Departed mid morning from Rainy Pass TH for Cutthroat Pass. Cloudy day made for cool hike to Pass. Parking lot had about a dozen cars in it and we saw numerous groups coming and going from Pass. Some day hikers but most groups passing through probably to Snow Lakes & Golden Horn. We staked out our 3 pack llamas and made camp near the Pass. No other campers near or even below Pass that we saw. Windy afternoon and evening, quite cool. Things finally settled down as sun set and we were treated to calm clear night. Early next morning started out calm and comfortable too but changed quickly as cloud ceiling dropped instantly on top of us and by the time we broke camp we were in the midst of a nice dropping of snow. This continued until we dropped about 2 miles down from the pass and turned to rain the rest of the way to trailhead. Despite change of weather, nice trip. No bugs to speak of and no water within 1 1/2 miles of pass. Pack it up with you or go without. Still some blueberries to be had.

We left the Rainy Pass TH, on the PCT, for Cutthroat Pass in sunny weather. The trail is in excellent condition. Camped overnight at a posted camp site at about four miles. This is the last source of water until after Granite Pass, possibly not until Snowey Lakes. The water source at this camp site is down to a trickle and may dry up in a week or so. The camp site was clean and is off the tail providing privacy. Bugs were at a minimum. The next morning there was a hoard of trail runners (several hundred)going from Rainy Pass to Cutthroat Lake TH. After the trail runners passed by we day hiked to up to Cutthroat Pass and on to Granite Pass. The views are awesome. We hiked out on Sunday just before the rains started.

Just returned from a trip up the PCT starting at Rainy pass and heading north to the first bridge across the West Fork of the Methow (16 miles north of Rainy Pass)The trail is in great shape the entire distance. Spent the first night at upper Snowy lake. Nice breeze kept the bugs to a minimum. Day hiked down the Methow the next day to inspect the bridge my son had helped construct the past two summers with the Forest Service trail crew.Returned south to our camp and retraced our route to Rainy the next day. Water is as scarce as I have ever seen it in this area. Carry an extra bottle and keep hydrated in the August heat ! Heading north from Rainy Pass you can get water at a small creek two miles below Cutthroat Pass. This is the last water north on the PCT until just before Snowy Lakes junction ( 8 miles without any good source )Continuing north over Methow pass your next water is 2 miles over the pass on the decent to the Methow. After that water was not as big an issue.

Hiked the PCT from Rainy Pass to Manning Park July 23-28. The trail is in great shape and the wildflowers are at their peak right now. This is the time to hike in this section of the PCT so don't put it off any longer this year. This has been our favorite section of the PCT. Lots of high ridge-walking and traverses, and not as much climbing up out of the valleys as in some of the other sections. The good news is that there is absolutely no snow on the trail, so it is all clear early this year. The bad news that goes with this is that most of the passes and ridges are dry. The longest dry stretch is about 13 miles from Brush Creek to just north of Harts Pass. One more word of warning. In Manning Park, do NOT believe the sign on Highway 3 for the PCT trailhead. They rerouted this section of the trail about 5 years ago but have not gotten around to changing the sign yet. The real trailhead is behind the lodge on the road to Gibson Pass at the Windy Joe trail. Look real hard for the small sign pointing to the PCT. Like dummies, we believed the highway sign and spotted our car at the old trail head, so we had to do some route finding across the river, old flood areas and a collapsed bridge to make it back to our car at the end of a 15 mile day. But the PCT is great, the views fantastic, deer visited us every night and wildfowers are everywhere.

PCT from Rainy Pass to Granite Pass is in excellent condition. Beautiful views all around. Lots of nice wildflowers coming into bloom. We looked down at Cutthroat Lk from the Pass area and it looked pretty low. Lower than last year anyway. No major bug concerns.