Took the route up past Cow Creek Meadow and up the ridge to the Granite Peak trail & followed that a half mile to a scenic overlook of Upper Larch Lake.

I wanted to avoid the ford on the more direct Larch Lakes stock trail, and it was getting close to my turnaround time when I reached the overlook, so I opted not to descend into the basin. I stopped at the overlook for a snack & some photos, then retraced my steps back out the same way I came in.

17.5 miles round trip (including minor detours into Cow Creek Meadow & the Myrtle Lake shoreline) with 3500’ gain.

4-6” of fresh snow above 5,000 ft. I didn’t use my YakTracks, but the trekking poles were helpful. Probably a lot more snow coming this weekend. 

Lots of hunters out there on the Entiat River Trail segment of the hike, which is a multi-use trail for motorcycles & stock in addition to hiking, so I had to yield for bikes & horses a few times. Didn’t see a soul after Myrtle Lake, though.

Larches were a little past their prime, but still pretty.

My hiking partner and I spent an incredible four days in the Entiat River trail network. First off, many, many thanks to the pro crew and volunteer teams at WTA for your incredible work this summer! It did not go unnoticed and is most certainly appreciated. Even with the fire damage this valley is an incredible asset to the outdoors community and we are grateful for your efforts.

Day one took us four miles up the Entiat River trail (#1400) to Myrtle Lake, then up to Cow Creek Meadows for the night. There is one excellent camp in the trees just on the outskirts of the meadow, and if you meander into the meadows there is another camp about 3/4 of the way towards the back. While bugs were nonexistent, there was a resident deer that gave us quite the scare at night by coming far too close to camp before we realized what it was. (Rangers told us there is another friendly deer at Myrtle Lake they have named "Dorothy." Please do not feed the wildlife!)

Day two was spent climbing the Cow Creek Meadows Trail (#1404) up above Cow Creek Meadows to the junction with the Garland Peak Trail (#1408). Excellent work by WTA folks to clear this trail of almost every blowdown. While steep, the larches and views afforded by the Garland Peak Trail are excellent, in particular once you round the corner to look over the entire bowl surrounding Larch Lakes. After stopping at Upper Larch Lake for lunch (at a great campsite on the western edge of the lake) we descended back down to the Entiat River Trail via the recently cleared (yay WTA!) Larch Lakes Trail (#1430), continued up the Entiat River Trail, and then camped at an excellent site just shy of the river ford of the Ice Lakes Trail. We had originally intended to go over Pomas Pass to get there, but having done that bushwhack last October and knowing WTA didn't completely clear the trail we were not eager to do that again. (Note: While the Pomas Pass Trail affords amazing views towards Glacier Peak once you gain the ridge between Larch Lakes and Pomas Pass, the trail has a couple short bushwhack sections as you descend to Ice Creek, followed by at least a half-mile of total bushwhacking in a burn section followed by some forest as you get to the mouth of the valley at Ice Creek. It is not worth it until the trail is completely rebuilt. See WTA's article on their work and previous trip reports about how rough this section of trail is.)

Day three was spent day hiking to lower Ice Lake (#1405). The trail was in excellent condition and clear of almost all blow-downs. While the Entiat River does need to be forded from the main trail (about ankle-deep this time of year), the two crossings of Ice Creek can be made just fine on logs. The Ice Lakes trail is steep but doable! We decided not to scramble to upper Ice Lake due to incoming weather and cold temperatures (it started snowing on our descent). On our way back to camp on the Entiat River we noticed fresh cougar tracks and cougar scat that was not there in the morning.

Not particularly wanting to be around a cougar tracking us we hiked out on day four instead of day hiking to Entiat Meadows. As we packed up camp we heard a pack of wolves howling for several minutes no more than a few hundred feet from camp. On our way out we met USFS trail maintenance crew (thank you for your work!) who told us there is a pack of four wolves in the valley (we saw their tracks on our way out) as well as several cougars. 

All in all it was a fantastic trip, but do be aware that wildlife is coming back- meaning the forest is recovering from the fires! The larch trees are peaking right now but winter weather is around the corner. We had temperatures in the upper 30s overnight and upper 50s during the day, but colder in the high meadows and at lower Ice Lake.

Our itinerary:

• Backpack in to Myrtle Lake (Friday afternoon/evening),
• Backpack up to/through Cow Creek Meadows (Saturday early-morning),
• Backpack up/over to Larch Lakes (Saturday mid-morning), and
• Backpack out to the trailhead (Sunday morning)

Based on recent trip reports, it's worth sharing there are *new* signs posted along the trail which make navigating ultra easy; including a sign at the junction to head up to Larch Lakes. Note: the foot bridge here is still missing, we did have to "ford the river" on our way out which was a chilly mid-calf deep.  There is a "bypass" to avoid this, which intersects the Myrtle Lake. It is marked with a sign when approaching it from Myrtle Lakes but not from Larch Lake; you'll need to keep an eye out for the boot path as you get within a 1/2-mile of the Entiat River.

An extra shout-out and many thanks to the incredible crews from WTA up at Larch Lakes -- their efforts made a huge difference!

Here are some other highlights/details worth sharing:

• Myrtle Lake has a great campsite on the North end, plus a campground on the South end.  At the North-end camp, we were visited by deer. They were alarmingly comfortable with our presence and stuck around camp until well after dark.
• Cow Creek Meadows is gorgeous and worth the extra elevation gain to take in the views.  A majority of this portion of the hike is through burn, and just as the forest returned we were treated with ripening huckleberries.
  • Continuing up Cow Creek Trail to Garland Peak Trail was also through burn area and felt much better ascending than I would imagine descending.  The first 400-feet are relatively straightforward but the last 400-feet you'll have to go up/over a number of blowdowns.
• Garland Peak Trail is also gorgeous, offering a variety of terrain - rock, alpine views and forest; by far the best point of entry to Larch Lakes and the surrounding meadows.
• Larch Lakes are lush and generally untouched from fires.  We enjoyed the upper lake without encountering anyone else, until Sunday morning when the WTA crew staying at the lower lakes came up to continue their work.  Larch Lake trail down was a tad overgrown in areas but otherwise easy to navigate.  There is a spur option to avoid the river-crossing. We took the risk and enjoyed our mid-morning refresh getting our feet (and calves) wet.

Got to the Parking lot Friday evening and hiked to Myrtle Lake. We camped at the very North end of the lake and it was a great spot to stay close to the trail without walking to the South end. 

Saturday morning we hiked to Cow Creek Meadows, walked around looking for wildlife. On the way up we saw Marmots, grouse, and deer. The forest definitely felt like it was on the road to recovery. 

From Cow Creek we continued up to the junction of Garland Peak Trail, and we hiked GPT to the upper Larch Lakes. This portion of the trail was very beautiful, it was an Evergreen dream. At Larch Lake the mosquitoes were VERY bad. 

From Larch Lake we continued to Pomas Pass - it was very hard. The traversing gave me the willies the entire time. The trail I guess has been washed out because it basically does not exist, and on the steep slope with zero place to kick your feet in, it was very scary. Once you're done traversing and crest the saddle you get the feeling that "you made it" but the challenge still persists since there is hardly any trail and somehow multiple feet of ash to walk down. We eventually made it down to the Ice Creek crossing where we camped (prior to actually crossing since it was midnight by the time we made it here)

Sunday we crossed Ice Creek, water level was relatively low, threw on our sandals and easily walked across. We continued to Ice Creek Trail and we were finally back on a visible trail. YAY

From Ice Creek trail we crossed the Entiat river and made our way back to our car via the Entiat River trail. It was relatively flat, and cloudy so it wasn't overly hot. 

Just got back from a 4-day logout with WTA's pro crew along the Cow Creek Trail and got lots of work done! The crew had been out here the week before working up from Myrtle Lake, and this week we finished clearing up the remaining trail to Cow Creek Meadows and beyond. As of Thursday, all fallen logs have been cleared from the Entiat River trailhead up to about .25 miles from the Garland Peak trail junction.

There is still plenty of tread work and brushing to be done to really bring this trail into tip-top shape, but it's honestly looking pretty good.

The road to the trailhead is paved almost the entire way, and the gravel section toward the end is in pretty good shape with only two real bumpy spots. Plenty of parking at the trailhead on a Monday morning (and honestly probably every morning) and a clean/open pit toilet available. We only saw one group of hikers come up to Cow Creek during our stay, and passed by one other group on our way in who had stopped to camp at Myrtle Lake. Plenty of solitude out here.

Ticks and mosquitos are both out in full force around the meadows — I went home with probably 150 mosquito bites (no exaggeration) after our visit. Thankfully no tick bites, but I saw them lounging around on branches as we sawed.

The trail was snow free up until ~6200 feet, just below the Garland Peak Trail junction, and then it became quite snow covered — though I expect it will be melting out quickly after this upcoming weekend/week.