My first WTA Volunteer Vacation: A great bunch of volunteers, led by Crew Leader Jacob and ACL Bill, spent the HOT week drastically improving the last 1/10th of a mile at the end of Agnes Gorge trail. The rough, rocky, steep trail was replaced by 5 or 6 switchbacks, a crib wall, some drainage and some amazing rockery. This 2.5 mile (one way) trail, which straddles the North Cascade National Park and Forest Service boundaries, is popular with families and is now much safer for all. The trail ends at the amazingly beautiful Agnes Gorge, where glacier water roars by and beautiful waterfalls pour down the mountainside. Trails end is the perfect spot for lunch. Speaking of lunch, keep your kids, and packs, close by. A bear explored one of our packs and ate part of a lunch. The trail has a couple of stream crossings, expect potentially wet feet. There are also a couple of narrow areas with very steep drop offs. Walk slowly and Hang on to the little ones. It was a great volunteer experience, I learned a lot, made some memories and I can't wait to do it again! Thanks to Jacob, Bill, Don, Suzy, Carmen, Lori, Kathy, Andrew, Chelsey, Teresa and Geneva.

We spent the weekend of the 4th of July hiking around Stehekin. It's a very special place and I would encourage everyone to visit. We left on Wednesday afternoon and camped at Daroga State Park near Chelan. Thursday saw us on the Lady Express. We disembarked at Stehekin Landing, made a dash to the Golden West Visitor Center to get camping permits, and hopped on the 11:00 shuttle bus to High Bridge, our base for the next two nights. Bill the hilariously cantankerous driver took us to High Bridge with a stop at the legendary bakery to pick up lunch to go. The hike to Agnes Gorge is nice but not astounding. There's a scary section if you're afraid of heights where the narrow path hugs a sheer cliff overlooking a bend in the gorge. Occasionally the forest opened up to give us a look at Agnes Peak, which we would see in all glory the next day. Friday we got up to hike McGregor Mountain. The trail information indicated that there was little to no water on the trail, and we spent a lot of time attempting to refill a bottle using a filter on the scummy Coon/Howard Lake. This was a waste of time as there are several creeks near the trail. There is a dry stretch of 2-3 miles after Coon Lake, but we found regular water sources further up the trail. This hike is great because you get out of the trees and into the wide-open views early. We encountered steep snow at around 6400' and turned back shortly after that because we did not have the gear for steep snow travel. The views up to that point over the North Cascades were phenomenal and we did not meet a single other hiker on the trail. Despite the elevation gain, the trail didn't feel too grueling due to the numerous switchbacks. The next day we took the shuttle back into Stehekin, with another bakery stop, and hiked Purple Pass. This was the only 'meh' day for me. Because of the shuttle schedule, we didn't get on the trail until 11:00, and the sun was already fierce. Treeline is high on this trail, switchbacks are relentless, and views over Lake Chelan are tantalizing but always partially blocked by dry trees. The brush is out of control; I was wearing shorts and got scratched pretty badly while whacking through the knee-deep growth. We met a couple of NPS trail maintenance workers low on the trail who had cleared the brush and blowdowns up to that point. They said they were the only workers in the district this year due to the sequestration We got to about 6500' before reaching our turnaround time. I'd recommend this hike only if you can start early enough to reach Boulder Butte, which previous trip reports recommend. On Sunday we made a last visit to the bakery and the Garden, a small farm and creamery. The farmer sells goat milk lassis with banana and carob. This might sound scary but they are delicious. Beautiful weather all weekend with the exception of a brief thunderstorm and downpour late on Saturday night. Photos at http://www.flickr.com/photos/laurajacobsen/sets/72157634583998419/

This is a spectacular gorge and the view from the trail is exceptional. We loaded our bikes onto the Stehekin bus and took it to the end of the road at High Bridge. From there, we hiked the beautiful 2.5 miles to the end of the trail. The dogwood were in full bloom and the greenery lovely. This is a great hike for older children but there are a couple steep sections where it would be very important to keep them close at hand. At the end of the trail, we made our way down to the water's edge by continuing to head upstream and there are some very easy ways to get to the water. We retraced our steps and then headed down the road on our bikes - stopping at the wonderful Bakery on our return. We loved the combination of bus, hike, bike, and bakery buns!

Highbridge to Holden This was a hike of solitude Once on the trail we didn’t see anyone other than our own party for the first 3 days. (Pretty amazing for a PCT hike!) It’s pretty much an old growth forest hike until we started toward Cloudy Pass (above the tree line) Travel to our route involved riding a passenger ferry up Lake Chelan to the small town of Stehekin. From there a bus ($5)is available to take you 10 miles to High Bridge (our starting point.) There are 2 ferry options and we were glad we took the fast boat (Lady Express.) It cost more money (about $20 more) but it got us on the trail 1hour 45 minutes earlier. Once at the trail head (around 1:30pm) we ate our lunch and started out. The first interesting thing was the sign marking the trailhead confused us and we hiked the first 2.5 miles on the wrong trail (Agnes Gorge). It parallels Agnes Creek but on the North side of the gorge. When we cane to the end of the trail we backtracked and located the Agnes Creek trail and were off. We made it to Five Mile Camp where we spent our first night. All along the way all the camps we used easily accommodated our party of 10 and we found water always nearby. Here we managed to locate some misquotes, but not bad. Day 2 took us to Hemlock Camp where we encountered enough misquotes to move us up the trail to Glacier Creek camp (which was outstanding!) Just at Glacier Creek we had to wade a creek (around 12 inches deep and flowing fast.) Day 3 took us to South Angus Creek trail which was quite brushy. It looked like no other hikers had been through (not even tracks in the few small snow patches.) We continued over Cloudy Pass (6,400 feet with fantastic views!) and down past Lyman Lake to Heart Lake for the night. Here we waded a creek for the second and last time. Heart Lake is a beautiful place with fewer bugs than Lyman Lake. Day 4 was a short hike into Holden Village. This is a large Christian retreat camp which occupies an abandoned mining town (remember those “happy Lutherans” someone reported earlier.). From there you can get a meal and a bus ride to Lake Chelan ($11 donation) or hike the remaining 15 miles down Railroad Creek to the lake. We chose to remain in Holden Village 4 more days (reservations advised.) Overall the trail was great. No blow downs were encountered in 35 miles. Lots of bear sign (but saw none ourselves.) Bugs-plenty of fly and misquotes. Brush- yes- plenty.

With all the snowmelt, the water is really pounding. It makes the hike even better than I imagine it normally would be. The trail is in great shape.