A friend and I did a 2-night backpack up to Lake Ann to enjoy some solitude, and this trip not only met but exceeded expectations.  Yes, there were obnoxious yellowjackets waiting for us at the parking lot when we got there, but they were just curious and not in the sting-y mood, thankfully, and once we left the parking lot, there were no annoying bugs - yay! 

The trail is in good shape and easy to follow, though a little rocky in some places.  It felt like a steady grade much of the way on the way up with a few surprisingly long switchbacks once you're near the head of the valley.  Turn around once in awhile, you'll enjoy the view down the valley! Silly us (me, more accurately) didn't look at our maps closely and thought it was going to be a gentle stroll from the junction with the trail to Lake Ann all the way to the lake.  Well, we got a bonus 500-600 feet of elevation gain getting to the ridge overlooking the lake - oof.  But what a view!

Spent two nights at a nice spot overlooking the lake looking west towards much of the central Cascades - amazing spot, with barely another human soul to disturb the peace.  We had an amazing sunset and starry sky the first night, but the rain on the second day that briefly turned to snow in the evening clouded out our second sunset.  

On Day 2 we enjoyed an off-trail adventure past Lake Ann up to the wilderness boundary between Ingalls Peak and some lesser high points on the ridge - what fun! Saw some mountain goat fur up there, but other than that, a mouse coming to check us out at our dinner spot rounded out our wildlife encounters.  Even so, we were glad to have our bear can with us.  Mr. Mouse was persistent!

Saw a few nice looking camp sites in the basin as we hiked up, and saw one other person camp at the Lake on night 1, but it was just us on night 2 - yay!  I thoroughly enjoyed the sense of being out in the wilderness on this trip, even though you're not technically within a wilderness boundary.  I'd do this one again!

Aggressive yellow jackets in the parking lot at Esmerelda Basin and Lake Ingalls! We managed not to get stung but they were relentless. 

This trip report is a 2 night backpacking trip up to Lake Ann with a day hike out to Van Epps Pass. 

Started on a Tuesday with only 3 other cars in the parking lot. Headed up to Lake Ann via Esmerelda Basin trail. Didn't see a single person all day. Trail is dry and dusty as to be expected - still lots of water sources though. Stopped for lunch at the horse camp - seems like a great camping spot but the creek is all dry. Does anyone know if it runs in the spring? 

We counted about 4 campsites at the lake - 2 at the lake and 2 more tucked back with great views of the valley below. No toilet but this was the first overnight that I didn't actually see any TP around- yay! Pika, American Dippers, Ravens, and Marmots could be heard all day. Spent the first night in total solitude.

Day 2 we dayhiked out to Van Epps Pass. I was not expecting much from this trail, just wanted to explore a bit past the lake. I was pleasantly surprised at how scenic this little hike was. The meadow just beyond Lake Ann is gorgeous with the bonus of marmots running around. The hike down to the pass was varied in vegetation with a very interesting rock cave section and views of the mountains. The trail dumps you out at the jeep road and then a short walk up the road leads to Van Epps Pass. Amazing views of Harding Mountain, Icicle Ridge, Jack Creek drainage, and Ingalls Peak. I scampered up the little knob above the jeep camp for more views. Nighttime back at camp was breezy and little cool. No mosquitoes. Was joined by one other party at the lake that night but we hardly saw them. 

Day 3 the smoke had rolled in. We packed up camp and headed back to an uneventful hike out. Saw only three other people. A little bummed that the smoke obscured our views at the top of the saddle overlooking that lake but was glad we had them on the way in. 

We were very glad to have hiking poles after we turned off for Lake Ann, since the trail is steep at times with a lot of loose gravel. We had temps in the high 60/low 70s with a breeze - I would not hike or backpack this in high temps in the middle of the day. Most of the difficult, steeper parts of the trail are exposed. 

Overall a moderate backpacking trip for those who want something not too easy, not too hard. Plenty of scenery and not a lot of people. 

This was a loop hike from the Cle Elum River road.  We parked a bit up road 170, or perhaps it is road 160 (maps differ, and it is unmarked), from the Cle Elum River road.  The intersection is 3/4 of a mile past the crossing of Fortune Creek.  We did not like the looks of road 170 or 160 and so decided to walk it.

After about 2.5 miles we reached a signed junction with the trail to Van Epps Pass.  We took this trail, which starts on a jeep road then branches left.  This piece of trail seems hardly used--moss was growing on it, and it was faint at times.  We got our feet wet at the crossing of the North Fork Fortune Creek.  The trail was steep, gaining about 2000 feet in two miles.  Never saw the supposed junction with a trail shown on the map heading northwest toward Scatter Peak and Scatter Creek.

At Van Epps Pass there was a jumble of jeep tracks, an old sign mentioning the "County Line Trail," and peekaboo views into Jack Creek valley.  The County Line Trail was an old trail along the Chelan-Kittitas county line.  It ran from Blewett Pass in the east to, well, I'm not really sure where.  Trico Mountain, maybe?  Anyway it's fragmented today, parts obliterated by logging in the east and other parts allowed to vanish over time.  If you ever climb Iron Bear or Miller Peaks you will walk on parts of this trail.

The trail from Van Epps Pass to Lake Ann is a piece of the old County Line trail.  This is an excellent walk, through subalpine fir and flowery meadows, with views west toward the Dutch Miller Gap peaks, and Mts. Hinman and Daniel.  There were a few patches of snow to cross here.  Lake Ann was unfrozen, located at treeline under Ingalls Peak, with some larches.  After a break, we continued on the trail over the divide to the south, catching some views of Glacier Peak, and reaching the upper Esmerelda Basin.

We turned right on the Esmeralda Basin trail, crossed a divide back into the Fortune Creek drainage, and descended steep switchbacks to the jeep road along the South Fork of Fortune Creek.  Hawkins Mountain was in view the entire time.  The intersection with the jeep road is about a mile north of Gallagher Head Lake.  We turned right and walked about five miles down the road back to the car.

This is a good early season hike.  We reached 6500 feet without encountering any serious snow.  It felt like we were in the heart of the Alpine Lakes Wilderness even though we were outside the capital-W Wilderness the whole way.  There were rugged snow-covered peaks in every direction.  We met only one other party, a family in the Esmeralda Basin who had walked from the end of the Teanaway River road.

After many years of looking at this “loop around Ingalls Peak”, this finally seemed to be the year. But research of recent trips of the area in past years showed that the Van Epps Creek trail was severely damaged from a wildfire. With this in mind, we loaded the maps for this area in the GPS app “Topo Maps” on our iPhones and we allowed for extra time in this section.

Heading over Monday evening, we slept in our vehicles at the North Fork Teanaway trailhead to allow for an early start. With the early sunrise, we were hiking by 5:15 but it was couple hours later until we actually saw the sun. With the cool morning and nice grade, we made good time up the Esmeralda Basin trail to Fortune Pass to be greeted by a goat and views of Mt Rainier to the south and Mt Daniel to the west. The trail down to Lake Ann had some hard snow on it in a few places but it was pretty easy to get by. After we passed Lake Ann, we saw evidence of motor or mountain bikes in the trail but fortunately didn’t see any. The trail ends at a road that goes up to Van Epps Pass and then another road heads down about 0.8 mile to the Van Epps Trail. At that point the trail was actually a pseudo road. But after that ended we soon lost any semblance of a path as we crossed a couple streams. With the phone in hand and the brush not too bad, we were able to stay close to the route of the trail. We actually found a decent stretch of the trail, about 1/2 mile long about half way down. But the fire obliterated much of the trail in the Van Epss Creek drainage. An earlier WTA report indicated trouble picking up a GPS signal but we had no problems with a signal. Noting from the maps that the Van Epps Creek trail and Jack Creek trail are both very close to Jack Creek about 1/2 mile before their junction, we decided to just go straight downhill to Jack Creek. We brought extra footwear for this crossing but we were lucky to have a nice log jam to make for an easy way over. I’m guessing that the elevation of Jack Creek at this point was 4100 feet.

We had a little trouble finding the Jack Creek trail as it was further away from Jack Creek than we expected. But it was a pleasure to be back on a trail again. There was much fire damage in this drainage as well but we had no trouble following the trail. The trail crossed Jack Creek two times. The first one had a log jam to cross on but the second one we used our extra footwear. As we approached Stuart Pass, the bugs were a slight problem, particularly when we took a break in a meadow below the pass. From Stuart Pass, it’s almost the same distance back to the trailhead via Lake Ingalls or Longs Pass. We opted for the Lake Ingalls route which we felt is more scenic and it required less up and down. Arriving at the lake, we saw the first people of the trip and the first significant snow. The snow actually made it easy to get around the east side of the lake with a short stint on rock. Leaving Lake Ingalls, it was nice trail with a few snowy sections to Ingalls Pass. And then nice trail back to the Esmeralda Basin trail where we overlapped just 0.3 mile of trail that we had hiked in the morning.

From the Green Trail maps, the  trail miles show as approximately 20 miles but we probably cut off about 1 mile when we dropped down to Jack Creek before the trail junction. And my altimeter watch indicated that we gained and lost about 5200 feet. All in all, a very nice lollipop loop.

My goal was to summit Van Epps Peak (elevation 7,041 ft.) and also hit Lake Ann and hopefully not run into very many people. 14 miles and 3,700 ft. of gain later, my goal was accomplished!

Lots of wildflowers blooming including thistle, thimbleberry, stream violet, shooting star (many swaths of meadow filled with these beauties), paintbrush, Douglasia nivalis, short-spurred rain orchid, trapper's tea, Davidson's penstemon, Cascade wallflower, white heather, and much more. Views from the pass are good; views from Van Epps Peak are spectacular!

Too many peaks to name, but Stuart, Ingalls, Hawkins, Solomon, Harding and Jack Ridge surround, with beyond views to Rainier and Glacier. There were elk, deer, goat, and cougar prints all over the place. Lake Ann is surrounded by snowfields, but campsites and the lake are melted out completely.

I spent the first six hours in complete solitude—sweet bliss! There was a family camped at the lake. I encountered four hikers near the N Fk Fortune Creek crossing on my way out. It was easy to maintain distance and everyone was super friendly.

My route: FSR 4330-170 (road walk) to 4W302 (road walk) to N Fk Fortune Creek trail to Van Epps Pass to summit (there is no trail; you'll have to make your own way) to Lake Ann (heading southeasterly off trail for a gentler down climb) to Lake Ann trail and back via same to pass and back to car.

• FSR 4330 - Condition deteriorates the further up the road you go. There are some stretches of washboarding and some of Swiss cheese potholes, some of which could so some damage if you're not paying attention. 
• FSR 4330-170 (Google calls this FSR-160) - Intersection not labeled; if you hit Silver Creek, you've gone too far. AWD recommended to lower gate; high clearance recommended above lower gate. I parked my '01 Jetta near the intersection of FSR 4330 and walked the extra 2.5 miles.
• 4W302 (Van Epps) - 4WD high clearance required. Many large rocks and water running in the road.
• North Fork Fortune Creek trail - Marked; very steep in places; faint in the snow chutes/meadows, and there's one spot where the trail has become a moss-covered streamlet. To cross N Fk Fortune Creek, you'll need trek poles and some sturdy boots (or water shoes). The crossing is overgrown but I was able to cross without taking my boots off or getting my feet wet. As you approach Van Epps Pass, blowdown increases, some of which require rerouting off trail.
• Summit to Van Epps Peak - There is no trail; just follow the ridge line up, gaining 1,000 ft. in about 0.7 miles. Why would anyone return down this way?
• Down climb to Lake Ann - Again, there is no trail; I made my own route losing 850 ft. over 1.2 miles to the actual Lake Ann trail, then to the lake.
• Lake Ann trail - Boggy/muddy near the lake, with some minor blowdown here and there. 

Total distance: 14 mi.
Max. elevation: 7,041 ft.
Elevation gain: 3,700 ft.