasn't stable enough. Noticed maybe half a dozen tents total between the lakes on the way back.

We wanted to kick start our hiking season this year. We wanted to do a hike on a somewhat flat terrain, and we found out from WTA site that Eastern Washington desert would best fit our bill.

The driving directions are slightly confusing. From Seattle, take 1-90 E till Exit #149. Drive along SR 281 North till you reach Quincy [about 10 miles]. Then turn left[west] on Sr28 and go for 4 miles. Then turn left at White trail road. Till this point, the driving directions are same as given in this WTA site.

Once in White trail road, take a RIGHT at 9-NW. This road comes less than a mile on the White trail road. If you keep going along this road, you would reach gravel road after a while, and drive till its end.

This trail is a bit different in the sense that there are no direction markers or trail markers. There is no trailhead marker too. You would find a jeep road, and you just need to take that. Once in this trail, you would find lot of forks in the trail. My recommendation would be to not worry about these forks. Try to keep left whenever you can, and try to trek between the 2 tall canyons on view.

The eastern washington desert landscape is wonderfully different from that near the west side. The trek is flat and the canyons reminded us of Arizona and Utah regions. There are a bunch of lakes near the trek's end and a few good waterfalls. In bright sunshine, the lakes were brilliantly shining in crystal blue and green [each lake in that region shines with a different color]. The trek was really worth the distance [from Seattle]. The rewards are sunshine, great canyon views, and amazing lake views where one can just sit in solace for hours. The trek can be covered in just 1 hour each way because it is relatively flat.

The only problem we had was the wind. The wind was quite strong the day we went, and may be it had something to do with the current storm system. But just within a few minutes in the trek, the effect of the wind was less. This was because we were surrounded by canyons which were probably blocking the winds.

We were probably too early for wild flowers. We did not see much of it during the time we went. So if you want to go for the flowers, you would want to go a little later.

Overall a great desert hike, and i would highly recommend it.