This week I headed out into the Great Burn to finally visit the hanging valley below Crater Mountain and maybe climb Crater Mountain from that side.
Day 1: On Monday I headed over Hoodoo Pass up Trout Creek and down to the Goose Creek trailhead (trail #414) with the plan to stay at Goose Lake the first night. I was worried that the trail had not been cut out this summer; phones calls to the local district went unanswered so I decided to just go as the trail is supposed to be cut out annually. The trail was cut out all the way to Goose Lake and the trail was in good shape.
The trail still needs to be brushed out as there is a ton of head high brush overhanging the trail. If you hike this trail either in the rain or if it has rained the day before you will get soaked head to toe. Goose Lake is renowned for it bugs and I was anticipating an onslaught while at the lake. Surprisingly, there were virtually no bugs at all, but I would take it. There was a Moose at the lake and she hung around for the day and evening. I also saw a Heron and deer. I camped over by the inlet and had a quiet night.
Day 2: In the morning I packed up and headed up the stateline trail #738 from Goose Lake to where the trail meets up with the stateline ridge, distance of about 1.25 miles. This section of trail had not been cut out so there were almost 10 windfalls that I needed to climb over or go around, but not bad. At the stateline I turned east and headed along the ridgeline towards the far ridge & Crater Mountain. This section is pretty much a cross-country route even though there are a series of old horse or game trails all the way to the hanging valley below Crater Mtn.; a distance of abour 2.5 miles. This is a very hard section as the trails are primitive and are hard to follow; losing the trail means you are sidehilling through beargrass.
I did really well sticking to the trails all the way over to the trail that crosses the very steep open slope before turning into the valley. This section is definitely not a casual walk as the trail and hillsides are very steep and the tread is either at the same angle of the slope or at times disappears. A mis-step here has some real consequences. The valley with the little lake is very cool, it was worth the trip. On the way in I observed about 25 elk in the basin below the valley. Although this was a realitively short hike of 4 miles from Goose Lake it was very hard and took over 4 hours. I thought about climbing Crater Mtn but didn't feel I had enough left to make the 1 mile & 1,000 ft climb to the summit.
Day 3: The night was quiet with no visitors but very cold with lots of dew. At Goose I left both fly doors open as it was warm & dry that nigt, but it must have been 20 degrees colder in the valley and I was putting my 35 degree bag to the test. As I was packing up I turned and there was the whole herd of elk I saw the day before watching me. They didn't stay and wait me out. It took me over an hour to work my way out of the valley and then cross the challenging section of trail along the steep slope. As cold as it was when I got up, the day heated up quick in the sun.
I didn't do nearly as good of a job sticking with the trails on the way back to the stateline trail so it was a tough go with the beargrass. It had really gotten warm by the time I got back to Goose Lake (4+ hrs). I took an extended break to filter water and try to eat. Somewhere in the morning I crossed by effort and heat threshhold where I get overextended. Not having the extensive miles under my belt and in less physical condition brings this along faster. The 6 miles back to the truck was going to be a real slog and I wasn't disappointed. It was almost 90 degrees when I got back to the truck. I just don't tolerate heat nearly as well as I used to and a full pack adds to that quickly where a day pack doesn't.
