Trail is in great condition. The log jam is easily crossed. A little brushy down in the Chiwawa River valley. Clear of blowdown once on the ridge. Lake is clear and beautiful. Mosquitoes are ruthless.

The long placed log jam is still in place although a good part of it is quite precarious. Unless you are well-balanced and have no cares about falling into a deep pool, ford the Chiwawa instead just downriver from the jam. The ford is only ankle deep here-actually quite soothing and great for removing dust on the return. The first mile of trail is very brushy. This is getting to be a theme on many of our trails as maintanace crews are becoming a thing of the past thanks to the FS's lack of dinero. Also on this trail you'll need to hop over or scoot under about 50 windfalls. None create any major difficulties. The tread is in good shape and Scaefer makes a good autumn destination. No bugs at the beautiful lake basin. The lake itself is one of the larger ones in these parts. On my return hike I nearly stumbled upon a black bear half submerged in the ground foraging in a bee nest. I have only seen this in A.A. Milne books. It was quite exciting to see. That's one tenacious bruin!

FS rd 62& 6200 still has many trees down with much debris on the road from Chikamin bridge to Trinity. Snow is spotty from Atkinson flats to Trinty and there is a washout with water running across where the road used to be past the 2nd snow gate that is closed due to snow on the road. Buck Creek trail is under water at Trinity due to the Chiwawa River cutting a new channel to the east and now going through Trinity and putting almost 4-5' of water on the trail due to damage to the pond. There are numerous trees and debris along with as much as 4-5' of snow still covering the rest of the trails especially in the upper elevations. Just getting to some of these trails isn't even possible at this time of year with out the right equipment.

Our group of five backpackers, Linda, Teresa, Lee, Howard and myself headed to the east side of the Glacier Peak Wilderness for a 3 day weekend up at Schaefer Lake off the Chiwawa River Road. About a 1/4 mile from the trailhead is the river crossing, either via the logjam or fording. We decided to just wade the river, which felt pretty good on a hot day. Once on the other side, we scouted around for the horse trail, which took some time since it was really over grown with brush. It connects up with the hiker trail in about 200 yards down stream. Even the hiker trail was over grown on the lower section before the trail starts switchbacking up the hill side. There were several creeks along the way to cool ourself off on the hike up to the lake. The blueberry bushes already had berries for the picking. We stopped at the Schaefer Creek before getting to the lower lake for some drinking water, then on up to the bigger lake below Mt. Sylvester. Once up at the lake, at 5,131', we found a good camp spot on the southeast shore of the lake. With clear skies, we could see a zillion stars after the sun went down. On Saturday Lee and I headed up above the lake on the north side to find the trail that heads to D Lake. I had been to it back in 1989. We scouted around trying to find were it left the lake, but couldn't find it, so we just headed up to the ridge where I remembered the trail was located. We switched back up the hill side following game trails. When we did get up to the top of the ridge, there was the old trail. We followed it westerly into a nice meadow area with a small creek. Where the creek drops down a waterfall to D Lake, we could see the lake far below. This was the area I had camped at in '89. After hiking this rough trail again, I wondered how I had carried a 60 pound pack up there 16 years ago. We had lunch at a good view spot where we could see a couple people fishing in D Lake, plus views out to Mt. Maude and Seven Fingered Jack. After some photos we headed back to Schaefer Lake in the afternoon. The other three in the group had done some exploring around the two Schaefer Lakes and went for a swim under hot sunny skys. Sunday morning we headed out about 7:30 am. Stopped along the way at a couple creeks for some cooler water to pour over my head. The river crossing on the way back felt great after the hike down from the lake. The water was only up to our knees. After changing clothes at the trail head, it was off to the 49er Dinner at Coles Corner for lunch on the way home. The group had a fun time seeing a new area of the mountains.

The hike starts with single log spanning across to a logjam (first picture). It isn't too scary, but maybe me & my friends just have a good sense of balance. Anyway if it is, you can either shimmy across it on your butt or wade across about 60' downstream; the flow is already low enough that it wouldn't be tough. Just don't choose the horse ford (upstream) which looks steep, deep & muddy. The next 1/4 to 1/2 mile where the trail is really overgrown with cow parsley, nettles and other weeds isn't too fun in shorts. After that you get into 2nd growth forest where the well engineered trail switchbacks on the steeps and gradually climbs at other times. The real steepness begins after the only bridge on the hike (over ""Shaefer"" Creek according to the GT map--a typo?), but again it's a nice series of switchbacks and doesn't take too long to reach the border of the wilderness area where the flat begins. Only 1 blowdown left on the trail & it looks like some maintenance has been done recently. Took us somewhere between 2 & 2.5 hours to make the lake. The lake's nice with a series of great campgrounds. Just please remember it's a fragile alpine lake and there's a maximum party size of 12 heartbeats (humans, dogs, horses, etc...). It was a shame to see bits of paper towels & soap bubbles in the lake, and most of all step on dog crap while walking around it. Also had to pick up several pieces of trash on the way back down. Mosquitoes were present, but not voracious.