Lake Ann — Wednesday, Oct. 4, 2023

I did this hike five years ago. It was harder than I remembered mostly because of how rocky the trail is much of the way. The coarse rocks on the trail require watching your footing and work your ankle muscles.

We arrived at about 10:40am on a sunny Wednesday to a full parking lot and lots of cars parked down the road. We had to park at least half a mile below the parking lot and outhouse. It seemed that more folks headed to Lake Ingalls, but there were a good five groups we leapfrogged with going up and just as many coming down as we came up. We were still able to enjoy plenty of peace and quiet, though.

The trail description will get you there if you don’t miss the sign for Lake Ann looking at your feet like we did. We accidentally continued straight beyond the right hand turn and got to an alpine ridge line. We turned around, kept our eyes peeled for the sign, and found it nailed to a tree on the right bad sides of the trail as you climb up.

Make sure to look West as you get close to the ridge line above the lake to see Mt. Rainier frames by near peaks.

We didn’t hike all the way down to the lake because we’d had our fill of climbing once we got to the ridge. The few larches up on the ridge were at their peak, and I love looking down to the northeast and seeing the larches among the firs and pines below. The fall colors on the way up were equally beautiful.