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Miners Ridge

Featured In: Day Hiking: Central Cascades, by Craig Romano.
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After the Tyee wildfire roared over Miners Ridge in 1994 (but spared its summit), the Forest Service abandoned this easy-to-hike, flower-studded, view-filled ridgeline hike. What a shame. The tread is still intact, the views and flowers
are still there, wildlife is prolific, and people are scarce. The only prob-lem-and it's a big one-is fighting your way around hundreds of downed trees before reaching the inviting meadows that drape the ridge.

Designation in 2008 as one of the Washington Trails Association's Top Ten Threatened Trails should help put the spotlight on this trail and hopefully "save" it, allowing hikers young and old, four-legged and two to once again enjoy this scenic route. Without the extensive blowdown covering the first 0.5 mile of this trail, Miners Ridge provides one of the easiest high-country rambles in the Entiat Mountains. And blowdowns or not, this is an excellent quieter alternative to the Mad River trails, especially when the motorcycles are revving.

Starting in what appears to be impenetrable windfall, locate tread and begin an arduous approach, crossing Miners Creek and then beginning short switchbacks up a shoulder littered with fallen timber. Stay tenacious. Think like a fisher or a pine marten, finding ways to clamber over, under, and around the woody mess. It gets better.

Leaving the shoulder, the trail turns southward, rounding a drainage and en-tering more open woods. Blowdowns diminish. Through small meadows, silver forest, and a countryside that looks remarkably like the Kettle River Range of northeast Washington's Columbia Highlands, gently crest the ridge.

Now on excellent tread through patches of green, saunter along the ridge, coming to a wide-open meadow just below a 5750-foot high point at 2 miles. Flowers! Views too! East to Tyee Ridge and the Waterville Plateau. South to Sugarloaf, Mission, Stuart, and Cashmere. West to the Chiwaukums and to Lake Wenatchee nestled beneath Nason Ridge. North to the snowy and craggy giants of Clark, Buck, and Glacier Peak.

Driving Directions:

From Leavenworth head north for 2.1 miles on the Chumstick Highway (formerly known as State Route 209), turning right onto County Road 112 (also known as Eagle Creek Road). Continue for 6 miles, turning left onto Forest Road 7520. After 5.8 miles, come to a four-way junction at a saddle near the French Creek Sno-Park. Turn left onto FR 52 and proceed for 8 miles, coming to the unsigned trailhead (elev. 4900 ft), marked by a post just south of a creek crossing. Park on the west side of the road. Alternatively, you can reach the trailhead by traveling 3.4 miles south on FR 52 from Maverick Saddle (see directions for Hike 96).

Recent Trip Reports

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There are 4 trip reports for this hike.

Railroad Creek, Lyman Lakes, Suiattle Pass, Miners Ridge — Oct 24, 2008 — jasonracey

Multi-night backpack

Features: Fall foliage

Issues: Snow on trail

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This was a 2-night, 3-day backpack up the Railroad Creek valley to Lyman Lake and back, with a day h...

This was a 2-night, 3-day backpack up the Railroad Creek valley to Lyman Lake and back, with a day hike to Miner's Ridge in the middle.

Snow started at the switchbacks up to Lyman Lake. The campsites at the lake are buried under 6 inches of powder. It was bitter cold at night. A good portion of the lake froze overnight, but the outlet remained open which is good as this is the only water source until the PCT junction between Suiattle Pass and Miner's Ridge.

I followed footsteps from Lyman Lake all the way to the junction to the Canyon Lake Trail on Miner's Ridge. These missed the spur that goes directly from Cloudy Pass to Suiattle Pass and instead dropped all the way to S. Fork Agnes Creek and then took the PCT up to Suiattle Pass. Not a big detour however.

The snow on Miner's Ridge was deeper, at least a foot or powder. I saw a lot of tracks on this trip but none were bear. They are gone for the winter.

On the way back the tracks took the spur directly from Suiattle Pass to Cloudy Pass. I followed these about halfway to Cloudy Pass when I encountered the person making them. She had stopped having lost the trail in snow. Luckily I'd been here a couple of months earlier so knew where to go and led us back to Cloudy Pass. Climbing through this rocky stretch in soft snow was very sketchy. I'm glad I had my ice axe just for balance.

The second night wasn't as cold because clouds moved in. I made it back to Holden in time for breakfast at 10 am. There I saw the hiker from the previous day. She had day hiked from Holden to Image Lake and back in one day - 36 miles RT!

It's about 5 hours from Holden to Lyman Lake. About 9 hours from Lyman Lake to Miner's Ridge and back. About 4.5 hours back to Holden - icy rocks were a pain on this leg. And the snow really slows you down.

http://www.flickr.com/jasonracey

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Spider Meadows #1511,Suiattle Pass #1279,Image Lake Hiker #785.1,Buck Creek #789,Buck Creek #781,Buck Creek #1513,Miners Ridge #1411,Suiattle Pass #1279 — Jul 23, 2007 — Troop 696 Mountain Guide

Day hike

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Four adults and 8 Varsity Scouts hike the Spider Gap to Buck Creek Pass loop from July 23 to July 27...

Four adults and 8 Varsity Scouts hike the Spider Gap to Buck Creek Pass loop from July 23 to July 27.

The going to Spider Meadow was a walk in the park. The meadow is very green and lush. We saw no sign of bears.

We continued over Spider Gap and down to Lyman Lake. It rained some at the top of the ridge. I'd recommend that you push through to Lyman campground if it starts to rain.

On day two we hike up to Image Lake. The trail over Cloudy Pass is in very good shape. At the PCT split we took the upper trail over the loose rocks. It might be faster to take the lower PCT connection back to Suiattle pass.

Out of Suiattle Pass we hike along Miners ridge and out to Image Lake. There were lots of bear signs. Make sure you are prepared to hang you food.

Day three we went out to the Fire Lookout then down the lower trail back to Suiattle Pass. The lower trail has several blow downs. The Suiattle Rive trail has even more according to others who had been through the area. We passed three trail crews working on the problems so it may be better by the end of August.

Crossing the creek on Miners Ridge was a little challenging but nothing that can't be done.

We ended day three at Buck Creek Pass. We also visited Flower Dome and Liberty Cap. Lots of bear signs at Buck Creek Pass and up on Flower Dome.

Day Four was an easy hike out. Trail crews have built a route around the sink hole that was reported earlier.

No major issues or problems. The normal bugs and an occassional blowdown but all in all a great hike. There was plenty of water along the way but no real problems crossing streams.

The wild flowers were best on the Liberty Cap trail. Flower Dome was only fair.

All in all a good four day hike.

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Miners Ridge #1411,Sugarloaf Mt. Lookout — Jun 29, 2005 — LeslieinOly

Day hike

Issues: Overgrown

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I am offering this report as a warning to other hapless hikers who might ask WNF staff to recommend...

I am offering this report as a warning to other hapless hikers who might ask WNF staff to recommend a hike in the vicinity of the Sugarloaf Mt. Lookout, on Entiat Ridge Road, a.k.a. Wenatchee NF Rd 56.

This active Lookout can be driven to by high clearance vehicles, as it is a short half mile from FR 56 on a steep rough road. When we visited the area in late June, FR 56 had some pretty deep ruts that required some careful manouevering of our low clearance vehicle.

Phone staff at the ranger station suggested that we follow our visit to the active lookout with a 6.5 mile loop hike on Miner's Ridge (Trail 1411), with a trailhead just a mile north of the lookout road. So we found an unsigned area at the right spot, and started up the trail. It has not, unfortunately been cleared in some time, and the trail is getting pretty obscure. We had hiked the 10.5 miles to Alpine Lookout the day before, so we aren't wimps, but bushwhacking wasn't in our plans for the day, so we returned to the car.

Since the map shows the trail meeting the road a few miles farther on, we drove to the other end, to see if it were in better shape. We could find no sign of a trail there, although we did find the adjacent creek and ""Miner's Corral.""

I now see that this trail is not included in Wenatchee National Forest's website listing. I guess I know why. LeslieinOly

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Upper Lyman Lake #1256.2,Miners Ridge #1411,Suiattle Pass #1279,Phelps Creek #1511,Spider Meadows #1511,Buck Creek #1513 — Aug 22, 2002 — tomj

Day hike

Issues: Blowdowns | Bugs

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My nephew Peter (the mid-western mountain goat) and I had three days to see some of the glories of ...

My nephew Peter (the mid-western mountain goat) and I had three days to see some of the glories of the Glacier Peak Wilderness.

Thursday, 8/22/02 we left the Phelps Creek trailhead a few minutes before 10. The trail up was easy, and free of logs. After a quick lunch, we hit the ascent up to Spider Gap, enjoying the great views of the meadows looking back south. Heading up the snowfield we saw signs that people had been sledding down on their air mattresses! Peter (mountain goat that he is) stopped at the top of the gap to walk to several promontories for more pictures and views

Coming over the gap, we came down the snowfield to the Upper Lyman Lakes -- the highest lake was pretty large for this late in the year, with several icebergs (calved from the glacier) floating prettily in the lake.

After picking our way along the edge of the upper lake for a while, we rejoined the trail and headed up then down to Lower Lyman Lake to set up camp just before sunset. Along the way, we could barely keep our eyes on the trail as Bonanza Peak kept catching our attention.

Unfortunately the trees sheltered us from the wind, which had been the only thing keeping the bugs off of us. After a quick meal we were fast asleep.

The next morning we set out for Cloudy Pass, meeting a Freshmen Trip from Whitman College. The weather was perfect, and we had great views of Lower Lyman Lake, Lyman Falls, Upper Lyman Lake, Lyman Glacier and the snowfield from the day before.

Crossing over Cloudy Pass we picked our way to Suiattle Pass. The short trail was clean and dry -- good as it's more appropriate for goats than backpackers.

Crossing over Suiattle Pass we got our first views of Glacier Peak that was to dominate the rest of our day. Wow.

We went down to miner's camp, up to Middle Ridge, down to Smart Creek and up to Buck Creek Pass. A long day with 3 noticeable uphill climbs, but worth it. The campsite at Buck Creek Pass was pretty full for a Friday night. The sunset was spectacular, and the views of Glacier Peak and the ridge to the south phenomenal. Several of these trails had blow-downs that hadn't yet been cleared. The bugs were substantial.

We picked the highest possible campsite at Buck Creek Pass -- it wasn't as buggy as the rest, but it turns out we were tenting just a few meters from a Pika's den.

Our last day we sadly said goodbye to Glacier Peak and walked down Buck Creek trail back to Trinity. Note: the Green Trails map indicates that it is 9.6 miles back -- our finely honed estimate indicates that there's another mile in there at the end. It took us about 5 hours to return -- a bit sore, but thrilled at a great trip.

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Location

Miners Ridge (#1411)

Central Cascades -- Entiat Mountains

Okanogan-Wenatchee National Forest, Wenatchee River Ranger District, Leavenworth

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