Glacier Peak Wilderness, Washington, USA

July, 2021

Glacier Peak Wilderness is a beautiful and remote area located in the Central Washington Cascades. Dominated by the 10,541′ Glacier Peak stratovolcano, the wilderness area contains deep glacial canyons, colorful lakes, and several popular hiking routes. For this trip, we chose an out and back, mainly due to time constraints and washed out trail reports that prevented us from doing the popular loop option through Buck Creek Pass. We began our trip at the 3500′ Phelps Creek trailhead. The bumpy Chiwawa River forest road out of Cole’s Corner made us glad that we rented a 4WD vehicle at the airport. Since our flight came in mid-day and the drive took several hours, we decided to camp at one of the many walk-in campgrounds along the road. We found the sites at Nineteen Mile Campground peaceful and had the night to ourselves.

The next morning, we drove to the TH and began a nice, 6.5 mile gradual 1900′ ascent to Spider Meadows along the Phelps Creek trail. Spider Meadow is a very popular spot for large group camping, families with kiddos, and backpackers wanting to get an early start up the Spider Gap glacier. The meadow is huge, surrounded by snow-melt waterfalls cascading down steep rock faces, and has a plethora of amazing campsites. Once we crossed the meadow we began the steep switchbacks up to the base of Spider Glacier. Looking down the valley we had just hiked up gave us a feeling of accomplishment, but the climb was only half done.

Now it was starting to get fun! We put on our microspikes and climbed up the snow fields of Spider Glacier. The views were spectacular, and we spotted several wolf spiders in the snow along the way. At the top of 7100′ Spider Gap, we could see many of the peaks and valleys of the Glacier Peak Wilderness area, as well as the beautiful Lyman Lakes below. Below Spider Gap one can descend via the large snowfield on the left or the scree on the right. We opted to hike down the snowfield until we spotted some cairns and use trails along the lower portion of the scree field. The trail is easy to lose and quite slippery; hiking poles came in handy many times. We found the trail alongside the turquoise colored upper Lyman Lakes and hiked a most scenic descent down to milky-white lower Lyman Lake. There were many campsites along this route, along with fields of wildflowers, gorgeous views, and seasonal streams.

From the stream crossing at Lower Lyman, at the intersection of the Cloudy Pass trail via Holden Village, we climbed another 1.8 miles up to Cloudy Pass in search of a scenic spot to make camp. The upper meadows were filled with white pasqueflower and curious marmots. To the SW we had amazing views of Fortress, Chiwawa, and Red Mountains. The mosquitos were plentiful in this area, and despite wearing bug nets and permethrin-treated clothes, we got many bites. We resorted to eating in our tent and brushing our teeth under our head nets that evening.

The colorful sunset and sunrise were breathtaking from Cloudy Pass! We positioned our tent along the ridge to have a view of distant Glacier Peak.

The next morning we decided to hike out to Miner’s Ridge and Image Lake. We took the climber’s route along the scree field to Suiattle Pass to join the PCT for a mere 0.8 miles until the turnoff for Image Lake. This trail was less used and quite brushy, and we enjoyed even more solitude along the way. There was an exciting creek crossing just above a decent-sized waterfall. We chose to soak our feet and wash off in the creek on our hike back. It was fun exploring ruins from an old miner’s camp, but the big WOW factor came while traversing along Miner’s Ridge. The views of Glacier Peak and surrounding valley were spectacular. This was one of my favorite parts of the entire trip. The meadows along the ridge trail were full over wildflowers and butterflies. We opted to eat lunch on some boulders overlooking the valley and heard (then spotted) some fighter jets circumnavigating Glacier Peak itself.

We hiked back to our camp at Cloudy Pass, packed up our tent, grateful the marmots hadn’t chewed their way inside, and descended to Lower Lyman Lake. We decided to push the 3+ miles up to the Upper Lyman Lakes to find a campsite. There were a few groups at each “designated campsite area”, and preferring privacy, we explored the area near the waterfall between Upper and Lower Lyman to find a suitable campsite. The cloudy waters of the upper lakes, due to rock flour from the surrounding peaks, were cold and refreshing. The weather that evening was brisk but the views of the peaks surrounding the lake made up for it.

The next morning, we awoke to very chilly temps and packed up to head out on our final day. We climbed up the glacier above Upper Lyman Lake to Spider Gap and enjoyed the expansive views once again. We had fun trying to glissade on our waterproof jackets down parts of Spider Glacier. It was bumpy due to melting snow and I think my tailbone was a little sore afterwards. We enjoyed soaking our feet in the frigid glacial waters below the snow and took our time packing up after lunch. We then descended back through Spider Meadow and along Phelps Creek to the trailhead and our waiting car. Overall we clocked over 35 miles and over 11K feet of elevation gain for a rewarding destination trip!