Methow Wildlife Area - Lewis Butte — Wednesday, Apr. 28, 2021

On a cloud day, a hike to the top of a local hill or butte in the Methow Valley, just over 3,300 ft, with a little over 1,000 ft of elevation gain, who would have guessed that I would have taken 61 photographs!

I was invited by my son and his wife to join them on a loop trail that goes from~2,340 ft to the summit of Lewis Butte (3,345 ft) and back. The trail was carefully designed for people on foot, on a mountain bike, or on a horse and/or with dog. The total distance is 5.3 miles with an elevation gain of 1,103 ft (the extra elevation comes in the way the trail was designed for mountain bike use—banked curves, level or slightly rising sections after descending sections. The trail is the result of a cooperative effort between Methow Trails and the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife. The trail is just outside of Winthrop on the Gunn Ranch Road (leave Winthrop, take the right on West Chewuch Road just before the ball field, turn left on the Rendezvous Road just before the Okanogan County Electric Cooperative facility, turn left on the Gunn Ranch Road and in about half mile, see the trail and trail sign on the right and an entrance to a WDF&W parking lot (Discovery Pass Required) on the left. There is a second parking area further along the Gunn Ranch Road, but you will miss the reason to take this trail.

Fields of spectacular flowers, mostly balsamroot arrowleaf and a blue lupine; however, there is serviceberry, three species from the Genus Lomatium including chocolate tip, trumpet lungwort or sage bluebells, ballhead waterleaf, a white or cream colored lupine, grasses, quaking aspen, bitterbrush (some with flowers), sagebrush, creeping Oregon-grape, ponderosa pine, and Douglas-fir. While we walked there was always the background songs of a variety of meadow birds. Enjoy the flowers, although the distant views of down the Methow Valley, Tiffany Mountain to the ENE, the Isabella Ridge, North and South Gardners to the NNE and to the east, Oval, Star, and Hoodoo were also excellent; they were overshadowed by this spring wonderland. All of these peaks were covered in winter-white, creating a nice contrast. Close-by there is Winthrop, Patterson Mountain, and Sun Mountain Lodge.