Wednesday

Our friends Matt and Hannah were visiting from out of town and wanted to “see mountains”. There are mountains just to the east and unlike the Pacific Northwest where I previously roamed, the bottoms of glacial valleys here aren’t covered with view-blocking trees. After picking them up from the airport and a stop at home to repack and resupply (camp fuel can’t be brought on airplanes), we set out for Eagle and Symphony Lakes from the South Fork Valley Trailhead.

The way starts on the south side of the valley with a view of expensive houses built on the slopes farther down the valley. A few side trails departed straight up the hillside along which our trail, well packed and initially wide enough to be a forest service road, traveled before it crossed the valley’s central river at a well maintained bridge.

After crossing to the north side of the valley, the trail there was a painted rock at the base of a tree. Later in the week, we saw one on another hike several hours away. Maybe it’s a thing someone is doing?

After about three miles, the trail started having muddy sections, usually from water seeping or flowing down from the ridge to the north. There were boards in some places but in most, the trail was significantly braided with most braids still relatively muddy.

The mud ended just before a giant rock field. A large cairn marked the start of the rock field, though a bridge across Eagle Lake’s outlet stream provided access to its main body. We explored the nearest reaches of the rock field and didn’t find good camping so went back to the cairn.

We set up tents and because my tent is degrading (a pole recently broke) and I want to replace it, I made a spur-of-the-moment decision to use the tarp I’d brought as a “group tarp” for making dinner instead of a ground cloth under the tent. Rain was forecast. What came was large drops, slowly at first, then rapidly. These transitioned to hail. The cacophony of hail on the tarp drowned out any attempt at conversation. Water and hailstones pooled in sagging areas of the tarp. When we cleared them every couple minutes, the quantity of accumulated precipitation was always surprisingly large. Eventually there was a break in the clouds and we escaped to our tents for the night. The storm then continued.

Thursday

In the morning, Matt and Hannah set off across the rock field, now slippery with the night’s rain, to find Symphony Lake. They found a small shelter which was missing its roof and reported that Symphony Lake was the lesser body of water in both size and beauty. I tried climbing the slope above our campsite to get an overview of the area but didn’t quite gain enough altitude to see over the ridge of the boulder field.

The muddy section was easier to navigate on the way out. Each mud pit had been something of a puzzle on the way in, requiring multiple scouting attempts. Now we knew the secret ways of minimal muddiness and also didn’t care if our shoes got wet as we could change out of them in the car.

Even though this was an out-and-back, there was cloud cover today which changed the light and the recent rain made the valley’s vegetation appear lusher. While I don’t usually enjoy retracing my steps as much as walking a trail for the first time, experiencing the same path in different conditions adds a new perspective which builds on the previous passage, enriching the whole.

All pics

Saturday

Lydia and I departed the Glen Alps trailhead’s lower parking lot after lunch. The goal was for this to be a “no lunch” overnighter where we’d go in after lunch and be home before lunch the next day. In between, we hoped to visit the Williwaw Lakes in a nearby glacial valley.

The Glen Alps trailhead is popular as it’s the easiest access to the Powerline Pass Trail which is a wide multiuse trail which serves as a destination in its own right but also a major connector of other trails. Our travel crossed this quickly, heading north across the valley bottom, then north-northwest to a parallel valley.

Turning up the Williwaw Lakes trail took us off the bikeable tread and onto a trail which rose slowly with the valley, staying on its south side slightly above the valley floor. It’s still early season and so the there were several muddy sections. At one point a lady with a dog told us she’d chosen to “get prickly” instead of pass through waist high water. The first place we encountered which might have matched that description was so easy to bypass, we hoped she had simply been hyperbolic. The second was a pond which had formed on the trail but had a social trail bypassing it. The third was waist deep water and the bypass trail was so overgrown that it stole a water bottle from Lydia’s pack. We thought that must have been what the lady was referring to until we came across an equally deep pond filling in a dip in the trail with no major social trail to bypass. That was a little prickly to get around and the ground was large rocks with a thin layer of dead leaves which didn’t make for good footing while trying to contort yourself between stunted trees. At least there weren’t thorns.

Then it started to rain. The rain brought out the intensity of the greens which are a hallmark of early season. The trail went up onto a low bench on the south side of the valley. The clouds were moving and so at times we got rained on while it was still sunny. Unfortunately, we couldn’t find any rainbows.

In the end we stopped just short of the Williwaw Lakes. The valley near their outlet stream was beautiful and open. The area is deceptive in that what looks like flat, level ground is actually quite lumpy and subtly sloped on closer inspection. A quick walk to the lakes revealed no level ground which wasn’t sodden or snow covered. There were tents on the north side of the stream but we weren’t up for getting our feet (and knees) wet just to share a campsite. So… we almost made it to the Williwaw Lakes.

Sunday

We tried to have a lazy morning. The sun is up so early this far north that any time you wake up seems like you’ve slept in late because it’s so bright.

The way out was a little less adventurous as we knew what to expect. We even found the water bottle lost which had been stolen by on our bushwhack. Some mind soul had placed it on a rock by the start of the bypass trail.

We also saw mountain goats. They were far away, high on the north slope of the valley and initially they like small snow patches which were moving. Binoculars came out. By the end of the trip we (ie Lydia who is better at these things) had spotted 19.

We made it home in time for a late lunch with that perfect level of hunger which leaves a strong desire for a particular dish without being overpowering, becoming generalized hunger pangs, or leaving you weak. It was a good lunch.

All pics