Red Butte Lake – wanderingyuncks

For the second hike of my September vacation I decided to revisit one of our earliest hikes. Our first visit and only previous visit to Duffy Lake (post) had been over 15 years ago and was only our 14th day spent hiking. Since that time I have spent 774 more days on trails. My plan for this outing was to revisit Duffy and Mowich Lakes and to continue on to Jorn Lake which we had visited on a 2016 hike starting from the Marion Lake Trailhead (post). I left open the option to hike up Red Butte depending on the amount of wildfire haze, and how I was feeling.

I obtained a Central Cascades Wilderness Day Use Permit for the Duffy Lake Trailhead and arrived shortly before sunrise (I had expected to be delayed by road construction.)

There were already a lot of cars at the trailhead.

I set off on the Duffy Lake Trail which was quickly joined on the left by the main spur of the Duffy Lake Trail which begins at Big Meadows Horse Camp at the Mt. Jefferson Wilderness boundary.

It’s 3.3-miles and 750′ of elevation gain to Duffy Lake from the trailhead which makes for a pretty gentle climb. Both Heather and I prefer to have shorter sections broken up by markers (preferably no more than 1.5-miles) and for this hike I used a couple of trail junctions to do just that. From the junction with the cutoff to Big Meadows Horse Camp it is approximately 1.4-miles to the Turpentine Trail.

The first of two rock fields along this stretch. I heard a couple of pikas but was unable to spot any of them.

The second rock field.

You can loop back to the trailhead by combining this trail with the Big Meadows Tie Trail which brings you to the Duffy Lake Trail coming from the horse camp about a half mile from the junction near the trailhead. Heather and I did that in 2010, but I opted not to add the additional three quarters of a mile to my day.

From the junction with the Turpentine Trail it is another mile and a half to the next junction with the Lava Lakes Trail.

The North Santiam River’s dry bed alongside the trail.

The trail crossing the riverbed.

A small part of Duffy Butte visible ahead.

The Lava Lakes Trail connects to the Maxwell Butte Trail (post) 2.8-miles away at Twin Lakes.

Three tenths of a mile from the Lava Lakes Trail I arrived at a 4-way junction at the SW end of Duffy Lake where a day use area provides a nice view.

Signs at the 4-way junction. The day use area was to the left and the faint 0.4-mile Duffy Prairie Trail forked off to the right.

Day use sign on the tree at the bottom.

Lousewort

Aster

After a quick stop at the day use area I continued along the lake stopping on a footbridge over the outlet which feeds the North Santiam River when the lake is full enough.

Common merganser

Shortly after crossing the bridge I arrived at a junction with the Blue Lake Trail which marks the end of the Duffy Lake Trail. The Blue Lake Trail is eight miles long with one end a tenth of a mile to the right (east) of the Duffy Lake Trail at a junction with the Duffy Prairie and Santiam Lake Trails and the other end at the Marion Lake Trail. In 2010 we had forked right onto the Duffy Prairie Trail then we took the Santiam Lake Trail to visit Santiam Lake and returned to the Blue Lake Trail via the Dixie Lakes Trail. I knew I wasn’t going to visit Santiam Lake since we had revisited that lake from the Pacific Crest Trail in 2021 (post). I was considering taking the Dixie Lakes Trail on the way back and cutting down here on the Blue Lake Trail though.

For now I continued straight on the Blue Lake Trail passing more great views of Duffy Lake and Butte.

It was just over three quarters of a mile from the Duffy Lake/Blue Lake junction to Mowich Lake which required gaining nearly 300′ of elevation. Along this section the trail passed in and out of the 2003 B&B Fire scar.

Meadow near the end of Duffy Lake.

Duffy Butte from the fire scar.

Huckleberry bush

The trail leveled out before arriving at Mowich Lake.

No campfire sign just before the lake. I took the spur to the left which led down to the lake while the Blue Lake Trail continued to the right.

Heading down to Mowich Lake.

Red Butte to the right.

Instead of returning to the trail via the spur I’d come down I decided to follow the lake shore for a bit thinking I would just pop back up on the Blue Lake Trail when another use trail appeared.

American pipit

Opting to follow the lake shore turned out to be a bit of a poor choice. I wasn’t seeing any other use trails and I could see on the map that the Blue Lake Trail veered uphill away from the lake near its middle. After checking my GPS and seeing that I was getting pretty close to where the trail would be turning away, I decided to just turn uphill and bushwack to it.

The trail is up there somewhere.

Found it!

Duffy Butte behind Mowich Lake.

The trail climbed gradually through the fire scar and past the junction with the Dixie Lakes Trail.

It was approximately 0.8-miles between the spur trail down to Mowich Lake and the Dixie Lakes Trail junction.

The trail leveled out at the junction and continued a third of a mile to a use trail just before Alice Lake.

Pearly everlasting along the trail.

Level trail in unburnt forest.

At the use trail I faced the choice of continuing straight to Jorn Lake or detouring up Red Butte. I was feeling up to the 500′, half mile climb and more importantly the visibility was good. The issue I ran into was there were three tents set up nearly on top of the trail. Not wanting to trapse through their camp I cut through the forest and started up the butte hoping to pick up the use trail at some point.

Alice Lake below.

The summit of Red Butte.

After climbing almost two tenths of a mile I spotted the use trail.

The use trail in the dirt area in the middle of the trees.

Following the use trail.

Penstemon

Bumble bee on thistle.

Maxwell Butte from the use trail.

Scott Mountain (post) on the left and Diamond Peak (post) in the distance to the right.

Mt. Jefferson behind the trees.

The summit of Red Butte.

Once I was at the summit I headed south to an overlook of Mowich Lake.

The two Dixie Lakes are visible in the forest to the left of Mowich Lake.

Three Fingered Jack, Mt. Washington, and the Three Sisters.

The Three Sisters behind Mt. Washington.

After admiring the view from this end of the butte I headed back across the summit to get the view to the north.

South Cinder Peak (post) between the trees and Rockpile Mountain to the right of them.

A little scrambling over the downed trees to the left resulted in a great view to the north.

Northern flicker

Saddle Mountain and Marion Mountain (post) to the left with Jorn Lake below and Mt. Jefferson in the distance.

Jorn Lake

Mt. Hood peaking up to the left of Mt. Jefferson.

Fritillary on thistle.

After soaking in the view headed back down the trail looking for a little shade to take a break in.

I used this log as a bench to have a snack and change out my socks before following the use trail down to Alice Lake.

Milk kellogia

I passed a little closer to the tents on my way back to the Blue Lake Trail then turned left and headed toward Jorn Lake.

Red Butte across Alice Lake from the Blue Lake Trail.

The tents on the far side of Alice Lake.

The trail began to descend toward the Eight Lakes Basin losing approximately 200′ in nearly a mile to a junction with the Bowerman Lake Trail near Jorn Lake.

Aster

Green Peak, Saddle Mountain, and Marion Mountain

Jorn Lake

I turned right onto the Bowerman Lake trail for a moment then took a use trail down to the lake.

After visiting the lake I headed back up the Blue Lake Trail. Two tenths of a mile from the Bowerman Lake Trail junction I veered downhill on a faint use trail to visit Red Butte Lake.

The top of Three Fingered Jack from the trail.

The use trail.

Three Fingered Jack from Red Butte Lake.

From Red Butte Lake I cut back up to the Blue Lake Trail and climbed back up past Alice Lake to the Dixie Lakes Trail junction.

From what little I could see of the Dixie Lakes Trail it appeared to be in good shape, so I veered left and headed for the lakes.

After half a mile I spotted North Dixie Lake through the trees.

I found a good use trail and headed down to the lake for a closer look.

Once again I decided to follow the lakeshore instead of returning to the trail and followed it to the southern end with a good view of Red Butte.

From North Dixie Lake I crossed a meadow and arrived at South Dixie Lake.

Woodpecker

Elk and deer prints in the mud.

It was a lot easier to cut back over to the trail from South Dixie Lake than it had been from Mowich Lake.

Not long after leaving South Dixie Lake the trail began to descend to its junction with the Santiam Lake Trail.

This was the only tree down along the trail which clearly receives maintenance from time to time.

The Three Pyramids (post)

Paintbrush

It was a total of 1.6-miles from the Blue Lake Trail junction to the junction with the Santiam Lake Trail.

I turned right on the Santiam Lake Trail and followed it 0.4-miles to the 3-way junction with the Blue Lake and Duffy Prairie trails.

Unsigned junction with the Duffy Prairie Trail on the left and the Blue Lake Trail on the right.

Since we had taken the Duffy Prairie Trail in 2010 I forked right onto the Blue Lake Trail which descended steeply to the junction with the Duffy Lake Trail in just a tenth of a mile.

The junction with the Duffy Lake Trail.

I turned left onto the Duffy Lake Trail and followed it 3.6-miles back to the car. There wasn’t much new to see on the way back. I still wasn’t able to spot any of the pikas I was hearing in the rock fields. Outside of small birds, chipmunks, and squirrels the only other critters I saw were a couple of grouse including one in the trail near the trailhead.

This hike came in at 15.3-miles with a just over 2000′ of cumulative elevation gain.

While most of the hike was on trails that we’d previously hiked I managed to get a small amount of new trail. While we’ve covered a lot of the area around Three Fingered Jack there are still some trails/sections left to explore.

There were a lot of people on the trails here, which was a little surprising given it was a Wednesday in September, but they were pretty spread out so no location that I visited felt crowded outside of the trailhead. The view from Red Butte is a really good one and well worth a visit. Happy Trails!

Flicker: Duffy Lake Trail to Jorn Lake

After three straight overnight trips it was time for a day hike. Our destination was the Eight Lakes Basin in the Mt. Jefferson Wilderness. The two most common routes to the area are from either the Duffy Lake Trailhead to the SW or the Marion Lake Trailhead to the north. The basin is a little closer to the Marion Lake Trailhead so this was where we decided to begin our hike.

We were surprised at the number of cars already parked at the trailhead when we arrived at 6:15am. Later we realized much of it was due to it being the opening weekend of hunting season. We had visited Marion Lake once before in October of 2014 on our way home from Central Oregon, but this time we would be continuing past the lake 4 miles to reach the Eight Lakes Basin and returning on a wide loop.

The first 1.8 miles of trail was familiar but some things had changed since our previous visit including the condition of the wilderness sign.

About a half mile prior to reaching Marion Lake the trail passes smaller Lake Ann.

On the far side of a lake a Great Blue Heron landed on a log along with some ducks while numerous other ducks could be seen on the water.

Shortly after Lake Ann we came to a split in the trail where the Marion Lake Trail headed left and the Marion Outlet Trail went right. Both trails lead to Marion Lake but the the Outlet Trail is .5 miles longer. They also lead to different portions of the lake, the Marion Lake Trail arrives at the northern end of the lake while the Marion Outlet Trail meets the Blue Lake Trail at the lake’s northwestern tip.

The main reason to take the Marion Outlet Trail though is to take a short unsigned side trail and visit Marion and Gatch Falls.

The trail down to the falls is somewhat steep in places but the views are wonderful. After visiting the falls we hiked to the Blue Lake Trail junction and crossed Marion Creek on the footbridge. Just beyond the footbridge the trail crosses a rock slide where the vine maple was starting to show its Fall colors.

After entering the trees again we took a trail down to the lake to get a view of Mt. Jefferson across the water.

We continued on the Blue Lake Trail which soon entered the forest burned by the 2003 B & B Fire.

The B & B Fire burned over 90,000 acres of forest and we would be spending a large portion of the day hiking through the burn. Some areas though were spared and one of those areas was a mile up the Blue Lake Trail at a junction with the Pine Ridge Trail.

By taking the Pine Ridge Trail we could have climbed up Marion Mountain, but we were leaving that for another time. Just beyond the junction a small pond reflected the rocky summit of that peak.

It was three miles from the Pine Ridge Trail junction to the next trail junction at Jorn Lake in the Eight Lakes Basin. A little over a mile from the pond was Jenny Lake.

Beyond Jenny Lake the forest around the Blue Lake Trail had all been burnt by the 2003 fire. The lack of live trees allowed for some big views through the silver snags and it was interesting to see how the forest was at work recovering. Small trees were working on replacing those lost and white pearly everlasting flowers made a nice contrast to the red huckleberry leaves dotting the ground.

The lack of trees also caused the trail to be exposed to the Sun which had come back with a vengeance after the previous weekends cooler temperatures. A short way from Jenny Lake the trail began a series of switchbacks as it climbed up and over a ridge before dropping down into the Eight Lakes Basin. The full exposure made this a really warm climb, but when we reached a saddle on the ridge the view of Three Fingered Jack with the basin below was worth it.

From this direction the first lake in the basin that we reached was Blue Lake.

We headed down to the lake where we were able to find a little shade on a rock along the shore.

After having a snack and cooling down we continued on following the Blue Lake Trail further downhill toward Jorn Lake.

Before checking out Jorn Lake more closely we wanted to continue past our planned loop a short distance to visit Red Butte Lake. We had scrambled up Red Butte in 2010 when we had taken a hike from the Duffy Lake Trailhead. We had turned around after climbing up the butte and not made it as far as Red Butte Lake so we figured this time we’d check it out. We wound up following a series of unofficial trails between Jorn and Red Butte Lakes which passed several nice looking campsites before finally bringing us to the shallow little lake.

We found a log to sit on and tried to watch some ducks enjoying the lake but it was just too hot to sit out in the sunlight so we decided to head back to Jorn Lake where some of the trees had been spared from the fire.

We took the official Blue Lake Trail back down to a junction with the Bowerman Lake Trail near Jorn Lake.

Before we turned onto the Bowerman Lake Trail we went down to Jorn Lakes shore.

While we were sitting by the lake a doe came down to the eastern end of the lake.

After she disappeared behind some trees we began to walk along the shore toward where she was since that was the direction we would be heading on the Bowerman Lake Trail. On the way a frog and a garter snake went from the shore into the water.

The best view of Mt. Jefferson came at the SE end of the lake.

We left the lake and briefly returned to the Bowerman Lake Trail but then quickly left it to check out a series of ponds between Jorn Lake and Bowerman Lake.

It was at Bowerman Lake that we realized it was opening weekend of hunting season when we ran into a gentleman who was resting by the lake.

Bowerman Lake was the last lake in the Basin that the trail passed and we were soon back into the snags.

The trails up until this point had been well maintained but the next 2+ miles on the Bowerman Lake Trail became increasingly difficult as numerous snags covered the path.

We spent quite a bit of time going over, under, around logs. Often times it was just easier to walk on top of them. Conditions improved after we reached the Minto Pass Trail where someone else had apparently encountered the obstacles over the Bowerman Lake Trail.

We were now following the Minto Pass Trail two miles to Marion Lake. Many of the vine maples along this trail were in full Autumn mode.

The trail crossed several springs and creeks as it neared the lake including the very pretty Mist Creek.

When the trail approached Marion Lake we walked down to the lake shore for one final rest stop. Three Fingered Jack rose above the lake on the horizon and we were joined by a number of tortoiseshell butterflies and a friendly Stellar’s blue jay.

The Minto Pass Trail had been recently rerouted, adding a couple of switchbacks, just before arriving at a three-way junction with the Lake of the Woods and Marion Lake Trails.

Back on the Marion Lake Trail we followed it for a half mile passing a trail to the lake’s day use area and continuing another .3 miles to the Marion Outlet Trail junction where we had begun our loop. We retraced our path from the morning spotting a garter snake and a large western toad along the way.

Unfortunately not all of the wildlife encounters were so nice. Between spotting the snake and the toad we had paused at Lake Ann for a moment and Heather was almost immediately stung by a yellow jacket. Several more were buzzing around and we ran to the end of the lake to avoid any additional stings.

What was supposed to be a sort of “easier” hike than what we’d been doing lately turned out to be a little more taxing than planned. Between the warm temperatures and exposure in the burn area and the stretch of trail covered in downed snags we were feeling pretty tired by the time we made it back to the trailhead. We had also managed to turn the 15.2 miles we had planned on into 17.9 miles by visiting the falls, Red Butte Lake, and doing some other off-trail exploring. It had been worth it though. The colors were amazing, we’d seen a lot of wildlife, and despite the full parking lot hadn’t seen very many other people along the way. Happy Trails!

Flickr: https://www.flickr.com/photos/9319235@N02/albums/72157673717910585