Two of us enjoyed a free Friday and took our dog up the Tunnel Creek Trailhead to Hope and Trap Lakes. We missed the turnout eastbound on US-2 and turned around at Stevens Pass (good place to grab a restroom break as there isn't one at the TH; also a good spot AFTER the hike if you're heading west as you can only go east coming out of the Tunnel Creek road) heading west. As soon as we passed the double yellows we pulled a U-turn and found the right turnoff.
The approach gravel road is a narrow single lane for most of it, and the most rutted I've been on this summer; take it slow and use an AWD/4WD with high clearance if available. We passed one woman coming down who (we later learned) dropped off four backpackers; she was gracious enough to back up to a bit of a turnout for us to be able to continue. Beware, it's overgrown and narrow in spots.
Apart from that, at the TH itself we spotted 3 cars including what looked like a trail maintenance car. I checked the posted dog laws and was pleasantly surprised to learn that our dog WAS PERMITTED to be off leash on the segment we were traveling. Bonus! We kept him under voice control and between the two of us the whole time, pretty easy to do since the trail is fairly narrow and hard to get past hikers walking in the middle of the trail.
At about .3 miles in, 6-8 youngsters from the Washington Conservation Corps were doing some much-appreciated trail work.
The trail is unrelentingly steep for the first 1.5 miles leading to the PCT junction at Hope Lake. We even had to help our dog up a steep mass of tree roots on the way back to the cars.
Most of the waterways are dry but a few allowed us to soak bandanas to help with cooling off. The approach and PCT are wonderfully shaded for at least 75% of the trail we were on, with a lovely breeze.
At Hope Lake we encountered 4 backpackers who had started a little before us at the same trailhead. We played leapfrog with them until we descended to Trap Lake and they climbed above it.
Trap Lake had fish jumping everywhere. We waded for at least 20 minutes -- our dog even went in up to his belly to cool off. It was the best sand beach I've seen this summer (and I've been to a lot of alpine lakes!) I didn't even need my wading shoes. While we were there, we heard several picas (even spotted two marmots on our hike) and 15 bird species, and the backpackers sent out echo yells as they passed above us.
On the day we encountered maybe 2 dozen people, not including the trail crew, split pretty evenly going north and south: one pair with fishing rods headed for Trap Lake, most with heavy packs for a multi-day backpack, and four trail runners.
The huckleberries and blueberries are ripe (and very yummy!) On the day, we covered 10 miles, 3000' elevation gain/loss in 4:45 moving time for a 2.1 mph average pace. Clouds in the morning made for a nice ascent, and the light breeze made the sunny afternoon not too hot. Lovely trail, if challenging in spots. Glad to see a new area with some stunning mountain scenery! And driving west at 5 p.m. on a Friday, the traffic was heaviest eastbound (rush hour) which was a nice change (US2 can get pretty backed up at times.)
Comments