Getting There: Take the Saltese exit and go under the old Milwaukee RR trestle. Follow up the main road (#305) for about 3.3 teeth jarring miles and bear to the right at the fork. It is another 1.25 miles to the lake, but the road is much better at this point. The road is rocky and steep with few turnouts, your brakes will smell on the way back down to Saltese.
This road is probably the worst road of all the descriptions, easily beating the Schley Mountain Trailhead road up Fish Creek. I have seen better roads in Canyonlands.
Option 2 - Stateline Road 391: I don't like to go up from Saltese so I drive to the lake from the stateline road. It is farther but less of a pounding, sort of. Take the Hiawatha Bike Trail exit (5) off I-90; then the right fork that goes over the state line to Rowland. If you end up in the Hiawatha parking lot, then you missed it. A mile or so up that road take the left fork and you will connect to the state line road (#391) in about 1.25 miles.
Take the left fork up the hill and follow this road for a bit more than 5 miles. At about the 5 mile mark turn left down the hill on road #305 that originates at Saltese. Go down this road for 1.5+ miles and turn left on road 1922, which heads back to Silver Lake in 1.25 miles. I don't know if this really gains you much as the road 305 is still rough; anyway just another way to get there.
At the Lake: I have been to this lake just a few times, once in the winter decades ago and a couple years ago on motorcycles. I haven’t fished it, so I am no help there, but I know there are fish. There are several beaten down campsites near the outlet when you first get to the lake. There is another campsite that is drivable around the left side of the lake, but turning around will be difficult for a regular sized truck.
The state line road (#391) is a little more than 1.5 miles from the junction to the lake on road #305 and has good access to several other lakes and late season huckleberry picking.
