This one had been on my list for many years. Finally was able to do it and the weather was perfect throughout. A fantastic, magical, exhilarating trip!
Perspective: I'm 65 y.o. and my wife is 62. This was probably our most adventurous trip to date. For the last 8 years we've done anywhere from 4-7 backpacking trips/year -- usually 2 night/3 day trips.
Itinerary:
Day 1: Level beautiful lush 9+ mile hike to Olympus GS. Little elev. gain. Started 8:30a and got to camp by 12:30p. Camped on the gravel bar with nobody else within view. Crows were aggressive and kind of a pain at a site in the woods on the river so we went out into the river valley. Beautiful sight as the sun rose at the end of the valley where we would be heading the next days. Heavy dew soaked everything not covered.
Day 2: 5.8 miles and 1750 elev. gain to Martin Creek. Trail continued to be level and easy walking up river to the 12.4 mile campsite, when it starts gaining elevation.
Had a beautiful site tucked in the woods and nobody else stayed there that night. Started 9:30a and got to site about 1p. Nice day to chill before our trek to the glacier on Day 3. Slept to sounds of Martin Creek. Many folks on the trail had pretty strong feelings about how Elk Creek was too crowded, the lake was murky and not a good water source. We were very glad to have stayed at Martin Creek as it is very close to Elk Lake. No real diff as far as a jumping off place to reach the glacier, but very quiet and chill.
Day 3: Packed our backpacks for a day hike and left everything else in the tent. Started out at 8:30 and got all the way to an amazing viewpoint looking out over the lateral moraine. Epic hike!! The rope/ladder adventure down the wash is very doable. At the bottom of the wash you rejoin the trail by climbing right back up the side of the wash on the right. It's very well marked.
Chose the lateral moraine because we were at the split above Glacier Meadows by 10:30a. We went a fairly long way up the lateral moraine trail but split off the trail and headed up the ridge to the right for an amazing overlook of the entire glacier. Lunch at the viewpoint.
Headed back down to our Martin Creek camp and got there by about 2:30. Took a short break, packed up and headed down to Lewis Meadow by about 3:15p. Got to Lewis Meadow at 5:45p.
Total of 6.4 mi. r/t up to glacier and back to Martin Creek and 2590 of elev. gain. Then another 5 mi. down to Lewis Meadows, so 11.40 mi. total. This was a long day, but so worth it!!
Grabbed a river front site in Lewis Meadow which we preferred to the Olympus GS sites. There are a number of river front sites if you explore downstream from where the main trail leads in... Very pretty camps here.
Day 4: Took us 4.5 hours to get back to the TH from Lewis Meadows. GAIA pegged it at 11 miles. Total of about 37.5 miles total. Highly recommend this hike!
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