West to East Crossing of Alpine Lakes Wilderness

August 28 to Sept. 5

8/28 Necklace Valley/East Fork Foss River. Two of us entered in light drizzle via Necklace Valley trail, camping at Jade Lake. Buggy when no breeze or rain. Wet brush overhanging trail at thigh level.

8/29 LaBohn Lakes. Continued up to head of valley and up way trail to LaBohn Lakes. Well cairned. Take talus slide upward along left edge to near its top. Cairns mark start of trail through trees to left and up. Camped at lower lake. Rain in evening, then clearing and ice on tent fly in morning. Decent cairns up and south to LaBohn Gap.

8/30 LaBohn Gap, Williams Lake, Dutch Miller Gap, Waptus River. Passed through LaBohn Gap and down to Chain Lakes, and on down below. Cairns less frequent, several variations marked, some snow remaining in bottom of valley, hard and thick. Found top of way trail down to Williams Lake at head of gully opening into talus slope below. Trail veers off to left of gully into trees and does not descend talus. Quite a bit of blowdown on this way trail, with fresh work arounds, careful trail spotting. Many bugs at Williams Lake. Good trail down to junction with Middle Fork Snoqualmie and up to Dutch Miller Gap. Trail down to Ivanhoe Lake is good. Bridge crushed below Ivanhoe, badly slanted, unsuitable for horses or easy walking, but passable. Further down, trail is a bit brushy, very noticable when wet. One creek crossing before intersection with PCT needed poles to avoid fording.

8/31 PCT from Waptus River to Cathedral Pass. Good trail, many people, blueberries ripe in a couple places, and no where else on the entire trip.

9/1 Cathedral Pass to Robin Lakes Creek crossings on PCT are fine.

Trial up to Tuck and Robin Lakes clearly marked, well cairned up to Robin Lakes, but need to pay attention or its easy to lose. Bugs not too bad at Robin Lakes. Frost and freezing overnight, but still bugs in morning. Three mountain goats visited our camp in morning.

9/2 Cross country up to ridge of Granite Peak, and south along eastern side of ridge. Descended to unnamed round lake halfway down to Klonaqua Lakes, mostly on heather slopes and talus, connecting ledges to avoid seriously cliffy gullies. Check 7.5 minute Mt Daniels topo for best looking terrain. From unnamed lake, at lower edge and right of outlet, we found a cairn and faint fisherman's trail leading down a ways and then left into a rock slot weakness through first band of cliffs below lake. The route through the second band of cliffs much lower was right of the main stream (facing down)and well right of the initial slot descent. Eventually reached the upper lake shore at its head in a grassy area. Faint fishermans trail (mostly bushwack)leads clockwise around northern shore to campsite on isthmus between the two lakes. Summary of day: Difficult cross country routefinding through potentially hazardous terrain. No ropes or ice ax needed but care and experience. May be other better routes down. About 7 hours from Lower Robin Lake including much map reading, looking, exploring several sections without packs, and enjoying the views.

9/3 Klonaqua Lakes/French Ck/Snowall Ck Followed fishermans trail (good though) from isthmus to Bob Lake, and along outlet of Bob Lake down and left to join official Klonaqua Lakes trail left of outlet creek. Trail has a number of trees across it and is brushy lower down. Crossing of Klonaqua Ck at junction with French Ck trail easy on rocks without ford now. Descended French Ck trail to junction with Snowall Crk trail. Ford of French Ck not difficult at this time, but hiker ford doesn't lead to trail on the other side which is well south of where Snowall Ck joins French Ck. The obvious shallow ford is north of Snowall Ck. Signage, etc could be better. Bushwacked to find trail.

Snowall Ck trail is good turning to brushy further up. Camped in meadow west of Cradle Pass. Not too buggy. Trail easy to lose in some meadows, with horse and elk variations, mud and overgrowth.



9/4 Cradle Lake, Meadow Ck, Jack Ck. Trail up over Cradle Pass and down to Cradle Lk is generally good. Beautiful area with great views of Stuart Pass, Mt Stuart from NW and north side of Ingall's Peak. Unfortunately, 5-6 small forest fires were burning in upper Jack Ck basin, above where Meadow Ck joins Jack Ck. These obstructed our planned exit over Stuart Pass to N Fork of Teanaway. Trail down to Meadow Ck was good, as was Meadow Ck trail from Snowall/Cradle Lake trail junction to junction with Jack Ck trail. Temporary sign at Jack Ck announced closure of Jack Cr Trail and Van Epps Pass Trail south of Meadow Ck. due to fires. (Caused by lightning several weeks earlier we later discovered.) So we descended Jack Ck. to Icicle River Road. Trail generally good. No cars, no people at trailhead or campgrounds at Rock Island or Chatter Ck. Camped at Chatter Ck Campground, not understanding why all was so deserted.

9/5 Icicle River Road Got up early, and began hiking down road to east. After a mile, the river began running over the road and we understood why there were no cars or people. A one lane fairly new dirt road workaround led about half a mile around the washout. It was closed to traffic and had lots of boot prints. At the new road end, two empty cars, two portapotties, and a good view of the river running off the road for the last time. ( We later learned a June 8, 2008 landslide provoked by rain/snow melt came down the northern facing slope into the river, diverting it onto the road on the northern side of the old river bed.) We very luckily picked up a ride almost immediately from a newly arrived car and had a real breakfast in Leavenworth. We were prepared to take the bus home, leaving Leavenworth at 1:10pm for Seattle, arriving 4:30pm, but an anxious family member came to get us instead.

This is a classic crossing of the Alpine Lakes Wilderness, linking a number of very scenic lakes, passes and lightly used trails. Except along the PCT over Labor Day Weekend, we saw a total of 8 people, all but two day hikers. Unsettled weather and the Icicle Ck Road washout may have helped us here. We went 48 hours west of PCT seeing no one, and 72 hours east of PCT seeing no one. The difficult cross country section above Klonaqua Lakes could be avoided by descending into the Cle Elum River from Cathedral Pass and ascending over Paddy-Go-Easy Pass to French Ck and Meadow Ck Pass. This has the disadvantage of touching a road, missing Tuck and Robin Lakes, Klonaqua Lakes and Cradle Lake. The exit over Stuart Pass would be most ideal, and we intend to go back to finish our trip properly.

Had a great four days in the Dutch Miller - LaBohn area. Walked up the Middlefork, being thankful that the road was closed. Ah what we didn't know was that a construction crew had an enormous sloppy car camp with tarps, garbage and beer bottles at the head of the trail. They brought a huge presence to scenic Pedro Camp, forcing us to Lake Williams. The pink tape every 25 feet or so was a nice touch. You know, this trail is in great condition, why the unnecessary work? Side note: Trails and roads are gouges in nature, not natural resources. Hike tough or stay home. Back to the report: Dog crap at Lake Williams, which is starting to recover from decades of over-use. Every campsite in the area had a fresh illegal firepit, with fresh illegal coals. Shame.

Tried the Becky route up Summit Chief, kinda tough, brushy and cliffy. I got hung up in cliffs on the way down.

The LaBohn gap area is beautiful, still got a lot of snow on the lakes, high ridges are clear. You can swan dive into the old mine shaft if you want.

Bugs? Mega.

The outlet bridge at Ivanhoe was smashed (duh, it never had a chance. waste of someone's money and time.) You know they make rocks that you can hop across on, don't get your jogahiker goretex megagear wet!

Left mountains with a sprained knee and feet that looked like meteoric debris, found cold beer at car. Awesome. Only hikers encountered were stuck-up Goldmeyer types.

Leave rover home and go see the gap. With a stove.

Lorax

We did a 6 day trip spending one night at Waptus Lake, 2 nights at Lake Williams and 2 nights at Spade Lake. We started our trip at the Salmon La Sac TH and hiked an easy, but dusty 8.5 miles to Lake Waptus on trail 1310. The hiker bridge is washed out and good signs directed us to the horse ford on trail 1329A. The river was about 40 feet wide, knee deep and was no problem with a pair of reef walkers. There is a large dusty, beaten down camping area at the head of the lake with the best views. We continued along the lakeshore and found some other fine campsites near the Spade Lake trail junction.

The next morning we headed up to lake Ivanhoe. We arrived early in the afternoon. It is beautiful, with tall cliffs surrounding the lake and deep blue water. There are a handful of small campsites on the penninsula on the NE side. We considered setting up camp there, but felt that it was a bit closed in and decided to head over Dutch Miller Gap to Lake Williams. We were both happy with our decision. Lake Williams is a gem. We found a perfect campsite on the small ridge just past the outlet with views across the lake and across the Middle Fork towards Summit Chief Mtn. The only downside to Lake Williams is that most of the shoreline is a bit marshy, but I would still consider it one of the most beautiful lakes I have ever been to in the Cascades.

We got an early start the next day and dayhiked to Chain Lakes and La Bohn Gap. The trail follows the W shore of the lake and comes to an old mine. A rough, steep bootpath goes uphill just to the left of the mine entrance. It's a bit sketchy at time, but not hard to follow.

Eventually, it comes to a boulder-filled gully. Cairns showed the way up the gully and the rock hopping wasn't difficult. There is also a cairned route that crosses the gully when you first get out of the trees that leads to a path in the woods that avoids some of the boulders. We took that on the way down. Eventually, we climbed a final grassy slope and reached the basin. It was a very warm bright sunny day and it was good to find some shade. We wandered around Chain Lakes on the polished granite and explored the remains of the Dutch Miller mining operations. We followed a well defined path to La Bohn Gap and La Bohn Lakes. The meadows, flowersand views down to the Necklace Valley we're remarkable.

We broke camp and we're on the trail the next day at 8 AM and headed back over Dutch Miller Gap on trail 1310 and 1362 and continued on the PCT to the intersection of trail 1337 up to Spade Lake, which we unfortunately, didn't arrive at until 1 PM. The 100 Hikes book recommends starting out from Waptus Lake no later than 7 AM, because of the steepness of the trail and the southern exposure. We both agreed! Do this hike early in the morning. It is a ball buster! There are no swithcbacks and lots of blowdown. It took us almost 4 hours to go 3.5 miles. At around 4600', the trail levels off for a bit and then continues to alternate between level/slightly downhill streches and steep ascents. The map shows the trail leveling off at 5200'. We found a stream with a fairly good flow at 4600"". There is also a place at that elevation where a well defined but lesser used trail goes off to the right. It is actually better to take this trail as it avoids some slippery scrambling through a washed out section of the trail a few yards ahead.

Spade Lake is a huge dramatic lake with grand views of peaks on the distant shore. There are a few ribs of polished granite near the outlet and a confusing array of trails that go over the top and around the many inlets of the lake. There are only a couple of spots for tents and they are not easy to find. We finally settled on a sandy beach, which would probably be underwater if the level of the lake was only a couple of feet higher. It was, however, another great campsite.

We had a fairly lazy day the next day. It was warm, sunny and still, and we we're feeling fortunate to have had 5 days of such great weather. We headed out on the fisherman's around the far side of the lake. We discoverd a few more camping areas along the first section of the trail. We had intended to hike up to Lake Venus, but decided not to do it when we found the footpath leading up to the lake to be overgrown. Had it not been so hot and had we not been so exhausted form the day before, we probably would have attemped it. We spent some time enjoying the beautiful meadows along that part of the lake and returned to our campsite for a swim, a bath and sunbathing. Spade lake is a wonderful place, but takes a bit of effort to get to. Follow the advice in the 100 Hikes book and start out early in the morning.

Our last day we hiked all the way out to Salmon La Sac, about 14 miles. On the way down from Spade Lake, we decided to keep track of the number of downed trees we had to either climb over or crawl under. We only counted those trees that we're large enough for us to break our stride. There were 30 significant trees up to the junction of the PCT and another 10 on the short section from the PCT to Waptus Lake. Our tax dollars at work!