Icicle Creek, Frosty - Wildhorse Creek & Chain and Doelle Lakes — Monday, Sep. 28, 2015

Central Cascades > Leavenworth Area

I actually did two trips; the first was Sep 19-21 and the second as indicated. My thought was to do the loop from Black Pine Horse camp (Icicle Creek Trail in Leavenworth) up to the first trail junction just shy of Frosty Pass, west on the unmaintained trail to Doelle and Chain lakes, down the Chain lakes trail, and out the Icicle Creek trail. However, the most recent info I could find on the "unmaintained" section of trail from just west of Frosty to Doelle lakes was over two years old. This info included a good map from nwhikers.net-- but I had no idea about current conditions. I stopped in at the ranger station and they had no info. So, headed up Icicle Creek trail to the Chain Lakes trail instead. A front moved in about half a day earlier than expected so that when I got the Chain lakes, they were fogged in and it was quite wet. Stayed one night and back-tracked the 11 miles out. However I did encounter a trail runner who said the "unmaintained" trail was easily negotiable if you pay attention. Being a bit frustrated, I went back the next week. This time, hiked up to Packrat Basin, then to the first junction just below Frosty Pass. Sign says "horse camps" to the NW, so took that route and followed the trail to Doelle Lakes. Heading NW is not hard, the trail is in good shape the first mile (still maintained) but water is scarce this late. Beyond the maintained portion, the trail is not hard to follow but when you get NW of Point 6122 (use a USGS map for this) you descend into a small meadow-- marked with cairns- then regain the trail which continues on and crosses the ridge line just at point 5888. This little meadow area is key, on the return (unless you are looping) you MUST ascend a bit from the meadow to regain the proper path. If you follow the "obvious" (old) tread it descends, then you end up at a wash out, so go back and look again. anyhow, I got to Doelle lakes with no issue-- trail is brushy but not hard to find along the south side of the ridge, then easy to see across the large meadow that leads up to the lake basin. One tricky spot is to cross the outlet stream and continue up the lake(s) --the trail is good if you cross over the outlet. Otherwise you are brush bashing which is unneeded. With the good weather coming, there is probably one or two weeks tops to do this trail this season. Vine maples are in color. Warm days but nights frosty. Sections of the Icicle Creek trail past the junction with Frosty-Wildhorse were brushy but OK. lots of horse use on sections of this trail. (A large camp area at the junction of Icicle Creek trail and Leland Creel trail was useful. might be crowded in prime season as this is the location of horse ford. ) On the the second visit(doing the partial loop counter clockwise instead of clockwise) I was on trails 3 days and saw nobody at all. Late Sep, mid-week, an unmaintained trail--- . In a way I do not want to see a lot of people at those lakes, but I wrote this report because I think it is a good trip and maybe other people have avoided trying it- if you follow the "unmaintained "part NW, you should be fine if you have a good map and pay attention to where you are.