Stetattle Creek — Wednesday, Jun. 26, 2013

North Cascades > North Cascades Highway - Hwy 20

As helpful hints to others. It's a wonderfully adventurous walk. Watch the slippery rocks in the gorge at the washout area. My companion took an unexpected bath. From the "end of maintained trail" sign after about 3 miles go a few feet up hill and turn left through the old blowdown to pick up the trail in a few yards. About a mile past the EOMT sign you will come to a creek below a small waterfall. The trail is pretty good to here. Descend the bank straight down to the stream and cross exactly there. Do not go downstream to cross as you will flounder around in very rough steep country on the opposite bank. After crossing the stream go under a large log and turn up the bank a few feet and you will be back on the old trail which leads gently up to the top of the bank. Warning - You shouldn't proceed further unless you are comfortable with route finding in brushy country. You can be standing in the "trail" and not see it. From the above crossing, the trail rapidly becomes a very faint route and is difficult to find in places. It is helpful look for the occasional chainsawed log from long ago and the route generally stays pretty much level. In a half mile (which took us an hour!) you come to an open forest area surrounded by brush and large fallen logs. From here you are on your own. There were bits of old flagging but none seemed to lead anywhere except to thick brush. We had lunch with the mosquitoes and turned around at this point.