[blue_tuberosa]

On Saturday I went out for an Alpine Lake jaunt with a ranger friend. It began with a bushwhack up Mineral Creek. This trail is in its usual condition but also has lots of biting black flies to top it off. Hate the trail; love the route… only 5 miles of crappy trail and Voila! You’re smack dab in ALW wonderland. We set up camp at the Park Lakes Tarn just off of the PCT… my friend went off to climb one of the brothers while I took a sweet, sweet nap. After I woke myself from snoring, I decided to go find him… turns out he ran into his girlfriend (on a dayhike) on the way up to the brothers, so he didn’t climb it… would go for it in the morning instead. We enjoyed the views and hiked back down to camp where there were amazingly few bugs!!! The next morning he took off for his climb and I napped a little more, then took off to rendezvous at Glacier Lake… I was happily strolling through the basin towards Glacier, when who should I see? Dayhike Mike, Jen Jen & Adi (can’t remember her full name but I know she’s on here ((sorry)). They were out having all sorts of high-route fun & craziness… I’m sure they’ll have a great TR. Glacier was beautiful… it was my first visit… sometime I’ll have to try to access Spectacle from the outflow. Eventually the ranger returned from the climb and we went back to pack up camp and head for Spectacle. The hike down to the lake was gorgeous… incredible views and nice people along the way. I was watching the peninsula below with my binoculars in hopes of being the only people at the lake (yeah right). It was looking really promising until we got there and there was 1 guy hiking in ahead of us. We set up camp and watched a number of other people trail in. We met this one woman… Lisa. My oh my, what a lady. She came into our camp and plopped herself down next to us along with her dog Shasta and proceeded to entertain us for hours with great climbing and skiing stories. She used to be the climbing ranger up on Mt. Baker and she was planning to go for Chikamin (sp) in the morning. She forgot her knife, but not her vino… she was pretty funny. More nice people. Oh! And hardly any bugs! Sadly, I had to hike out early on Monday so I could still get in a ½ day of work, but even the hike out was riddled with nice folk. I ran into the Cle Elum Trail Crew @ Pete Lake (John H., Jen, & Deb), then 15 minutes later, I ran into the woman who did the mudding a taping on my house… then 30 minutes later I ran into more CE Trail Crew (Todd & Tim) bringing in stock to do work up @ Waptus Pass. It was a great trip… great weather minimal bugs… good times. (Sorry to be so long-winded) BT

[Damian]

Dang if you're not always runnin' into nice folk...

[Galadriel]

Sounds like a great time with beautiful scenery and interesting people. Your report brings back good memories of the area.

[Tazz]

great trip report it is always nice to run into good people on the trail. reminds me of all the good peeps I met on the wonderland trail.

[Blue Dome]

Nice trip report, BT. Spectacle is nice and a nap in the ALW is always a good thing.