[denisseattle]

What can I add to all that has been written about this route? Trailhead parking info was my first challenge. Stevens Pass ski resort allows hikers to park against the back wall of lot D on the north side of US 2. No parking pass is required. Stevens asked me to leave a note on the dash with an emergency contact. The PCT southbound has an inglorious start as it cuts through the ski area, then through a power line right-of-way, eventually arriving at the unimpressive Lake Susan Jane. It’s a small, shallow lake with extensive recent avalanche damage in its basin and very limited camping. Josephine Lake is much nicer. It has a little grassy beach, decent swimming, and a small number of campsites all close together and all full by midafternoon on a Saturday. There's a small tent site at the Icicle junction. Trail 1551 crosses Icicle Creek a couple of times. On this early August weekend it was no problem to hop rocks across the creek. Frequent good water sources are all along this boring section of trail. The Whitepine Creek Trail east from the Icicle Creek junction is no longer. Nice campsite near the junction at the edge of a pretty meadow, with water nearby. If you were thinking of hiking through to Whitepine Creek from this direction it would be a GPS navigation exercise and at least 2 miles of bushwhacking. Wild blueberries are ripe at 4000 feet elevation. After I turned uphill on trail 1569 I found delicious ripe elderberries at 5000 feet. There is no water source along the (yes, very steep) Chain Lakes trail. There are several logs down across the trail, a couple of which require detours. There are just 4 or maybe 5 established campsites in the Chain Lakes basin. On my hike out on Saturday I met 12 people and three dogs who were headed there to camp. Good camping at Doelle Lakes (pronounced dooly) is even scarcer. I was in the basin for 3 days and I scouted all over to find something better than the middle-of-trail designated campsite I used. I didn’t find it. The climb from Chain Lakes to Doelle Lakes doesn’t look like much on a map, but it gains 500 feet on an open south-facing talus slope. To avoid the heat, hike it in the morning. Stock up on water as you cross the inlet stream, which is the freshest water you will find in the Doelle Lakes basin, and easier to reach now than scrambling down to the lake from camp. I met 2 guys who were on day 4 of their hike from North Bend (Middle Fork of the Snoqualmie) to Leavenworth “for a beer” via Icicle Ridge and the abandoned trail to Frosty Pass. Long ago this 3.5-mile trail was labeled “unmaintained” and has long since been removed from maps altogether. For good reason: The eastern-most mile of it is gone. It probably never was where the old maps show it leaving lower Doelle Lake via Doughgod Creek and crossing a marshy meadow. You're on your own traveling cross country between Doelle Lakes and the east side of the huge Doughgod Meadow. The brush is head high and the way is steep and bouldery. From there to Frosty Pass there is tread and no reliable water sources. My GPS odometer said the distance from Stevens Pass to Doelle Lakes is 14 miles. Issue yourself a backcountry permit at a bulletin board in the lawn between the ticket windows and the Kerr’s Chairlift base. Stevens Pass is now also a mountain bike park, so the Bull’s Tooth bar and grill is open in summer season.