East Fork Foss - Necklace Valley — Friday, Jul. 15, 2011

Central Cascades > Stevens Pass - West

After a week of hoping for sunny weather to melt the snow, reading trip reports, and scanning maps and books for routes that might be clear of snow, Gary S. and I finally picked three possible destinations near Skykomish off Highway 2. We stopped at the Skykomish Ranger Station and a helpful ranger there told us that all three hikes still had “solid snow” above 4000 feet or so. But, Jade Lake reportedly had one campsite that was melted out. So we headed for Jade Lake on the East Fork of the Foss. The trailhead had two other cars. We met both parties on the trail. One group was headed to the five-mile camp and the other was headed out and reported a lot of snow and blow downs on the way to Jade Lake. The first five miles were mainly flat with a few mosquitoes. After the river crossing at the five-mile camp, the trail gets steeper. We started seeing patches of snow at the Nesby Memorial Bridge at about mile six. There were also a few blow downs after that point. About a quarter mile from Jade Lake the trail became steeper and was covered with snow. Post-holing was a problem in some places. When we got to the lake, there was a camp site on a little island in the outlet stream that was clear of snow, dry, and unoccupied. The trail along the lake heading south was indeed snow-covered and the south half of the lake was frozen. We set up camp. The weather was cool and overcast. There were no bugs. At about 7:00 p.m. a solo hiker passed by, heading to Mt. Hinman. It rained off and on during the night. The next morning, we left our packs at the campsite and headed south to explore the other nearby lakes. The trail follows the east shore of Jade Lake and then crosses the inlet stream. Because everything was snow-covered and the stream was running high, it was difficult to find the crossing. But we found some rocks to jump across without getting too wet and continued to the old cabin on the way to Emerald Lake. The trail was hard to find, but fortunately the hiker from the night before left a nice set of tracks that seemed to more or less follow the trail after the inlet crossing. The cabin is in rough shape with a wet, muddy floor. We walked on to Opal Lake, which was also about half-frozen. Looking south down the valley, we enjoyed the views of some unnamed peaks and the ridge leading up to the La Bohn Lakes. We returned to camp around noon. It had been raining lightly all morning and now it started raining hard. We finished packing and started home. The two miles down to the lower valley were less strenuous than on the way up, but our pace was probably the same due to the slippery trail. Near the Nesby Bridge, we passed one group of four hikers going up, but saw no one else on the trail. We got back to the car around 5:00 p.m.