Westside weather concerns forced us east of Lake Chelan. 45 miles and 2 hours N of Chelan on road 82 we reached Summer Blossom trailhead. This little used trail begins in forest but soon its all views. We camped night 1 at east fork Prince Creek, very green with great sunsets. Day 2 we hiked up Angel Staircase to over 8000'. From there the trail contours the shoulder overlooking Cooney Lake. We then dropped to Merchants Basin and on to Sunrise Lake where we spent night 2. Day 3 we took a shortcut over the pass S of the lake to rejoin the Summer Blossom trail saving 5 miles back to the car. Total trip about 20 miles and 4000'.

Plan A involved climbing St. Helens. After everyone bailed, we decided to go for something more weather-friendly, and settled on Lake Mary, in Icicle Canyon. When the weather there started acting sketchy, we opted out of that plan and looked high and low for drier weather. Finally around noon on Friday, we packed the car and headed for the Methow, with Foggy Dew Falls and beyond as the objective. Many, many, many hours later, we arrived in the Gold Creek drainage and opted for a nice campfire and some car camping and beers, with a pact to get a reasonably early start on our hike. The car camping, especially the primitive variety, is of excellent quality along FS road 4340.

I heard R get up and start the coffee, and promised myself I’d just sleep for a few more minutes. An hour later, at 10:30, I finally crawled out of bed. Note to self: Day job making me too tired, must quit job and devote self full-time to leisure activities. We reached the trailhead at the crack of noon to find just three vehicles, including a Forest Service truck. We encountered a smattering of people on the way in, and one mother grouse doing her best to act injured so we wouldn’t disturb her nest. We were so impressed with her display that we opted to not eat her offspring.

Shortly after we started up the trail, a cascading falls appeared on our left. We had a slurp of water and admired our speedy pace, as the guide indicates Foggy Dew Falls to be 2 ½ miles in. Sometime later we saw a sign next to another tumble of water indicating it to be Foggy Dew Falls. Guess we weren’t so speedy after all!

We expected to see a ton of dirt bikes and mounatin bikes, but didn’t see a one until the Merchants Basin/Cooney Lake intersection at five miles from the car. Here we met a lone Forest Service ranger on a dirt bike. He was toting a chainsaw and had done a boatload of trail maintenance in the area that day. We never once had to step over any deadfall, thanks to his effort. After bidding him farewell, we proceeded to make the steep climb to Merchant’s Basin. It was a pleasant walk with great views down the valley, but in summer it would be a blisteringly hot misery-fest. A long mile later, Merchant’s Basin unfolded before us. Hoary Marmots loped about and whistled to one another, and wildflowers abounded. There was a lot of horse manure at the larger camps, and one privy destroyed by the winter’s snow. We crossed the middle fork of Foggy Dew Creek and found a reasonably dry camp. There’s a fair bit of snow up there, but it is going fast and we were entirely on dry ground. It was a nice treat to be camped at 7000 feet so early in the season.

Note: If the Basin is too windy, there are nice camps just below, near the boulder field, and amid some gigantic larch trees.

We had a nice small fire (wow! it’s allowed here!) and some dinner and whiskey, and enjoyed the longest day of the year until it became too chilly to sit around any more. We snuggled in to our tiny tent for some shut-eye, with the full intention of getting up and hiking over to Sunshine Lake in the morning. At 9:40 it was warm enough to move around without too much shivering, so the plan to visit the lake went out the window, so to speak. After much coffee, we bombed down the trail. We made it back to the car in two and a half hours, and then fantasized about the great grub at the Winthrop Brewery until at last we reached that objective in mid-afternoon.

The Foggy Dew Trail is not to be missed. It’s in great condition, with nice views and waterfalls, and tons of wildlife and flowers. Warnings of hordes of motorcycles should be ignored, at least early in the summer.

We had planned to do Horseshoe Basin, Tungsten Mine, etc., but it was sleeting at the trailhead – neither one of us were prepared for a wet, cold trip, so we decided to think about switching trip locations. The problem was, we didn’t have maps for anywhere else. Imagine an engineer spontaneously switching backpacking locations on the fly. Oh, ho! Now imagine MtnMike as that engineer. Ah! A double-whammy!

After some galumphing and harrumphing, we decided upon Sunrise Lake and the peaks Navarre via the Foggy Dew trail out of Carlton, on Hwy. 153 South of Twisp. (we obtained some maps from friends of Mikes when we re-grouped in Winthrop).

Though the Foggy Dew trail is a motorbike trail, we never encountered any. The trail is in excellent condition, yet dusty as hell. Several inches of dry, sandy dirt fluff around your legs with every step. It’s not too annoying unless you are a contact-wearer. The trail winds through beautiful forest along Foggy Dew Creek, which sometimes rushes through rocky deep canyons, sometimes tumbles across large boulders. Foggy Dew Falls is very beautiful, plunging into a pretty gorge below.

At 5 miles is the Cooney Lake junction. We opted to hike the 2 miles to Sunrise Lake because it is a “hiker only” destination, whereas Cooney is subject to motorized visitors.

At one mile beyond the junction is beautiful Merchants’ Basin. There are a couple of horsecamps here, and a creek running through the meadow. Cross the creek, and the trail winds up through a canopy of colorful, golden larches and to pretty Sunrise Lake, where there are about 3 campsites. The larch color was just about at its height here – beautiful against the emerald green of the lake.

Saturday, we found the old, easy-to-follow unmaintained trail around the lake and up the saddle where we scrambled pk. 8002. From here are spectacular views of Silver Star Peak, Martin Peak, all the peaks around Lake Chelan, Mt. Baker, Glacier Peak, Mt. Rainier.

We continued on the old trail down, down, down to Horsethief Basin, and skirted the edge of the remains of the Rex Cr fire and up to a saddle leading to N. Navarre Peak.

The trail to N Navarre is a well-kept trail, and boasts some nice rock walls. From the summit you can look smack-dab into the heart of the Railroad Creek drainage, see the mine there, and all the mountains surrounding the area – you know: the usual suspects. The summit register there has an entry in it from 1964!

Note: On our way out, we noticed a “Trail Closed Due to Fire Damage” sign on the N Navarre trail. It was on the ground. I swear we didn’t see it before heading up. At any rate, the trail skirts the very edge of about 30 charred trees and doesn't pose a hazard. It's not clear whether the trail is indeed closed: the map at the trailhead of 'closed' and 'open' areas is very faded and hard to read.

I am pleased to announce that Mike came out of the impromptu ordeal very well, despite the fact that he's an engineer, he's Mike, and he didn’t have the exact map he wanted. I never even wanted to kill him, not even once; even though I heard the word, “map” 8,015 times in 3 days (I counted).

Sunrise is a wonderful lake, and the trail leading from the lake to the Navarres is very pretty. Check out these nifty photos.

http://www.mtnmike.com/WTA/sunrise_lk.jpg http://www.mtnmike.com/WTA/to_sunrise_lk.jpg