Entered this trail and encountered quite a few blowdowns going up to Oval Lakes. None of which were terrible and are not huge trees- however still slowed my hike quite a bit. This is a old burn area so there isn't a lot of shade till you get closer to the lakes...plan for that if you're going in the heatwave and have plenty of sunscreen!! Mosquitoes at west Oval were godawful. The price you pay for beauty!! Overall: Trail was snowfree, beautiful, but expect to be slower than usual with the blow downs. Also invest in a mosquito face covering! 

June 30- July 2 2022. Jaw dropping scenery in the Chelan Sawtooths. We did a clockwise loop up Oval Creek to west oval lake. Camped there for night 1. Next day we woke up continued on to gray peak and it’s ridges. Traversed along the ridge to Courtney peak. Then back and up to the unnamed peak towering over West Oval Lake. Then dropped down to Tuckaway lake for night 2. Then climbed up out of that basin off route and found a little boot path straight down to Eagle Pass. And finally down Eagle creek back to the TH.

Gear: nothing special, we did this all in trail runners. Bring some wool socks for the snow. Poles could be nice but we didn’t feel it was needed. We saw another group with crampons/ice axe/helmets etc and we were glad we did not bring any of that. 

The Road: great shape for all cars.

Oval Creek Trail: Overall it’s in okay shape. Has some overgrown bushes early on but it’s not bad. The creek crossing near the intersection requires some thinking as it’s running high right now. We found a great spot just a little ways downstream to cross. The burn area is exposed so if it’s hot out this trail won’t provide a bunch of shade in the middle. There was quite a bit of blowdown on this trail. Mostly in the middle but it’s very notable and a little frustrating. The final climb up to west oval lake is pretty sturdy. The snow got more trouble some towards the end of this. At the very end we didn’t follow the snow covered trail and just went up. There are a few campsites at the lake, most near the outlet that are totally melted which we were relieved to find. Lake is 50% frozen.

West Oval Lake - Gray Peak - Courtney Peak - Tuckaway Lake:

We slept in and hit the trail around noon. Off and on snow up to the base of Gray. Quite a bit of snow in this area but not hard to navigate. We chose to kinda follow the trail and head across the slopes of gray side hilling in the snow. Once we got to the NE arm of Gray, we just went straight up it though. Another guy just went straight up the snow kicking steps to the lowest point on the ridge to the NW of gray which prolly was smarter. Outstanding views from all along this ridge, faint trail on it too. The tops of the ridge and other side is all melted so no worries about snow here. From gray I ran straight over to Courtney Peak staying along the ridge going up Courtney west side which was super fun scrambling and everything felt solid. Great view over there. Then back down and around the ridge. Quickly summited the peak above west oval lake. Then we followed the faint trail down towards Tuckaway Lake. Decent amount of snow in Horseshoe Basin. We followed for awhile but once we got closer to the lake we just glissaded down the slopes and walked across to the lake. There’s at least one campsite that’s melted there, it’s an AMAZING spot to camp. It’s seriously beautiful. Went for a quick dip in the COLD lake and hung around the campfire. Went to the ridge north of the lake for sunset and scout a route out.

Tuckaway Lake - Eagle Pass - Eagle Creek:

We just left the basin straight to the north up the ridge. Much easier than going around on the summit trail that looked to have quite a bit of snow on it. There’s a gnarly looking ridge that has a unmarked boot path that leads straight down to Eagle pass. Steep and rocky but doable with overnight packs. More snow once we got close to Eagle Pass. We got to Eagle Pass around sunrise so the snow was pretty solid. We had to do some sweet kick stepping to get down the pass. It was too hard to glissade this early in the morning. Most of the upper eagle creek basin is snow covered so we just had to roughly follow the GPS along the “trail”. I think closer to like 6200 feet it had less snow again. This trail was nice in the upper portions. We tried to go to silver lake but there was a deeper creek crossing to get to it and we didn’t feel like soaking ourselves. Totally doable, it was just cold and we needed to head out. After that the trail started to have a lot of blowdown like the Oval Creek trail. No way to avoid blowdown in this area. Closer to the intersection with main trail out it starts to smooth out. 

Bugs were only noticeable along the Oval Creek Trail. We didn’t notice them anywhere else, even at the lakes. Maybe we lucked out.

This area is absolutely amazing. Can’t wait to come back and summit some of its other peaks. Larch trees galore! The views into the north cascades are insane and otherworldly. It’s a huge sea of gnarly mountain peaks.  It’s a pretty safe bet with any mountain range named “sawtooth”. 

If anyone has any questions feel free to ask, the days before I was scouring the web for reports and snow conditions haha.

Side Note: Lost a red trowel somewhere on the Oval Creek trail. Fell out somewhere climbing over blowdown I’m sure. If you find it, congrats you got a almost brand new UL trowel lol

Three Night/Four Day Backpack/Scramble Trip - 6/15/2021-6/18/2021

Eagle Creek Trailhead - West Oval Lake - Oval Pass - Star Lake - Tuckaway Lake - Eagle Pass - Eagle Creek Trailhead

Side Trips to Courtney and Oval Peaks

6/17 And 6/18 Very Hot

Eagle Creek Trailhead - West Oval Lake (6/15)

Use of Logjam Downstream Of Trail Ford of Eagle Creek ~4000 ft Advisable

Numerous Blowdowns on Trail, Primarily After Eagle Creek/Oval Creek Trail Junction

Patchy Snow Starting at ~5300 ft

West Oval Lake Mostly Frozen, Significant Snow Cover On All But Southeastern Aspects of Basin

West Oval Lake - Star Lake (6/16)

Steep Snowfields With Early Solar Exposure Covering Basin East of Oval Pass

Ridgeline and Southern Slopes Clear Of Snow

Meadows Immediately Below Star Lake Basin Clear of Snow, Lake Basin Mostly Snow Covered, Lake Fully Frozen

Courtney Peak (6/16)

Southeast Ridge Snow Free

Oval Peak From Star Lake Camp (6/17)

Abandoned Scaffold Ridge Trail Difficult to Follow in Places, Numerous Blowdowns, Upper Sections Snow-Covered

Basin Southeast of Oval Peak Mostly Snow Covered

South Ridge and Southeast Face of Oval Mostly Snow-Free, Limited Snowfields Immediately East of South Ridge and High on Southeast Face

Star Lake - Tuckaway Lake (6/17)

Blowdowns on Chelan Summit Trail, Basin Immediately West of Gray Peak Snow-Covered, Patchy Snow Cover in Tuckaway Lake Basin

Very Hot By Mid-Afternoon

Tuckaway Lake - Eagle Pass - Eagle Creek Trailhead (6/18)

Very Hot Day

Sheltered and Northerly Aspects of Basin South of Battle Mountain Snow Covered

Trail Lost Under Snow After Crossing Over Eagle Pass - Our Party Followed Eagle Creek Down Valley Until Meeting The Trail ~5800 ft

Numerous Blowdowns on Trail

Large Log Immediately Downstream of Trail Ford of Eagle Creek Above Oval/Eagle Junction Useful For Crossing

Blog version (disclaimers)

Quick-and-dirty version

Access: Eagle Creek Trailhead
Round Trip: 16.7 miles
Elevation Range: 3160′-7816′
Gear: helmet, snowshoes
Dog-Friendly: with guidance

Approach

1. Hike the Eagle Creek Trail to the creek in 1.5 miles.
2. Ford the stream or use the log jam downstream to cross the raging water.
3. Continue hiking to the top of Eagle Creek Basin and camp below the 7040' saddle between the two mountains.
4. Climb Battle Mountain via the east ridge and return to the saddle.
5. Continue east on the crest and climb Snowshoe Ridge via the southwest ridge.

Highlights

• Expansive view of Lake Chelan-Sawtooth Wilderness and Glacier Peak Wilderness
• In-your-face view of Oval Peak
• Sunshine and solitude

Lowlights

• Crossing Eagle Creek
• First mosquitoes of the season

Summary: Epic overnight trip! The bugs were awful on several parts, especially along Eagle Creek and I found a head net useful. Substantial overgrowth on sections of Oval Lakes trail and Eagle Creek trail where long pants were useful. You are very exposed after leaving Oval Lakes before getting to Eagle Creek so sun protection was a must for me.

Did an overnight as described in Backpacking Washington by Craig Romano published by Mountaineers Books. This was an epic trip and very do-able in two days. We did the loop counter-clockwise, taking 4 hours to West Oval Lake, and 10 hours back to the car via Eagle Creek including the summit of Gray Peak. The first four miles of the Oval Creek Trail #410A traverse a burned zone and have substantial overgrowth where long pants are nice. As the forest transitions to green the bugs come to visit and they rarely relent the entire way. There are blooming flowers before West Oval, but just wait until you get to the Summit Trail! West Oval had three other parties staying the night, and we were the last to arrive around 6pm. There were a few other sites open and there is a toilet available. At night, the bugs were not terrible at West Oval but it was a bit colder than I was expecting.

I woke around sunrise and watched the nearby peaks light up for an hour before the sun finally came into view. Shortly after the sun came up, so did the mosquitos. They were pretty bad at West Oval starting around 7:30am and I found my headset useful here. We set out to summit Gray Peak before continuing on the loop. The trail to the summit, Oval Lakes 410B, was not entirely obvious in a few places but don't give up, it continues marching upwards to Oval Pass on your right. We missed the fork to the pass and continued along the Oval Lakes trail towards Middle Oval on the left before realizing the mistake. Deciding not to turn backwards towards Oval Pass, we followed a steep climbers trail to the summit of Gray Peak where we found someone had left a tupperware container with a note. It looked more like trash than a climbers log. We enjoyed the views of the Lake Chelan-Sawtooth Wilderness peaks, Glacier Peak, and Oval Peak for a bit before walking the ridge back to oval pass. From the summit, the Chelan Summit Trail is visible for a few miles.

We descended Oval Pass into the gorgeous meadows surrounding Tuckaway Lake. The bugs were not too bad here as long as you kept moving although I got a few occasional bites. Reaching the basin below Tuckaway, the way to the Summit Trail was not obvious to us, we used GPS here to find the trail.

Continuing along the Summit Trail views and wildflowers abound. There is terrific color diversity on both sides of the trail. Cresting a ridge, Glacier Peak comes back into view as well as Lake Chelan in the distance. Eagle pass and the trail we are taking up to Eagle Pass was visible across the valley. From this point it was another 50 minutes before we got to Eagle Pass. This section required some effort as you descend 850ft to get to Fish Creek Basin only to regain 750ft of that to reach Eagle Pass. The flowers continue to impress throughout the journey to Eagle Pass and even beyond down Eagle Creek.

At Eagle Pass, Oval Peak comes into view before you descend down the Eagle Creek Trail. From here it was a gentle downhill ride, but the bugs were relentless. Stopping for lunch or a break would have been unbearable so we pushed on. The trail leads to a crossing of Eagle Creek which was deep and flowing but not difficult to avoid getting wet walking across a small log. At this point, there is a connector trail that goes around Duckbill Mountain back to the Oval Lakes trail. This is not the junction point shown in many maps, including description of this trip in Backpacking Washington by Craig Romano. It adds a few extra miles to the total loop distance. We were not able to find the official path down Eagle Creek to the junction shown. this section is through burned forest and continues as such to back to the parking lot.