What a difference a few months makes.  The river crossing that stumped us in the spring didn't even have water flowing.

This is a delightful hike.  I went about 8 miles round trip to a meadow up Indian creek and back. The trail is in excellent condition and I would guess it had work recently.  Really nice forest to walk through with some larger trees and views of the river.  The section I did was fairly flat and easy walking.  Parking lot is large and not a lot of people.

We did Glacier Peak circumnavigation as a 9-day hike with a few long days and a few shorter days Aug. 25-Sept. 2.

First, a debt of gratitude: Anyone who hiked this trail in July must have endured a whole lot of suffering. Respect and thanks to the early-season hikers who beat paths around 7ft tall logs (lying down) and through thick brush that obscured the trail and created trip hazards on sketchy cliffsides, and to the tireless trail crews who helped make Indian Creek passable. There were just a few sections, outlined below, that gave us pause.

Second, a gripe: the PCT is such an awesome trail. But with so many people burning the miles, there is A LOT of surface pooping going on. Be careful where you step in any of the campsites, or what rock you turn over. I get it: folks are pushing 30mi days and are probably too tired to poop at all, much less bury it. But we encountered a young man who’d traveled to WA for Section K, and fallen violently ill with norovirus or Giardia. He hadn't kept anything in or down in 2 days and was trying to bail off on the Suiattle River Trail. (We offered to walk him to Sulphur Creek CG, at a social distance, carrying his stuff, but he managed to keep water down overnight, said he could do it on his own and had SOS on his iphone, just in case.) Additionally, horse people use campsites below Boulder Pass, and you have to walk around A LOT of horse pee and poo. We weren’t sure our water filters would protect us. (That was our last night, so we’ll wait a couple days and hope for the best.) Please, people. Do better by your fellow hikers and this beautiful part of our state!!!

Otherwise, this trip was amazing!!! We’d been wanting to do it for years, and seemed to run into wildfire closures every August. So, this was the year!

Day 1 – White River TH to White Pass via Indian Creek. Thanks to trail crews who brushed the trail for the first several miles. If the last 4-5mi were any indication of how bad it had been, your work saved us tons of energy. Those miles were hard, but we never lost the trail, just a lot of pushing through. Once on the PCT, the miles to White Pass went quickly and we enjoyed a beautiful sunset in camp. (About 15mi and 3800ft)

Day 2 – White Pass to Glacier Creek. The hike to Red Pass was gorgeous, and we got to scramble Portal Peak (left side of Red Pass heading north). It was fun, ledgy and had great views. After that, we continued down to Glacier Meadows, a lush camping area, and then kept going down to the Whitechuck River, which is milk-white – I’d never seen anything like it – then farther, across the broken but sturdy bridge at Baekos Creek. There are some pretty riverside campsites at Baekos, but we pressed onward past Sitkum, which had a log and a rock hop and some sandy campsites on the other side. Then we crossed Kennedy Creek, which was harrowing. My partner is a field & stream guy, and we had some good beta from a young woman hiking the opposite direction, so we made it across and had a bath – thigh-high on 6’2” Nate and stomach-high on 5’3” me. We got a lot of gravel in our shoes while crossing. I recommend Crocs or something similar. My Xero sandals would not have offered enough stability, so I wore my trail runners and the cleanup was really something!. After that, we switchbacked up Kennedy Ridge and camped at Glacier Creek, a nothing camp spot, but next to water. (About 16mi/4000ft)

Day 3 – Glacier Creek to Mica Lake. This was one of the prettiest days on the trail, though thunder and lightning were forecast for the afternoon.We could see the big glaciers on Glacier Peak up close for a while. Fire Creek Pass is stupendous and has some great, but dry, camp spots. We continued down to the lake, where there are a few excellent campsites. We got in at 1pm, and the rain started at 2. But we still got to swim and explore after it passed. It also rained at night. (About 6mi/2600ft)

Day 4 – Mica Lake to Milk Creek. I think this was about 11mi, not sure of elevation gain and loss, but it was hard travel in drizzle with wet veg soaking our shoes and rain gear. About 1/2mi and a few hundred feet below Mica Lake is some good camping with a toilet. Continuing down are switchbacks and lots of blowdown to a brushy section on Milk Creek. Before and after the bridge, there’s brush and slippery, rocky trail with steep drop-offs until the switchback trail that goes up about 2000ft. The switchbacks are in decent shape and lead up to the area before Vista Ridge, where there are a couple good but dry campsites. Nate reached Milk Creek’s east fork before I did and was enchanted. I found him blissed out in a campsite, so we made it a shorter day and enjoyed the afternoon, including a bit of rain.

Day 5 – East Fork Milk Creek to PCT. A few hundred feet up from our camp was the turnoff to Grassy Point and iconic view of Glacier Peak. You can camp there, but it’s dry. A few hundred feet down is Dolly Creek, with some nothing campsites, but near water. We kept going down, down, down, and through the worst of the blowdown (think jungle gyms) to the Suiattle River through some wonderful old and second growth forest. We had planned for an 18mi day but stopped after 13 to camp on Miner’s Creek next to a big new bridge, after a significant blowdown that required gymnastics. This used to be the Suiattle River crossing before the old bridge blew out, and it was once a great campground, but tree fall decimated all but 2 campsites. We took one, in which a PCTer had left a sacred heart made of sticks (trail magic). The young man with stomach issues came later and took the other site.

Day 6 – PCT to Buck Creek trail, up to Buck Creek Pass. After ascertaining that our camp mate could hike on his own, we parted ways, he for Sulphur Creek (and hopefully urgent care and a hotel room), and Nate and I for Buck Creek Pass. A couple big blowdowns on the PCT and the Buck Creek trail, but with workarounds. Buck Creek Pass was empty because the TH is closed for the Pomas fire; we skirted the edge of the closure map and found an amazing campsite with a view of Glacier Peak. (Around 9.5mi and 4300ft up.)

Day 7 – A short day up to High Pass, then down to a turquoise tarn on the other side. (4.5mi, 2000ft.) The first boulder field before High Pass required route finding. Like the trip reporter from Aug. 17, we took the lower route and turned up to the left of a big boulder. The route across the second boulder field was obvious. The tarn was one of our favorite sites, though it was full of algae, so we didn’t swim, and we found water sources above it. We took turns napping, reading and rock scrambling the rest of the day.

Day 8 – High Pass tarn to Boulder Creek camp at 5200ft. This was another hard travel day! We’d heard about the slippery, steep, brushy slope down to the Napeequa, and we both landed on our butts twice, but it was nothing compared to the overgrown, hard-to-navigate, rocky, rooty 3.5mi on the Napeequa, across the river (again, thigh-high on Nate and stomach-high on me around 1pm) and up 1500ft toward Boulder Pass. Gazing on the Napeequa valley from above is magical, but I’ll be OK if I never visit that valley again. Once the trail busted out into the meadows below Boulder Pass (at 5700ft), my whole mood lightened. The switchbacks to Boulder Pass at 6300ft and down the other side were impressive. We thought we’d find water and camping 200ft below/beyond Boulder Pass, but we only saw one small, sloped campsite near a trickle of water, so we continued down to 5200 and the horse camp. Despite the manure, it was one of the prettiest campsites we stayed in. (12-ish miles, 2200ft?)

Day 9 – We got an early start and watched the sunrise hit Clark Mountain - magnificent! 9.2mi down the impressive switchbacks and out the White River trail to our car without incident. We celebrated with warm TH near-beer, hemp milk lattes at the Sasquatch hut near Goldbar and delicious Southern Indian food in Monroe, the first real food we’d had, unless you count the cups and cups of berries we ate on the trail (blueberries, red and purple huckleberries, salmonberries, salal and the last of the thimbleberries).

I'm beyond thrilled that we finally got this one done, and I highly recommend it to hardy hikers with backpacking, scrambling and fording experience and good cheer in tough conditions.

August 8 - Boulder Pass, Napeequa River, High Pass

10.5 miles and 4500' over Boulder Pass, down (bushwacking!) into the Napeequa valley and up the High Pass "trail" to a flat spot about a mile below High Pass.

More huckleberries on the way up, but not all were ripe when we went through. The climb up to Boulder Pass was dusty and the old trail is getting overgrown in places, so there's a high line that goes above some of the growth in the grove. Some trail work here to restore the trail to a single line, could be good. Great views from Boulder Pass across both valleys, with a peek-a-boo view of Fortress Mountain between Berge and the Chiwawa Ridge. About a mile below Boulder Pass there's a split in the trail, with the right trail going to a group of nice tent sites in a wide flat area of trees at about 5700'.

The lower part of the descent down from Boulder Pass, on the other hand, is a mess. About halfway down, the trail becomes completely overgrown with small evergreens, alder, brambles, blueberries and various other plants, plus numerous large fallen trees. That overgrowth thoroughly obscures the trail on and off for about 2 miles, making it hard to find the true switchbacks. This continues until you reach the Napeequa River, which itself is shrouded in thick slide alder.

Follow the most obvious gaps to the Napeequa crossing; there's a large sandbar to prep for the crossing. It was about knee high, but moving very fast, so we braced against each other and stepped carefully to get across. On the other side, there's another sandbar off to the left, but the trail is tricky to find through the alder from either direction on the north side; we met someone doing the Glacier Peak Circumnavigation who was trying to find the crossing.

Along the river is where the biting flies were the worst we encountered. I had a head net on, which helped a lot.

The Napeequa Valley is incredibly verdant with more shades of green than I could count, and many wildflowers blooming. We found the trail to be quite brushy in some sections, with some hidden pits to catch an ankle. It's clear that not many people come through here, given how the plants growing in the trail were only somewhat trampled. Quite a bit of bear scat, but we never saw a bear. There's room for a couple of tents at Lewis Creek Falls camp, right off the trail, though it may be buggy. Crossing Lewis Creek was fine (the falls are lovely) but the place where the trail intersects the creek is quite eroded and steep.

Climbing up from the Napeequa on the High Pass Trail is exceptionally steep, dusty, and overgrown. Here, the slide alder was useful as handholds. We learned later that there used to be a trail with real switchbacks a bit further north, but I suspect it would take quite a bit of excavating to find it. Once it flattens out into the meadow, the trail can be hard to find and crosses the creek a couple times at obvious spots. Stay a bit high and it should be easy to re-acquire. Plenty of marmot holes with their occupants letting each other know that we were coming. A nice song into the evening.

We found a flat spot on gravel about a mile below High Pass to pitch our small tent. The entire valley is a mishmash of small creeks, so there's no shortage of water. Great views back to Clark and Luahna and their great hanging glaciers (however much longer they may last!).

August 9 - High Pass scrambling: Cleator, Triad Lake

3 miles and about 2000 feet of scrambling and gazing longingly at the various peaks in the area.

We hiked up to High Pass just behind the one other person we saw all of Saturday and Sunday. From there, we decided to scramble up Mount Cleator for better views. Joke was on us (though we should have realized from the map): the easy class 3-4 scramble directly up from High Pass to Cleator is to the false summit. The true summit is 25 feet higher, and a few hundred feet to the north but scrambling directly to it would have gone over several terrible rubble piles. We could see the obvious trail up to the true summit, reached by continuing north on the High Pass/Liberty Cap trail, so we settled for the views we had, which were phenomenal.

We spent a couple hours on false Cleator identifying peaks and discussing trails in the other valleys (friend A. has hiked many of them). Glacier Peak was properly looming to the west, Fortress, Chiwawa, and Bonanaza were big to the north, and Maude, Seven-Fingered Jack, and Fernow made an imposing line east. The multiple summits of Buck looked incredibly steep from this side, with a cracked and crumbling glacier in the north shadow of Buck. The charred trees from past years fires along Buck Creek were stark: I'd bet the trail there is rough right now.

Instead of trying to scramble Cirque and/or Napeequa (we could imagine a possible route, but I'd read past years reports and there were still snow patches getting to cirque that would have been a challenge), we descended down to the ice-free Triad Lake via the mostly-snow-free boulder gully on the east side. There was no snowfield on the north side of High Pass: A. said when she was first here 30 years ago it was a massive snow field in September, and Triad was completely ice covered. More clear signs of climate change.

A. found what she thought was a viable slab scramble out on the southeast side of the lake, so we boulder-hopped to gain some dry class-4 low angle slab. I'm a strong rock climber (working on 5.12 outdoors this year), but I haven't done as much slab walking, so this was a useful lesson in humility for me! We didn't have to cross any snow to get up this way, which was good because the snow looked quite thin and the rock moats would have been trouble. This scramble put us in the saddle due-south of Triad Lake, so we wandered left back up towards High Pass and dropped down a scree field to get back to the trail.

Back at camp for dinner and a full moon night; we decided our campsite was so nice that we'd stay in it one more night and make a big push out the next day, instead of going down to Lewis Creek Falls Camp in the evening.

August 10 - Return to White River trailhead

19 miles and 3800' up, 7600' down to get back to the car!

Wonderful moonlight on the cliff walls and glaciers to the south, and the sunrise made for perfect breakfast entertainment. A.'s older guidebook said it was 2.5 miles and 2500' up from the Napeequa to Boulder Pass (it's really 3.8 and 2800'); this plus some other slightly optimistic distances in it had us thinking we'd only have 16 or so miles to go to get out. Ha! Nothing for it but to suit up and start hiking. Getting down the lower part of the High Pass trail went quickly, using alders as swinging branches, kicking up a lot of dust on the way. I wouldn't want to do it when the trail is very wet, though.

The trail getting out of Lewis Creek crumbled some underneath me as I was clambering up it; the large rocks were not embedded as well in the soil as it had seemed. It was good we knew roughly where the Napeequa crossing would be, because it was definitely harder to find coming from the north. Climbing up through the bushwack to Boulder Pass didn't feel as bad as coming down, possibly because we at least knew what to expect. A short lunch and rest at Boulder Pass, and then it was down to the car; the final trudge along the White River seemed to be several miles longer than it was on the way in. Something something relativity in action.

My longest single day with a pack, and the >7000' descent definitely left an impression on my knees! But it was worth it to have another night and morning with that view of the Richardson and Butterfly glaciers.

Hopefully we can get a work party in to at least clean the brush down from Boulder Pass: the campsites on the east side of Boulder Pass at 5700' would be a good staging area.

Spent a night at Boulder Pass, hiking in and out from the White River side.

Road Conditions. The start of the unpaved section was a bit soft/sandy, could be an issue for cars without AWD after heavy rain. The last mile past the White River campground was sprinkled with pointy rocks, but should be fine for most vehicles, with some care. 

Trail Conditions. No major obstacles. Gentle grade and mostly nice tread, but a bit dusty in dry areas. The lower part of the trail was more or less brushed out. The open areas below the basin had a few sections of waist-high brush remaining, and the trail climbing up to the pass had sections of knee-high brush, but was still easy to follow. The lower crossing of Boulder Creek had a sturdy log, and the upper crossing could be hopped across. Plenty running water along the trail, including just below the pass. 

Highlights. Wildflowers were mostly past prime. Lots of ripe thimbleberries along the lower part of the trail. Blueberries started at 4,000ft, still a bit early, but plenty were already ripe. Marmots were whistling and pikas squeaking. Saw a mountain goat at the pass, and scared up several grouse hens with chicks.

Bug Status. Just a few mosquitoes at dusk and at dawn.

Crowds. A dozen or so cars at the trailhead early Saturday morning, plenty of space. Encountered one trail crew (clearing out brush along the White River), two parties of hunters (bear season?), two parties on horseback (heading to Boulder Basin), and three parties of climbers (heading up Clark Mountain).

I wanted to revisit the White River trail after my visit last year.  The approach FS road is in very good condition.   I drove up to 25 mph coming into the trailhead.  The last couple miles (4total) are very narrow with many blind corners.   Like many of the roads, the biggest danger is the car coming in the other direction in the middle of the road.    There were about 10 cars here this morning for the three trails served by this single trailhead.  No modern facilities, just a box privy about 50 yards from the trailhead (backtracking the FS road).   

The good news for hikers and stock is that the FS and WTA have cleared the first four miles to the Boulder Pass Trail intersection of all obstructions.   There are still sections of medium heavy brush that extends into the tread but nothing to hinder your path forward.   This is why I always wear long pants while hiking.   

I do Not recommend stock past the 4-mile point on the White River Trail.   The maintenance crews have not removed fallen trees across the trail.  I went about 1.5 miles further and had numerous 24” plus down logs to step over.   This next section was the focus of brushing by a WTA work crew this past week.   They opened up another mile of trail.   The bad news is that this open area has long sections of very heavy brush ( you can Not see your feet).   Hopefully the FS will continue to send crews to reopen this corridor.    

I did find the WTA crew brushing away in the late morning.   I dropped off some treats and then headed back.   I passed two backpacking groups headed up the Boulder Pass Trail.   

One safety reminder.   Hunting season starts on August 1st for bear in the high country.   The bears are nearby based on the scat along the trails.  Enjoy.