[mbravenboer]

I'm trying to quickly catch up on some of my post-poned summer hiking plans before winter takes over. One place I've enjoyed the trip reports from is Crater Mountain, Lake 6380 and Jerry Lakes. Notably, the report from GaliWalker ( https://www.nwhikers.net/forums/viewtopic.php?t=7970259 ) proved that it can be done in a day (at least by GaliWalker ), and kyle d ( https://www.nwhikers.net/forums/viewtopic.php?t=7987156 ) demonstrated that the area has beautiful larch trees. Maybe I would get lucky with larches, a bit of snow, and a sunny day? Me and my dog started hiking at 6am, the first 50 minutes with a headlamp (on the way out I learned that I didn't miss too much). The trail is a bit brushy in the beginning, but it soon gets better (so do not be discouraged) and even becomes extremely pleasant, covered in soft needles and with almost no rocks and roots. It took me about 2 hours to climb to the unmarked split to Crater Lake at 5200ft. There are two creek crossings in this section, both fairly large. The unmarked split is a small open area right before a small creek. Even without GPS it is hard to miss. During the more mellow traverse to Crater Lake there were finally some views of the North Cascades peaks. Fog was hanging in the valley, which was quite pretty. There really isn't too much to see until close to the lake at 5800ft though, and with a trailhead at 1800ft, this hike is definitely more about the destination than the journey.

Foggy early morning in the North Cascades

View south (Granite Creek drainage)

View south (Granite Creek drainage)

Crater Lake

A bit before the lake the start of the bootpath to Lookout No 2 was fairly clear. I continued briefly to the lake first to check it out. Based on earlier reports, I expected the lake to be pretty ugly, but with the right expectations, it's not so bad. It's certainly hardly a lake, with rocks and trees spread out in the shallow pond. There are a few larches around the lake. The boothpath to Lookout No 2 is surprisingly well graded and easy to follow. There are a few blowdowns, but none are a serious problem. The final climb to the (absent) Lookout No 2 is still very well graded and with reasonbly thread, but if you're generally afraid of slipping, then sticks would be handy there. The rock is a bit of a crumbly mess.

Early view west with fog hanging in the Panther and Thunder creek drainage. Later Snowfield Peak will become visible

Early view of Eldorado in the distance

The modest Elija Ridge is easily overlooked in the sea of higher summits, but is quite beautiful

North Cascades (with some fresh snow on the higher peaks, like Mesahchie, Katsuk, and Kimtah in the middle)

Devils Park with some larches

It took me a bit under 4 hours to reach the lookout site. The view is gorgeous, covering most of the North Cascades peaks starting from Snowfield Peak to Black Peak and Frisco, and of course Crater and Jack. The unnamed glacial silt lake (Lake 6380) below East Crater is particularly beautiful with the backdrop of the steep cliffs.

North Cascades Panorama

Panorama from Mt Logan to Snowfield Peak, with Ruby Mountain the foreground barely visible

North Cascades peaks (Eldorado, Primus, Snowfield)

Lake 6380 and Jack Mountain in the background

Now the goal was to descent to the lake. I'm not sure, but people seem to take the obvious west ridge descending towards the lake (going straight down from the lookout site is impossible). However, I wasn't particularly enthusiastic about hitting the class 3 point described in some reports, and I wasn't sure if it would be safe for my dog. After checking the map and Google Earth I thought there is a slight detour that would perhaps at most be class 2, which turned out to be correct. I kept following the north ridge as far as possible, and then did a descending traverse of the north slope towards the lake. There is a small scree descent at the top that is unpleasant (at most class 2), but after that the traverse is mostly fairly solid heather and scree. It took me about an hour to get down to the lake from the lookout site.

Crater Mountain with Jerry Glacier

View north view with larches loosing their needles

Sitting down at the lake surrounded by steep cliffs was my favorite moment of the day. There was virtually no wind, which resulted in beautiful reflections of clouds and cliffs. There were some nice frozen waterfalls that were slowly melting in the sun that was peeking just over the edge.

Frozen streams slowly melting in the sun

Liesl

At the lookout site I had noticed that the traverse to Jerry Lakes involves a scree slope that didn't look like a ton of fun, and I didn't see needles left on the larches around the lake. This made continuing to the lakes less interesting, and instead I decided to just wander around in the area and explore the 'glacier route', which returns to Crater Lake via the gap between the East and West peak of Crater Mountain. Unfortunately this was made very hard by black ice. The glacier polished rock had various creeks running down that were all frozen and formed sheets of black ice. We tried to find routes up for a while, but it really wasn't safe and the route finding up and down the biggest sheets of ice was exhausting. I decided to just return via the lookout site instead. The area was still great fun to explore though, with gorgeous geological features, like red pools, and many interesting rocks.

Tarn west of Lake 6380 with view of Jack Mountain

Beautiful rocks

Beautiful rocks

Interesting mixtures of rock types

Looking back at the north-side of the Lookout No 2 ridge, which we traversed to get to the lake

Jerry Glacier

Below Jerry Glacier terminus

The area below the Jerry Glacier has many small red pools

Jerry Glacier

Jerry Glacier

Lake 6380, a lone larch, and the ridge of lookout no 2 in the background

Jack Mountain

For the return trip, I saw that it should be easier to stay a bit lower during the traverse to the north ridge. There are some steep rocks there, but there is a convenient ledge to top of the ridge. Unfortunately, the short section of steep scree still cannot be avoided. It took me an hour to climb back from the lake to the lookout site, and then an uneventful 2 hours down to car.

Larches, Lake 6380, Jerry Glacier and West+East summits of Crater Mountain

Larch

Lake 6380 and Jack Mountain in the background

Crater Lake with a few larches

I'm not sure about the total mileage, because all the switchbacks in the forest are hard to track by GPS. The guide book by Craig Romano claims 14 miles. I recorded about 11.5 miles. The trip to the lake was 3.5 miles. Car to car duration was 10.5 hours (6am - 4:30pm). Total elevation gain: 6380ft.

GPS track Crater Mountain Lookout No 2

There was a van parked at the trailhead when I started and left, but I did not see anybody the entire day. Exactly the way I like it All photos: https://www.flickr.com/photos/bravenboer/albums/72157659916325575

[puzzlr]

Ever since going to the other Lookout as a side trip on the way to Jack I've wanted to go back and check out the lookout you went to. And I didn't realize the trail marked on the USGS topo was so far off, assuming your GPS is close the actual route.

[Bootpathguy]

Nice report Thanks for sharing

[iron]

awesome. this has been high on my larch trip hikes. there's a peak further north of interest as well.

[GaliWalker]

Missed seeing this one, since I was on a hiking trip. Very cool! Very nice photos too (better than mine)!

[mbravenboer]

Thanks GaliWalker! I think I still have a lot to learn before my photos approach your excellent reports, but I'll consider it an encouragement . Thanks for sharing your route info.

[Brushbuffalo]

Excellent TR for a beautiful area. Thanks. Area trivia 1: while camping on top of main Crater in the 1970s, I dropped a cookpot off the top while scraping frozen snow from the summit cornice. Saw the fallen pot on the Jerry Glacier far below. Went down and around to get it but also found a double-bitted axe that must have been tossed off the top when the lookout was destroyed. Seems odd to have had such a tool 1500' above trees.. The axe resides on my woodshed to this day (I considered it litter rather than an artifact, since it was quite out of place). Trivia 2: we talked with a couple loaded down with rock-climbing gear including large angle pitons ( called "bongs" back in the day)to climb what, I don't know...who spoke of a grizzly sighting near Jerry Lakes.... Identity of bear never verified SFAIK., but it is wild enough back there to be grizz habitat.

[Distel32]