Goat Flats, Three Fingers

We completed a family climb to the Three Fingers lookout, with our four children between the ages of 7 and 14.

On the first afternoon we started our trip by backpacking to Goat Flats. Recent rains had turned the first half mile of the trail into a small streambed. While the trail improved after that, it remained quite wet and muddy in many places, and somewhat brushy. At least there were some good blueberry bushes! The trail is quite rugged -- lots of rocks and tree roots -- until Saddle Lake, then better (though still very wet and muddy in places) to Goat Flats.

The campsites at Goat Flats were snow free -- we were the only party camping there. The mosquitoes were very thick our first night there, though not aggressively biting.

The trail conditions above Goat Flats were much better than conditions below. On our way to the summit we saw two mountain goats and a number of marmots. Since we were climbing with our children, we roped up for the two steep snow sections -- the second snow slope in particular is still very steep and not passable in the moat until it melts out further -- an ice axe is a must. (We encountered a day hiker on this section who was hiking without an ice axe. He took a frightening slide, but was fortunately uninjured. On the way out he used our rope on this section.)

There is also still a good size snow patch very near the summit. Because of the exposure we roped up again for the final climb up the ladders to the summit. The summit ladders were all in good shape.

After descending from the summit, we spent a second night at Goat Flats, again the only party camping there. It was colder the second night -- which was great because it kept the mosquitoes away!

On our final morning we hiked back down from Goat Flats to the trailhead. There was not nearly as much water on the trail as there had been on the way in, so if the weather stays sunny it should dry out quite soon.