[rockitbiker]

Preacher Mtn 5,924 ft (TOPO! 24k) - 13 miles - 5550 ft elevation

Preacher Route

Last week when this came up in conversation, I was pumped to make the trip to this little known peak in the heart of the Alpine Lakes Wilderness. As we were looking for information on the hike, another trip report popped up with some good but limited beta on it, which just whet my appetite even more. Saturday was the day and hot was the forecast. Armed with the water pump and ice axe, Forty-n-Eight, Jaded, Fancy Dog and I head off for some adventure or maybe mis-adventure.

The Middle Fork meanders along

FnE rocks out the Gateway

Rainy Creek winds thru second growth

The trail starts off mild crossing the middle fork of the Snoqualmie on the Gateway Bridge. After crossing we quickly head south along the east bank searching for the famed Rainy Creek, which was less than a half-mile. We weren't sure what to expect, but what we got was wide crossing that was all braided and pretty dry to cross. Once across it was pretty easy to sniff out the Rainy Creek trail and start heading up to Rainy Lake.

The trail slowly climbs thru brush

Boulder hopping along the trail

The lush trailside

FnE chillin by some old growth

The trail even has slab hopping

Garfield pokes out thru the trees

The first half of the trail is through some second growth and bushy forest. It sort of meandered along the creek before hitting the old growth and then the trail turned a bit more vicious. The trail consisted on some washouts, boulder fields, stream crossings and one slab crossing. All in all it was in pretty good shape for an un-marked trail, well maybe on GT, but didn't have it. The second half of the trail did most of the elevation gain to the lake, which was a good way to get the heart going. Once up on the ridge of above Rainy Lake we were all excited to see the lake just a mere 100 ft below us.

The steamy Rainy Lake

Rainy Lake from the inlet end

At this point it was time to get some breakfast, pump some water and go sniff around a few stumps. Of course the Fancy Dog really enjoyed the stump sniffing, so we figured that would be where she would hang out with Jaded, while F-n-E and I decided to go see the Preacher.

Russian Butte from the ridge

FnE excited about more brush bashing

The brush lets up around 5000 ft

A snow ramp to URL, we hope

Climbing the east ridge above URL

Russian, Teneriff, Si over Pratt and Middle Snoqualmie valleys

Once packed, we found the least brushy slope and started working our way up the ridge just east of the lake across the outlet. Once past the initial huckleberry bushes and slide alder, the ridge started to relent a little turning into forest with some open areas or at least less brush. We kept gaining the ridge looking for a good sign to start making the traverse over to Upper Rainy Lake, which is what most references recommend (which now I totally concur with ). Well as luck would have it, we didn't make the contour soon enough and ended up about 100 ft above the lake. Well see we had plenty of water from the lower Rainy Lake, we decided to see what the ridge east of URL had to offer. It definitely has some nice snow ramps to entice, so we just were lured up the ridge with perfect ramps only to get left high and dry on the ridge , that’s what they mean by not a recommended route. Oh well, time to drop down a few hundred feet and try for another gully that will get us up and over the ridge we first wanted. We got lucky on the second try and crested onto a nice meadowy ridge walk up to the summit.

Don't go up this gully... its a bit airy

URL from the wrong gully

FnE not excited about dropping down and going around... can't blame him ooops

Horseshoe, Shamrock and Elbow Lakes from the meadowy ridge walk

Garfield, Glacier and N. Cascades from the ridge

Hiked into this view at the summit

The summit was more brushy than I expected, but still was quite an awesome feeling after all the hiking and scrambling that went into the trip. Perfect place to drop packs and soak in the 360° views and eat lunch. We had fun checking out the benchmarks, signing logs and placing a register. After reading yet another report that there wasn't a register, I decided to get some bass tubing and paper up there so this cool view could be noted by any who felt like it, and what a view it was. Preacher sits one the edge of the ALW and there were plenty of lakes to check out. What an amazing area to just sit and look into and check out the many peaks we had been to before. We were both stunned at the profile of Kaleetan as it was one we had been to before and couldn't recognize it other than by its location. I now know why it is called Chair Peak , what a striking resemblance.

Lake Caroline surrounded by Kaleetan, Chair, Roosevelt, Wright and Snoqualmie

Horseshoe Lake and the ALW

Hatchet Lake with just the tip of Derrick Lake

rb does the Preacher... summit

After about an hour of lunch and views, it was time to head down and hopefully an easier trip with the recommended route scoped out. We were both quite happy with the route heading down the southern ridge of URL. It was mostly forest and meadows with a decent grade. We tried to find a way over to the snow for some plunge stepping, but ran into much resistance with postholes into the boulders so we kept to the meadows and solid snow on the ground.

URL from the easier ridge south of URL

Approaching URL

Once down at URL, it was time for another snack and some fresh water for our bottles, did I mention it was hot, but the ice floating in URL made it feel cooler. Once refreshed with snowmelt water, we started making the grade over to where we should have crossed over. We quickly found our trail up and tried to keep on it going down, sometimes finding easier slots and sometimes finding way too much brush... ooops we better go that way. The sun was getting lower at least giving us some relief and we were beating the lower brush out of our way in some thick patches, but then would open up to needled slopes. We even had some mini cone paths, which felt like hiking on eggshells. Again I agree, the brush just above lower Rainy Lake is a pain, but the rest of the hike/scramble is in pretty good shape.

URL iceberg

Reflections in URL

Looking back at the easier ridge

Descending alpine country

Once back at the lower lake, we changed down to shorts and dropped out sweaty gaitors into the pack for a nice relief from the heat. Once back in the forested trail it was time to pick up the pace to race the hoards of biting flies and skeeters before they drew the last of our strength. We made good time down with plenty of light and were able to enjoy some tasty cold beverages down at the trailhead.

Dropping down to the Middle Fork

What a perfect day out in the ALW, we didn't run into a soul the entire trip. It was very quiet out there with such a beautiful lake backdrop, I look forward to going back.

[Magellan]

Awesome work! Congrats on finding your way. What was the roundtrip time for you guys?

[puzzlr]

Nicely done hike and report. This trail is not officially maintained, but on one of my walks exploring the area around Stegasaurus Butte I ran into the trail angel that keeps it cleared out. He's been hiking it all his life since the days it was a more popular destination, and doesn't want to see it disappear. He wouldn't give me his name or let me take a picture. I'm very appreciative of folks like this who step in where the FS is too bound up in budgets and red-tape to do anything.

[rockitbiker]

The total trip time was 13 hrs for us, 0715 to 2015. That did include an hour long break at lower Rainy Lake, an hour at the summit and 1/2 hour at URL. With all that figured in and the missed route finding up and down , we figured it was about the average time for making the summit. I saw some of the more recent work by the trail angel on the Rainy Lake trail. There is a 1/2 mile of newer blowdown section on the trail which is well taped and under "construction". The angel definitely has been keeping up on it and a very worthy project indeed.

[gone]

Congratulations! And thanks for sharing all the great details and pics! I've wanted to try this myself, at least to Rainy Lake, though the whack to URL sounds really interesting, too, and this may be just the thing to get me there. Thanks!

[Forty-n-Eight]

What a great day in the hills. Here are some more pics...

Rockitbiker heading up the Rainy Lake trail

Rainy Lake

Heading up the (wrong) gully

Upper Rainy Lake from the ridge

Rainier

Alpine Lakes view - Roosevelt, Chair, Kaleetan, Caroline Lake

Pratt emptying into the Middle Fork

Glacier Peak

Benchmark

FnE atop Preacher

Rockitbiker above Upper Rainy Lake

Upper Rainy Lake

Alpine Lakes water - good to the last drop

Rockitbiker and Garfiled

PreacherMap