The Denny Creek trail is a complex of tread types. The first mile which passes over a stout bridge and under I-90 is big, broad, and soft on the feet with dirt and duff. There are good turnpikes and gentle grades. At the famous Denny Creek rock slabs the trail comes to the washed out bridge which was totally obliterated a few seasons ago and never rebuilt. Too bad, because this is a popular trail that gets heavy use.

The creek is down to a trickle so it is easy to cross it on the rocks but there are signs up with serious warnings that crossing in spring and summer runoff times would be dangerous. There are two cairns a bit upstream which show where the trail picks up again on the other side.

From here to the falls (which are also a trickle at this time of year), the tread is decent. As soon as it leaves the trees, however, the trail crosses a long scree and boulder field which makes for a rocky stumbly path all the way up into the first set of switchbacks.

These switchbacks ascend to the upper Denny Creek valley. There the trail gets rooty as it climbs up and over a hump before crossing over the creek again. The crossing here is bridged by an old rotten log that I refused in favor of simply crossing on the stones. Again as the trail leaves the trees it crosses more scree-boulder fields and then up a rocky set of switchbacks to Hemlock Pass. From there it is an easy walk to Melakwa Lake and Upper Melakwa Lake.

Both lakes are low on water. There are lots of trails lacing the space between them and many good campsites. There is also a box toilet on a rise hidden in the trees. From Upper Melakwa it is pretty much a talus traverse up to Melakwa Pass, interrupted by a few groves of trees. There is another trail going up to Kaleetan which takes off from the Lower Melakwa spillway up past the toilet. I've done both of these before but not on this run.

Foliage colors are starting but will probably be in full color in two weeks. Total gain is 2200 feet in 4.5 miles.