Lake Dorothy - Lake Bear - Lake Deer — Friday, May. 21, 1999

Central Cascades > Stevens Pass - West

Had a nice hike yesterday. The road is relatively snow free until about 1.5 miles from the trailhead. The snow on the road should be gone in a week or so. About a mile from the trailhead a very large tree (~3 ft diameter) is down across the road and you'll have to walk from that point. The trail was patchy snow until you come to a small footbridge (about 20-30 minutes in). Past that point it was pretty much solid deep snow. Most people (including us) turned around at that point. A half dozen or so people went on to the lake and reported that it took them about an hour and a half of snow hiking and route finding to get to the lake. They said that the lake was still frozen over except for a small area near the outlet. The weather and the hike itself were quite lovely. The rivers and creeks are full of whitewater, but it didn't hinder hiking. We saw the smallest black bear I have ever seen right near the trailhead parking lot. It was about the size of a small dog and couldn't have weighed more than 40 pounds. We never saw its mother, but both of us and the cub headed in opposite directions pretty quickly.