Lena Lake, The Brothers — Friday, Aug. 15, 2008

Olympic Peninsula > Hood Canal

We hadn't done any climbing in the Olympics, so thought we'd do an overnight and summit the peak that always tempts us on the horizon... The Brothers. We unfortunately chose one of the hottest weekends to to this. We headed up early on Friday across to Kingston and over to the Lena Lake TH. The parking lot wasn't full [yet] with all of the many families and campers we saw Saturday. We hiked about 7 miles around Lena Lake and then up to the end of the formal trail at the Y in the river. The bugs were somewhat bothersome, but left us alone after sundown. We awakened early and followed a well-marked trail up to the burn of 2006. Contrary to what we thought, the trail was easily followed all the way to the summit. There truly was some degee of ""trail"" all the way up. We brought our ice axes, but they probably won't be needed any longer. There was only one sketchy snow bridge which will be surely melted next week. I would highly suggest wearing a helmet, as there is so much loose scree the entire way, and this tumbles on down the couloir and could hit unsuspecting hikers below. We could not believe some of the people hiking with no helmet, too little water (less than a liter), and tennis shoes??!!! The summit was a fly-fest, so we only stayed a short time, but long enough to take in the breathtaking views. We then started the hot descent. It had heated up to a toasty 89-90 degrees, even up at 6000+ feet. The way down is where one can easily lose the trail, but after a short bushwhack through the fire burn, we found the trail again. We packed up camp and headed out the long, hot 7 miles to the car. By the time we rounded the lake, it was packed with tents. I'm not sure there was room for everyone?! We hit the road and treated ourselves up at the Sol Duc Hot Springs for the night. Blissful!