Taylor River, Snoqualmie Lake, Bear/Deer Lake

July 6-8, 2007

The Monkey Butler and I walked a couple miles up Taylor Riverand found a trail spur that led to a nice, secluded spot y the river. One of the few sites we saw in the valley out of view of the trail, so that was great. We stayed pretty close to the trailhead so we could hike out super early Sunday morning. Another mile further in (just before Marten Creek) is apparently a great site next to a huge cracked boulder. Good to keep in mind for future trips . . .

Saturday we went for a pretty big hike up the valley to a few higher lakes. Big Creek, the big draw of that trail for many, is super impressive. Water cascading over HUGE slabs of rock. It's about 4 miles in (?), which makes for a sizeable day hike. I was impressed by the diversity of ages or shapes we saw there. The weird part about the creek is that the bridge crossing it is made out of concrete. There were plans for the whole trail to be a road at one point (CCC or WPA work decades ago), though it never came to fruition (thankfully). Would make a good portion of the Alpine Lakes Wilderness a very different place.

The path splits a little further up the trail - one path to Snoqualmie Lake another to Nordrum Lake. We chose the former (that's Snoqualmie, for the adjectively-impaired). We gained a little under 2000 feet to Snoqualmie Lake, which is ENORMOUS. And full of tiny annoying bugs. We continued up quickly, looking for a place to lunch without being hassled by insects. We found a chill spot at the bottom of the rock slide, where we lunched, read, and napped a little till almost 4 o'clock (where did the time go??). It was only another mile (UP!) to Bear and Deer Lakes, so we decided to check them out. Bear Lake is gorgeous. Would definitely camp there. The water was a great temperature, too. But the time for swimming had passed; we were ready to get back. For next time: Bear Lake and Deer Lake can also be reached via Route 2-Lake Dorothy. Refilled our water at Bear Lake, glanced at Deer Lake (the further lake, though they're pretty much adjacent) and started the long hike back to camp. No pics on the Shabbos . . . maybe next time.