French Creek #1595,Klonaqua Lake #1563
Aug 22, 2007
- Type of Outing
- Day hike
- Read More in our Hiking Guide
- Hike: French Creek
- Region: South Cascades -- Lewis River Region
- Agency: USFS Mount St. Helens National Volcanic Monument
- Trails: French Creek (#1595)
- Avg Rating: 3.00
- Read More in our Hiking Guide
- Hike: Klonaqua Lakes
- Region: Central Cascades -- Leavenworth Area
- Trails: Klonaqua Lakes (#1563)
- Avg Rating: 3.00
- Be Aware Of
- Blowdowns
- Overgrown
Especially the last section of trail up to Lower Klonqua from French Creek has quite a few blowdowns, some of them quite big. There's also a couple sections where the brush is overgrown but since it was dry on the way in, that was fine. We actually had some light rain on way out a few days later so the full rain suit sure came in handy. The rest of the trail is in excellent condition.
My older version of ""100 Hikes"" for the ALW says that the lower lake was once dammed. Well, it still is. Once a year a helicopter from some Irrigation District lands on the helipad a the lake's outlet and 5 folks jump out, 4 of them to turn an ancient valve to drain the lake even further. We happened to be there just the once a year they happen to fly in. Bizarre. Apparently, before ALW existed, both the Klonaqua lakes were privately owned as reservoirs for orchards and is under some special leasing agreement with the government to maintain the dam and water usage there. Hence, the previous report's mentioning of the lake being ""damage goods"". Someone also apparently drilled a hole all the way under the lower lake to the upper lake to facilitate faster draining of the upper lake. It's hard to consider it wilderness in my book at that point but I'd hate to see what the place might look like had the ALW never come into existance. If I ever visit here again I might try to find out exactly where this helicopter comes from to time my trip apart from theirs.
Aside from the above, it's a lovely lake. The water level was quite down, maybe 10 feet or more. There's some nice fat fish to be found there, if you're willing to wait for them as they were a bit slow. After some poking around, we found a trail up along the SW side of the lake to Bob Lake. After some searching around, we finally found another trail that led up to the Upper K lake. It was windy and cold so we didn't stay long. Also there were finally more than a couple blueberries and huckleberries to be found near the upper lake. Of course we found those AFTER we'd eaten the blueberry-less pancakes! We hadn't seen many the entire trip and my guess is that the whole area over there has been too dry and hot. Many of the plants looked scorched. The dryness also helped with the bugs...there were a few skeeters but nothing to bark about. My headnet never left my pack.
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