Surprise and Glacier Lakes, Trap Lake, Trap Pass, Tunnel Creek & Hope and Mig Lakes — Thursday, Oct. 2, 2025

Today I did a through hike from the Tunnel creek TH to the Surprise Creek TH with The Mountaineers.
We parked cars at both trailheads and started hiking at 8:45 am from the Tunnel Creek TH. I have done this section 2 months ago when I did go to the Thunder Mountain Lakes.
The first part to the PCT is steep, 1.7 miles and then the trail intersects PCT and Hope Lake. There were a lot of ribbons hanging there in that trail which indicates there might be a trail-work in future.

After reaching the Hope lake, we took PCT south and kept going to the Trap Pass, this section has some great fall colors. and Berries everywhere..we had so much blue and Huckleberries.
At the trap Pass, the trail goes down through many switchbacks to the Surprise Lake.
however, there was a junction where the PCT south trail goes to the left and that'll take you to the Glacier lake. We opted to go right to hit the Surprise lake first and then Glacier Lake.
Going down in those switchbacks was fun. but not so many berries this side of the mountain.

Surprise is a beautiful lake, I've never done this Hike before.
After surprise we climbed another 200 feet to Glacier Lake.
Glacier lake is prettier than Surprise.
We had our final snacks break there and headed straight to the Surprise creek TH. it's around 5 miles to the TH from the Glacier lake. This part was uninteresting, muddy and slippery navigating through the roots and rocks. There are tons of various kinds of mushrooms and fungus in this area.

We only saw 3 blowdowns in the entire trail, all in the surprise creek trail.

We had a fantastic time out in nature today, It was a little bit chilly the entire time, with no sun and a cold breeze made this hike very much fun.

Total 14.48 miles with 3424 feet of elevation gain. 8 hours 37 minutes total.