In search of gold

Ingalls Way (to Ingalls Lake)
9 miles, 2500 ft elevation gain (I don’t believe it, I think it was longer)

(Mount Stuart standing majestically before Headlight Basin and its larches)

Anyone who has listened to me talk about hiking this year has heard the names of two hikes mentioned over and over: Blanca Lake (with its light blue glacial waters) and Ingalls Lake (a shocking gem of a lake, with the possibility of golden larches on the way). I gave up on Blanca for the year after a failed attempt to reach the trailhead but continued to watch the weekend weather forecasts for an opportunity for Ingalls. Last weekend was it! Sunny weather, golden larches barely still hanging onto their needles, perfect. Unfortunately, everyone else thought so, too. By 10:30am, the trailhead parking lot was way more than full, and there were over a dozen cars starting to line the side of the road. This weekend was also the opening weekend of hunting season, and we passed many hunting camps on the way in, including one very reassuring sign that said, “Kill zone.” The last stretch was 9 miles on unpaved, bumpy USFS road that was pretty slow going.

 
(left: Mt. Rainier is watching you, right: crunchy ice threads on the trail)

Three trails leave from this trailhead. The Esmeralda Basin trail splits off pretty quickly, then the trail starts a nice series of switchbacks upwards. We started to see crunchy ice in shapes that looked like bunches of little threads (see above) along the trail, and there were light patches of snow as well. Despite the highs being forecast in the 50s, at 10:30am it was definitely in the 30s. Nice weather for hiking while the sun was out, but it got chilly pretty quickly anytime we would stop moving. We hit the first point of the day where we’d look and see teeny tiny people in the distance, far away and high above us, and think, “We have to go there?!” This happened a number of times during this hike. I don’t think I’ve ever done a hike where it really felt like we covered a lot of distance, maybe because so much of the hiking was on exposed surfaces where the distance was visible.

 
(left: a bit of meadow, right: golden larches)

At the 2 mile mark, the trail to Longs Pass split off, and we were encouraged with the thought that we only had 2.5 miles to go. Well, I still don’t believe the total distance figure, but that 2.5 miles felt way longer than the initial 2. We started the climb up to Ingalls Pass, the high point of the trail. As we got higher, we got some nice views of mountain ranges, a looming Mt. Rainier, and the tip of what supposedly is Mt. Adams. Around 1pm, we made it through the pass and dropped into the gorgeous Headlight Basin. We stopped briefly for lunch, admiring the view. Larches were a little past their prime and were starting to get pretty bare, but we did still get some golden color. We heard people talking about it being 1.5 more miles to go and had another one of those “We have to go there?!” moments. There wasn’t a lot of elevation gain left, but we had to traverse around one entire side of the basin to get to one last scramble that would lead to Lake Ingalls.

(picturesque meadows in the basin)

We walked through pretty meadows with creeks, tarns, and golden larches. There were a few campsites on the upper trail (we saw 3 tents) and more on a lower basin trail (similarly occupied). Despite it being October, backpacking was pretty popular. We saw a lot of people coming up all day with big packs. No dogs, though. Dogs are not allowed on the Ingalls Way trail, and I was happy to not see any rule breakers.

(left: cairn in front of Mt. Stuart, right: Ingalls Lake)

After passing through the meadows, the trail quickly got rocky. Despite cairns being gratuitously scattered on pretty much every large rock with a flat surface, we still lost the trail a few times. Finally, we found the final scramble to the lake. Someone earlier had pointed out a single tree at the top of a ridge (“We have to go there?!”) and it was satisfying to finally get there. As we dropped down towards the lake, the views made the work worth it. I think the best views are with Mount Stuart in the background, a little to the left of where we came in. Plenty of rocks for sitting and eating lunch or enjoying the view. A lot of people were there, but it didn’t feel crowded because of all the space. Supposedly there were mountain goats on the other end of the lake, but we were too tired to go and investigate.

(Ingalls Lake)

The hike back was long and got chilly near the end. We made it back to the trailhead at 5:45, a safe distance before sunset. With a 2.5 hour drive each way from Seattle, this trail makes for a long day, but completely worth it! At this point, I believe hiking season is over for me, and I couldn’t ask for a better last hike of the year.

~N