Ancient Lakes — Saturday, May. 25, 2024

group of 4 - we started at lower trail head and backpacked into a camp spot between the lakes. We counted at least 30 tents on Saturday night and about 20 on Sunday night. Lots of campers but everyone was polite and it was nice to get away from the rain on the west side of the mountains and enjoy time with friends.

we brought water for ourselves and our dog and then did a restock on Sunday with a hike down to the Columbia River. we encountered 1 small rattlesnake near the path on the way to the River and carefully walked around it both ways.

A group of campers down at the river stated they had seen several rattlesnakes down near the river so we reversed course and went back up to camp after refilling our water (with filter). other notes talked about not drinking the polluted run off water from the lakes so we avoided as well for ourselves and our dog.