[HitTheTrail]

After a quick foray up the Purple Pass trail at the end of my Lake Shore hike this Spring I knew I wanted to see more of the area. Tuesday morning I caught the fast boat in Chelan and was at Stehekin by 11:00 am. Upon asking for a camping permit at the park headquarters I was told that in National Parks you can only camp in designated sites and their last report had the Juanita Lake area(the only camping area on top) completely socked in with deep snow. My eyes glazed over as the girl rattled off a list of alternate hikes so I decided to day hike it and ask for a permit to stay in the local campground at Stehekin. I was on the trail just before 6:00 am the next day and crested the summit at 10:20 am. Even though you gain around 5600 feet in seven and half miles the hike was not as daunting as I expected. It is a good trail with well graded switchbacks until the last couple of miles and even they were not too bad. As I looked around the summit I was hard pressed to find any snow at all!!! Their report must have been at least two weeks old. Anyway, I hiked the last half mile to Boulder Butte for lunch and a photo shoot. Lingered for around an hour and headed back down. The trip down took my old knees almost as long as the trip up. The day was workout but well worth it. The only final thing I can add is that you will need to carry water after you cross Purple Creek a couple miles up the trail. And, there is no water on top unless you drop down into Juanita Lake.

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JuanitaLake

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[Philthy Phil]

Hope you got a chance to show the Park Service your pics. Maybe you should send them the bill for your ferry ticket.

[ree]

Thanks for posting your pictures. It's cool to see the view from top there. That hike is fairly demanding. Hmm. We noticed that old trip report about snow being at Juanita Lake too. It also said the creek ford would get our feet wet, but it was no problem at all.