A group of us hiked in to lovely little June Lake on a sunny day. Note that as of this date there is still a small section of road covered with water and an adjacent area with huge washboard. We did fine in a Subaru Outback. The trail in to the lake is delightful and very easy. At the lake one must go toward the far end to see the tall waterfall that comes roaring into the lake. We then found the rugged little trail that heads up to the Loowit Trail where we hiked westward a ways before stopping for lunch in view of St. Helens. The short trail to Lake June is a perfect family hike; the scramble on up to Loowit is not!

Using the WTA Hiking Guide map, Herself checked off Mountain views, Wildflowers, and Waterfalls, and wouldn't you know it, on the 7th of June, a place called June Lake came up! Love that WTA feature, especially when you seek somewhere new but are overwhelmed by all the choices. Filters rule.

While I note the road is "suitable for all vehicles", that's only true up to about 0.4 mile shy of the June Lake turnoff, which is 0.2 miles from the trailhead itself. There was a significant mudslide in March, and as of yesterday there was perhaps 1+ feet of water flowing across FR 83 in the wet spot and a series of 1 foot high-2 feet apart "sand humps" that will severely test any low-clearance vehicle. But there's a large level pull-out spot just before the warning sign sawhorse, and starting from there adds only 0.6 mile each way. NOTE that both the USFS recorded message line AND the human I spoke to at the USFS office stated that the washout was BEYOND the June Lake turnoff, and that you could get to the trailhead no problem. Not..exactly.

Trailhead parking held only a 4WD truck and a Camaro (??!!), and we passed those folks coming down, so we had the trail to ourselves. Wildflowers are blooming nicely; many of the trillium have gone past white to purple, but the avalanche lilies are just getting started. The creek is flowing noisily down in the gulch; it's fun to cross it on a sturdy bridge just before you reach June Lake, source of the flow. The snow patch we encountered before the lake was a surprise, but only covered five feet of trail.

June Lake is small but features an impressive waterfall (and a smaller, more hidden one to its south) whose viewing dominates your lunch stop. After a restful pause, we ambled a bit west to overlook the rockfall and stare up at Mt. St. Helens, which we previously had known only from the north side. There were other viewpoints on the way back, and we chose one (in the shade!) to get out the binoculars and count the climbers coming back down, as it was past mid-afternoon by then. We passed one other group heading up just before we reached the trailhead, but basically it was a quiet, peaceful day in the woods.

The obligatory stop for ice cream (the Lone Fir Resort in Cougar) was marred only by the fact that they had run out of soft-serve huckleberry. Guess we'll just have to return!

Date: October 14, 2023

Location: South side of Mt. St. Helens

Arrival Time: 8:30am

Number of cars upon arrival: 2

Road conditions: Paved the entire way including the TH parking lot. TH has parking for about 10 cars.

Weather conditions: Cloudy with a Solar Eclipse.  We could not see MSH summit due to the low cloud deck.

Trail conditions: Overall the trail is in good shape.  The Loowit has a few blowdowns that are easy to cross. No mud or snow.

Trail grade and tread: The trail is well graded to June Lake then steep and a bit scrambly up to the Loowit Trail.  The section of the Loowit from the June Lake junction to Chocolate Falls crosses about 1 mile of lava flow.  Careful balance and navigation using the markers (wooden and PVC poles) and cairns is needed.  Navigating this section in the snow, darkness or fog could be quite challenging without experience and GPS. The Swift Creek Ski trail and Pine Marten trails are in great shape. 

Hike features:  Shallow June Lake is lovely with a waterfall feeding the north end.  Chocolate Falls is seasonal and was completely dry on the day we visited.  There are nice views once on top of the lava flow with a small glimpse of Mt. Adams' summit. This is a nice loop with varied terrain.

Wildlife: None

Bugs: None

Flowers, berries, fall color: Fall foliage is quickly on the way out but the mushrooms were large and plentiful. Some of the best mushroom blooms that we have seen.

Number of cars upon return: 3

Mileage: 5.70

Elevation gain: 1,150

it was a foggy and misty day but still a great hike, the trail was dry. Slight incline on the way to the lake but lovely sounds of rushing water most of the way. 

Since this is such a short hike it really isn't suitable for an all-day outing so I hadn't visited June Lake in the summer in a long time. This time I combined it with another short hike in the area to create a full day of hiking.

We drove to the June Lake trailhead, which only has formal parking for 8 vehicles. Fortunately, we arrived early enough in the day to get one of the designated parking spaces.

The trailhead is now heavily signed to advise backpackers doing the Loowit Trail to park elsewhere (like Marble Mountain Sno-Park) and that cars left overnight will be ticketed. This frees up the limited parking spaces for day trippers.

As we were about the leave the trailhead, a woman with two teen-agers came down the trail and asked for help jumping the battery on her car. We stopped to help her get her car going. As we headed out on our hike, the woman made the rookie mistake of turning off her engine instead of keeping it running to fully charge her battery. Other hikers were coming down the trail so we figured they could help her if she couldn't get her car started again.

The June Lake Trail passes through forest that was logged and replanted before the 1980 eruption, so the trees are some 50 years old now and mostly block the views of Mount St. Helens up the June Creek drainage. The forest is not very interesting, but we saw some nice wildflowers along the way.

At June Lake, the environment is totally different. The lake was formed by a 2,000 year-old lava flow blocking the June Creek drainage and the lake shore is made of deep pumice soils. Willows and alders are growing on the shoreline and open areas have wildflowers including Cardwell's penstemon, partridgefoot and pussy paws.

We found a shady spot by the lake shore to eat lunch, watching birds and insects for entertainment. We counted four dippers at the lake and speculated that they have nests at the base of the waterfall because we could see them flying in that direction with food in their beaks.

Then it was time to hike back down the trail for Hike No. 2. The woman with the dead battery was gone when we got back to the trailhead.