We spent 5 days on these trails, with two nights camped at the East Fork Foss River crossing, and the two middle nights camped at Jade Lake. From Jade, we day-hiked to Tank Lakes (more later) and Al and Locket Lakes (more later).

The trail is as described elsewhere - easy going until the river crossing, and then a grind up to the valley. If you look closely, you'll see remnants of the logging railroad along whose bed the first part of the trail lies. Some specifics from this hike that might be helpful:

During our week there, a USFS crew was hard at work clearing out some of the brushy sections and removing all the trees that had fallen across the trail, so it is clear all the way up to Jade. Yeah for USFS workers, and yeah to see our taxes doing good work!

Be sure to pack plenty of water when heading up from the river crossing. It's a long, hot climb up to Necklace Valley, and the river, while always in earshot, is usually too far away to gain access to refill those water bottles.

Mosquitoes. They were beyond horrible all throughout the valley, from morning until well after dusk. We used bug spray and mesh netting and still they were miserable. Be prepared. They were awful.

The hike to Tank Lakes was also a grind, and completely exposed to the sun. Upon reaching the south end of Necklace Valley take a hard right and follow the talus slope up. and up. and up, staying in the gully until rounding the razor edge of the peaks to your left.  The last 1/3 of the route was under snow, and the lake was still mostly frozen over, with just the southern shore opening up. But the view was beyond breathtaking, and highly worth it. Kudos to the US Navy for buzzing us with their E/A-18s while we were refilling water bottles at the lake. 

The hike into Al and Locket Lake was difficult only for the brushy overgrowth and the ever-present mosquitos. The trail to Al was clear enough, but we had to do some cross-country route finding to reach Locket, which was as pretty as the rest of the lakes in the area. I wish we'd had time for a swim, as the water was crystal clear.

Those who wish to make the trek up to Tank, or to Locket, should have some skill in map-reading and cross-country trecking, and a good sense of direction since the trail isn't always clear.

There were a few ripe blueberries on the hike out today, and there should be a lot more in a few more weeks.

If you want a brutal but rewarding snowshoe outing, try hitting the Tank Lakes plateau in Feb! I've been up in early April before, which is still quite a struggle from mid-way to Jade Lake and above, but after coming across a trip report from Steph Abegg she did in late Feb I decided to try for it mid-winter, for more pristine snow and heavy-coated peaks. The East Foss Lakes TH is generally inaccessible by car in mid-winter, but you can park about 1.5 mi from it at the end of the maintained (plowed) county road (right after going under the train trestle), and hike/snowshoe to the TH. The first 5 miles along the river were decent on the way in, several parties of the past week had laid down a bit of a trail to follow. You can basically choose your own path in winter, just heading up the valley, but on the mid-section between the bridge (river crossing marking the end of the flat first 5 mi) to Jade Lake, you'll want to stick to the summer route as much as possible to avoid steep ravines, creeks, and cliffs. Every snow outing is different of course, and pretty much 100% dependent on the weather and snow condition. I had 4-6" of soft pow on the way in, atop an older base that would hold my 240lb load (w/ pack) on 35" snowshoes (MSR Lighting Ascents, 30" w/ tails) with an acceptable amount of post-holing. The last two days however, it decided to DUMP. Forecast was for showers and misc breaks, but instead it dropped about 16+" in 24 hrs. My inbound tracks were completely gone, and it became a painstakingly slow and painful effort heading outbound, even downhill. Despite the storm, it was still a beautiful trip. Complete solitude, crazy ice formations, occasional phantom sun outlines poking through the snowfall. The worst part was that despite my 3 night camp up above Tank Lakes, not once did Summit Chief, Chimney Rock, and Overcoat come out to play or be photographed (the main reason to get up there). I think Tank would make a pretty awesome ski touring trip. It's a long 10 mi, but making turns on all that powder up there would be phenomenal! Maybe next year. Love any beta if anyone has done this before. Notes: - Go prepared. I wouldn't try the upper valley unless you've done it before in summer or are rather familiar (or going with someone who is). - I had overnight temps around 0 before wind chill, I slept in a North Face Inferno 0, with heavy base layer, puffy, insulated pants and heavy socks, heated Nalgene bottle, and still got kinda cold by late morning. - My 35" snowshoes were not enough to keep me afloat from Jade Lake and above, or any exposed open slopes or meadows below. - My in/out times were about 9 moving hrs up/6 moving hrs down. If the snowpack firms up I'm sure you can shave an hour or two off that.

The first 5 miles are very easy with minimal elevation gain, and the log bridge across the East Fork Foss River makes for a good spot to take a load off for both dayhikers and backpackers. If you don't enjoy elevation gain then turn back here, because the next three miles are brutal if you aren't used to it. You gain about 600 feet over the first five miles, and then in the following 3 miles you gain about 2400 very inconsistent feet to Jade Lake. The sign at the trailhead says 7 miles to Jade Lake, which is not true in the least, I've done this hike twice now, and both times there has been at least 2 Suunto GPS watches in my group (mine both times and another on each trip, 3 total). All 3 watches have indicated that the trail is actually about 8 miles to Jade Lake. Jade Lake is gorgeous and appears to be a decent spot to swim in, however, there is only one truly established campsite on the southeast corner of the lake, so you'll want to get there early if you want that spot. There is one other small spot suitable for a smaller tent on an "island" between the inflow of the lake, but this is directly on the trail so expect some foot traffic if you camp here. Emerald Lake is more or less a large swamp. It is very shallow but there are a few more spots to camp along it, most notably a rocky ledge overlooking the lake on the center of the west side, and there appears to be room to camp by the broken down cabin as well. Opal Lake is most comparable to a large canal system. There are lots of streams carving through a marshy grassland, and it makes for a pretty cool photo op but other than that there isn't much to see at Opal. We saw several groups around the valley, most of whom had gone on to one of the extended trips, La Bohn Lakes or Tank Lakes. Tank Lakes was our destination, and after the crash course with route-finding/scrambling/bushwhacking that I experienced on my last trip up to them I wanted to find a true trail up to them. After Opal Lake just follow the trail and the cairns. It should start getting rockier and more overgrown, but still easy to follow. Keep going until you come to a stream that begins to slant uphill to the right marked by several cairns, this is the path that leads to Tank Lakes. The path leads you up the stream into a gully. Keep your eyes peeled for cairns on the right side of the gully because the most obvious route up branches off right here and follows those cairns. It is very exposed in this part of the valley so definitely bring sunscreen. There is no defined trail to speak of, so you'll basically be relying on cairns the whole way up, but if you lose the cairns then just head west or southwest the best you can through the granite scree fields. Once you get to Tank Lakes you are greeted by views of Chimney Rock and Summit Chief Mountain. There are several camping locations around the lakes so find one that suits your needs. The bugs here are horrendous without bug spray, even at night. Our tent had about 30 mosquitoes on it at any given time, so bring bug spray, don't forget it like I did. The total distance to Tank Lakes is about 11 miles and a total elevation gain of 4200 feet, and definitely worth the miles, although the 5 mile stretch at the start feels like it never ends.

We got a late start and didn't get to the trail head until 2pm on Saturday. We had originally planned on camping at the Tank lakes but our new plan was to get as far as we could before it got dark. We booked it down the East Fork of the Foss trail over dozens of blowdowns and then headed up to Jade lake. There were quite a few people camping by the Foss river but there were still some open campsites. We passed those up and continued on. Consistent snow started about 1000ft below Jade lake. We didn’t use any traction but the snow was very rotten in places and we had to watch our step. We got to Jade lake around 7pm then went as fast as we could over to Emerald lake over a snow bridge that looked like it might not last much longer to set up camp there. There is only 1 nice campsite at Jade (that was actually dry!) but it was taken. We still got an awesome spot all to ourselves at Emerald lake. We didn’t see anyone else go beyond Jade lake our entire trip. The next morning the snow was hard so we used microspikes on our way up to the Tank Lakes and eventually switched to snowshoes as it warmed up. We had a GPS to stay on track and the rolling snow fields made for much easier travel then the bushwhack and boulder fields in the summer. We crossed a few sketchy snow bridges but didn’t have any problem getting to the Tank lakes.

The Tank Lakes basin feels like it's perched on the edge of the world. The route to reach it via the Necklace Valley probably represents my hardest-earned miles of Hike-a-Thon. What a unique time to visit this special place. The valley is normally dripping with water everywhere in waterfalls, lakes, streams, meadows and the beautiful East Fork Foss River. By the look of it, the trail itself carries more than its share of water much of the time. It's striking to see so much cracked soil where small lakes and ponds would normally be. And it makes all the water you do see that much more precious. (There was adequate water along the way for filtering purposes though you will likely need to draw from one of the lakes since most of the upper streams have dried up). We could smell smoke faintly on the first day and the surrounding peaks were in a haze due to the smoke. We woke up to much clearer skies after a windy night; the air quality got worse again as we headed down valley back to the trailhead. We were one of six small groups camped in the Tank Lakes area that night. Maybe more than you might expect (or desire) at the end of the world. There seemed to be room for all of us but it did take some searching to find a level, hardened campsite away from the lakeshore. Most groups were traveling out and back via the Necklace Valley; one group from Portland was on the final night of what must have been a spectacular thru-hike starting from the Salmon la Sac area across the Cascade Crest. Just after dark we were surprised to see a head lamp or lantern high up on a saddle on nearby Iron Cap Mountain. In the morning we pulled out binoculars and thought we could see a tent on the rocks. Getting up to Tank Lakes and back is a tough but beautiful slog with many sights along the way. The final section is off trail and requires basic route finding skills; cairns mark much of the way (and cairns mark multiple potential routes). On the way down, we stopped along the river for a much needed rest. I could see how a day hike - or overnight - just to the river and back would make for a wonderful trip in its own right someday.