[pasayten]

I always wanted to check out the Falls Creek area in Winthrop where I live, so I figured Friday would be a good day. I set my sights on Obstruction Peak based on a 2008 trail report here on the board by Stefan... also to take a peak over the hill at Crystal lake and the Disaster Creek area... I hit the trailhead at 8am... about 12 miles of nice paved road all the way to the end...

Fall Creek trailhead

Trail heading out

The first creek crossing was still high did not have a suitable log for crossing, so I stayed on an old cow/hiker trail on the northeast side that parallels the main trail until I could find a decent log...

Need a good log crossing

This is where I crossed the creek

I crossed at the 2 small logs and climbed up the hill and quickly ran onto the main trial. The trail is in great shape and has even been logged out for the distance I traveled on it. After a few miles, I turned off of the main trail onto an old trail that follows thea northeast fork of the creek into the basin below Obstruction Peak. View of the ridge between Mt Barney and Obstruction soon appear...

My goal is coming into view

Connecting ridge to Birch Mtn

The side trail has more than a few blowdowns and eventually deteriorates and then I ran into snow... It was easy to walk on top and then I came to where it actually crossed the creek and basically ended... No big deal as the terrain opened up and was easy to traverse cross country...

Old trail ended... now cross-country up to the top

Birch Mtn in distance

Can see the upper part of the ridge that connects to Obstruction Peak

I just kept angling up the hill to come out at the ridgeline at the head of the basin and up Obstruction Peak aways...

Snow well consolidated and easy to walk on

Birch Mtn

Big Craggy and West Craggy coming into a good view

Obstruction Peak up there somewhere... lol...

Climb got steep in a few places

I finally reached the top at 1pm... Getting slow in my old age... At the rock pile on the peak, there was a ladybug convention...

Sure a lot of ladybugs

Rock painted with ladybugs

Ladybug closeup

They were clustered everywhere on a small section of the rocks at the very top of Obstruction Peak

You can usually always find a "convention" of ladybugs on many of the peaks around the Methow Valley in the spring and early summer. This picture was taken on Obstruction Peak in July 2012. Access via the Falls River drainage.

The views were great in all directions...

Crystal Lake and Disaster Creek headwaters

Zoomin to Crystal Lake

Looking east towards Tiffany, Middle Tiffany, and Clark

Big Craggy Mtn across from Obstruction Peak

I checked out the peak register... small plastic tube about 6 inches in length... note many folks come up here...

I added my name to the register

Peak register 4

Peak register 3

Peak register 2

Peak register on Obstruction Peak

Spent more time enjoying the sun and views...

Big Craggy Mtn

2 labels

Looking out over riges that hold Kidney & Halfmoon lakes

Ridge connecting to Obstruction Peak from north

Looking southeast... Mt Barney...

Happy but tired

Looking northerly

About 2:30pm, I started back down...

Down... Birch Mtn to right

Heading down... open country in the higher elevations...

This ridge continues on to Mt. Barney

Heading back down...

Filtering andf refilling my water bottles

On the last part of the trail, I ran into a porcupine rambling along...

Just strolling along...

Whoa... I am going to climb the tree...

Came across this critter on the hike back from Obstruction Peak along a trail in the Fall River drainage. We stared at each other for awhile, and then he figured that maybe he should climb a tree... :-)

Back out to the truck at 6pm... An end to a great day of hiking and views... Update: Video... 360 deg view from top of Obstruction Peak...

[Tangeman]

Nice! Any idea what the trail to crystal lake is like? And is the "Falls Creek TH" at the end of Falls Creek Road?

[pasayten]

I have heard that the trail to Crystal Lake is covered by numerous blow downs... Somebody had mentioned 299... lol... The Disaster Creek Basin looks like it really got fried in the fire... Recent USFS report... Crystal Lake 517 Snow free to a quarter mile past the wilderness boundary. Hundreds of down trees have not been cleared. The first 2 miles of trail are very brushy. 6/15/12 I was toying with using this route as an alternate route to the lake for the future... Yes, the Fall Creek trailhead is at the end of the road...

[wildernessed]

Nice, we were thinking of going up there and into all the lakes, we had thoughts of just taking it up the gut from Black Lake, this might be easier.

[pasayten]

[BeyondLost]

[silence]

cool stuff .. keep em coming from your side of the crest