snow lake – wanderingyuncks

Comet Falls and Snow & Bench Lakes – 08/07/2025

After a wet Wednesday the forecast for Thursday looked a lot drier with only a slight chance of a shower in the morning and partly sunny skies by the afternoon. Our plan was to continue the waterfall theme from the day before (post) by visiting Comet Falls then check out a pair of lakes, Bench and Snow, before returning to Packwood for one final night.

It was dry but overcast when we arrived at the Comet Falls Trailhead.

The Van Trump Trail climbs relatively steeply for almost two miles to the base of Comet Falls. Total elevation gain is approximately 1250′ making this a fairly strenuous hike.

This footbridge is over Chrstine Falls which we got a view of the day before.

Van Trump Creek

Paintbrush

Several salmonberries were consumed during this hike.

Pika!

Fireweed

The steep set of stairs ahead were a workout.

Pearly everlasting

Beardtongue

Monkeyflower and yellow willow-herb

Unnamed fall on Van Trump Creek.

Rocky stretch of trail where the pikas were seemingly everywhere.

One pika!

Pika number 2, with snack.

Tall mountain bluebells

Confluence of the West and East Forks of Van Trump Creek.

Footbridge over the East Fork Van Trump Creek.

Bloucher Falls

It was just 200′ from Bloucher Falls to a viewpoint of Comet Falls. Unfortunately fog was hiding most of the view from the viewpoint, but continuing on the Van Trump Trail produced clearer views.

Comet Falls is over 300′ tall.

The best view of the morning before more fog rolled in.

The Van Trump Trail continues steeply uphill to Van Trump Park and can be connected to the Rampart Ridge Trail (post). Originally, we had planned on visiting the wildflowers and views at Van Trump Park, but after rearraigning our plans due to Sunday’s flat tire (post) and Wednesday’s rain we decided to turn around at Comet Falls.

Right about the time we headed back more fog moved in really obstructing the view of the falls.

Fog was now affecting the view of Bloucher Falls as well.

We kept our eyes out for pikas on the way down and were not disappointed.

Beardtongue

Pika with a mouthful of vegatation.

Stonecrop

Harebells

Penstemon

A pika and a thrush.

Blueberries

Twinflower

Chestnut-backed chickadee

Final drop to the trailhead.

Our 3.8-mile, 1250′ track.

From the trailhead we headed back toward Packwood for eight miles to the Snow Lake Trailhead. The trailhead itself was closed for repaving/striping, but we’d hoped to find a spot along one of the nearby pullouts. The two closest pullouts were full so we wound up driving 0.4-miles back up Stevens Canyon Road to the next available pullout.

The closed trailhead.

The pullout we parked at.

We had a 0.4-mile road walk to reach the trail.

The full pullouts on either side of the road.

While the trail is only about 1.2-miles long it gains over 600′ in a series of steep ups and downs.

False hellebore

Unicorn Peak in the clouds.

Gentian

The northern end of Bench Lake. There is reportedly a view of Mt. Rainier to the north from this rocky overlook however the clouds eliminated any chance of that today.

Spur trail to the left down to Bench Lake.

The spur trail was steep and very eroded. Heather took one look and said “no thanks” and continued on to Snow Lake.

On a clear day there would be a view of Mt. Rainier from the southern end of this lake.

Blurry great blue heron on the far side of Bench Lake.

After checking out Bench Lake I followed Heather toward Snow Lake.

Paintbrush

Footbridge over Unicorn Creek.

Arnica

Spur to Snow Lake Camp and the privy to the left.

Snow Lake

Sickle-top lousewort

Snow Lake from the outlet.

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Snow Lake Trail passing above Snow Lake.

Unicorn Peak

The end of the maintained trail.

Unicorn Creek near its source.

Tents at Snow Lake Camp across the water.

We headed back after visiting Snow Lake and while the clouds began to break up the sky didn’t clear up enough for us to ever see Mount Rainier.

Unicorn Peak with a little blue sky.

Nuthatch

We stopped at the overlook of Bench Lake again to watch some deer in the brush below.

No view of the mountain today.

Due to where we parked this stop came in at 3.7-miles with a little over 700′ of elevation gain giving us a total of 7.3-miles and 1950′ on the day.

We returned to Packwood for our final night. We had burgers from Cliff Droppers for dinner then watched the elk graze in the grass behind our room.

Group A

Group B

Another great day at Mount Rainier was in the books with one more hike remaining. The next morning we would be heading for the Naches Peak Loop where we hoped to see some great wildflowers and epic views of Mount Rainier. Happy Trails!

Flickr: Comet Falls and Snow & Bench Lakes

Mount Margaret Backcountry – Obscurity Lake to South Coldwater Trailhead

Waking up to a third tent at Obscurity Camp wasn’t our only surprise in the morning. I awoke at 4:30am to find nearly clear skies above the lake save for one small finger of cloud creeping over the ridge behind Obscurity Lake. We were getting an extra early start due to the forecast of possible Thunderstorms after 11am. The clear sky was encouraging, but it wasn’t long before clouds began creeping into the basin from all sides.

By the time we were on our way we were hiking through fog.

It was a fairly steep climb out of the Obscurity Lake Basin but as we neared the saddle between Obscurity and Panhandle Lakes beautiful blue skies appeared through the fog giving us some hope for views.

There were some views if we looked up but when we crested the saddle it was evident that the view of Panhandle Lake would not be clear.

Down we went back into even thicker fog. The trail crossed a couple of nice streams with marsh marigolds as it wound around the lake.

As we neared the lake we spotted a mountain goat lounging just above the trail.

It sized us up and kept a close eye on us as we passed by.

We decided not to go down to the lake figuring the view couldn’t be much better than what we had along the trail.

We continued on toward Shovel Lake. Once again the trail climbed out of a basin but instead of dropping back down toward Shovel Lake the trail passed above it along a ridge. On the far side of the lake was Mt. Whittier making this one of the most dramatic lakes in the backcountry but we never saw it.
The thickest layer of clouds lay right over Shovel Lake, but as we climbed the ridge we eventually rose above the clouds.

We were pretty excited when we realized we could see the top of Mt. Rainier in the distance.

The trail to Shovel Lake was near the top of the ridge which meant we would have had to descend a half mile back into the clouds to visit this lake. Once again we passed figuring it left us one more thing to come back for.

From the Shovel Lake Trail junction though we had a great view of Mt. Adams, which appeared to be wrestling with the clouds.

The trail continued up the ridge to a saddle where it was joined by the Whittier Ridge Trail.

From this saddle we then began our descent toward Coldwater Lake. First up was Snow Lake.

We had finally found a lake without clouds and as an added bonus we had a great view beyond to Coldwater Peak.

The trail swung out around the lake and as it did so we gained a little glimpse of Mt. St. Helens as well.

This time the trail went right by Snow Lake giving us an up close look.

The other nice thing about Snow Lake was the climb out of the basin was short and not steep. We quickly crested the saddle above the lake and began to drop into another mass of clouds.

From Snow Lake it was 3.4 miles to the Coldwater Trail and a footbridge over Coldwater Creek. We were passing through the cloud layer for the first part of this section so we couldn’t see much. The trail itself was brushy with thimbleberry bushes and vine maples.

The tread was also narrow and washed out in spots but passable.

We eventually got under the clouds and could see Coldwater Creek below us.

We were also seeing more wildflowers again and finding ripe berries, including our first thimbleberries of the year.

Trailing blackberry

Thimbleberry

Red huckleberry

We passed a couple of small waterfalls along side streams, one on either side of the valley.

The trail then passed above what appeared to be a nice fall along Coldwater Creek but didn’t provide much of a view.

Just after passing the waterfall the trail entered a forested area.

Hedgenettle

From there to the Coldwater Trail junction the trial alternated between small meadows and woods with occasional views back to Coldwater Creek.

Another trail crew from the Washington Trails Association was working on the Coldwater Trail on the far side of the footbridge when we arrived there. We stopped on some rocks above the bridge for a snack break and watched them as they worked.

We were now on familiar trail, at least in theory. When we had hiked the loop around Coldwater Lake in May 2014 much of the vegetation was only beginning to produce leaves.
Coldwater Trail

This time the trail was crowded with plants.

The wildflowers were out in force as we drew nearer to Tractor Junction.

A male grouse flew out of one of the meadows and landed in a nearby tree. It was the first one we’d seen in full display and was quite colorful.

IMG_2360 (2)

The views were much better than they had been the day before at Tractor Junction and along the 3.2 miles from there back to the trailhead. Coldwater Lake was clearly visible and Mt. St. Helens even made an appearance.

For the second day in a row we’d escaped without dealing with any rain showers and the thunderstorms had not materialized before we’d made it back to the car. Despite the sometimes cloudy conditions it had turned out to be a really nice trip. The views we did miss out on can now be our excuse for return trip sometime in the future. Happy Trails!

Flickr: https://www.flickr.com/photos/9319235@N02/albums/72157670492933452