Peggy's Pond — Friday, Aug. 30, 2019

We knew the tucquala meadows trailhead would be crazy Labor Day weekend, so we chose to head out there Friday night and were able to camp just across the first bridge on the cathedral pass trail. The next morning we headed for Peggy’s Pond from there. My pup was stung by a hornet about a mile in, before arrival at squaw lake. My boyfriend and I were stung at the same area on the way down, so be prepare for wasp activity. The hike to Peggy’s was a lot more challenging than I had anticipated. Sections of the trail were so thin and involved climbing skills, and I had never attempted this level of technicality with an overnight pack even though I consider myself to be pretty experienced. The lake itself was beautiful, we stayed up high above it on night one and were thankful to have the privacy that many of the lakeside campsites did not. Night two we wandered past the lake and were amazed at how beautiful the meadow and Hyas creek were so we moved our camp and were rewarded with a river bank and pool deep enough for swimming all to ourselves. A ranger was very present throughout the weekend, and anyone who had a fire or was camped on grass got a citation.