A day for lakes, Mountain View’s and wild flowers makes living in the PNW so very special and this hike had it all.  To get to the trail head, take exit 54 off I-90 left at the base of the off ramp and then right on the frontage road with signed Gold Creek. Continue on the frontage road pass the turn off to Gold Creek and past where the pavement ends on to the forest service road for about 2 miles.  The trail begins on the road and after several 100 feet take the road to the left for about a mile. The trail is on your left from there.  The trail was dusty and a bit rocky, climbing steadily though an old logged out area.  Bring plenty of water for sure.  After about a mile you enter the forest and the trail gets to be much better up to the junction of the Margaret Lake and Lake Lillian trails, great options either way.  The first destination was Lake Lillian towards the left.  The trail climbs gently and had plenty of passable blow downs.  About 1/4 mile, on the right is a barely visible boot path that leads to the summit of Mount Margaret.  Taking the boot path leads to the summit with incredible views of Margaret Lake, the Central Cascades (Hibox and Mt Stewart were incredible!!) and Mt. Rainier with plenty of solitude to take it all in.  Leading back down to the main trail, the trail continues north, fairly level until the views of Rampart Ridge and Lake Lillian come into view.  At that point, the trail goes downhill at a steady decline, to the Twin Lakes Basin.  It was at Twin Lakes, that the bugs really became a nuisance.  Leaving Twin Lakes, the trail gets rougher and there is a significant area of impassable blow downs.  A make shift reroute about 500 ft long gets one around the blow downs.  From there the trail becomes very rough, steep up and down and rocky.  All passable but take your time and watch your footing.  1 1/2 miles and Lake Lillian is the reward.  The Lake is well worth the effort and beyond the lake is a rough climbing trail that takes one to Rampart Ridge and beyond.  There are several campsites however by mid afternoon, all spots were taken.  On the way back, a side trip to Margaret Lake was worth the effort and the trail from the junction to the lake is in great shape.  The Lake is at the base of Mount Margaret and is gorgeous in the fall with all the fall color that surrounds the lake.   

Hiked to Twin Lakes today. Expected snow, but got lots of streams and puddles.All the snow has melted. Parked at Hyak and walked on road 9070 for 2 miles. Technically you could drive on this road all the way to the TH. We assumed the road would be too bad, but it looks doable. Lots of potholes, but ok. 2 miles on the road and on the left you see a sign for Twin lakes. Took this trail and it took us to the lakes. No snow. Walked back and decided to do a bit of the Lake Keechelus trail. We found a trail marked with blue diamonds and cut through to the lake. Those stumps are amazing. Huge! First time getting close to them.Wandering around you need to go over various running streams. It's probably easier when not so much rain dumped from the sky. Cool area.

This is a morning hike if you are planning to go to lake. The trail to summit of Margaret is not marked. The trip report from wakf00 on Aug16  was very helpful specially in figuring where the trail starts after walking on decommissioned road.

The summit has tall trees on south so no views there. There is a ledge on the north which has nice views but there is space for standing of one person at a time so very small and with crowd will need to queue up to take photos there.

Did this on a weekday evening short hike. I used the connector ridge trail from Margaret to Lake Lillian but did not make it to laura lakes as I had a set a hard turn around time for myself at 5:30pm. 

Started at 3pm with almost full parking lot. I did not go down to the lake after I saw the lake was in shade from switchbacks going down to lake. rather went up to mount margaret which is very steep, similar to old mailbox peak type grade.Some people were still going up while I was coming down. Sun has gone down behind the ridge at 6:52pm and I was back at car at 7pm.

Most of the down trees had trail around them so they must have been down for a while, only two were on the trail and you had to climb over them. Fireweed on last leg. Fall colors at peak for most of the bushes and wines. Still a lot of berries, specially on the connector trail. If you are at second talus field you have missed the spur trail to Mount Margaret. 

We had a lovely hike to Twin Lakes and up Mount Margaret on the way back.  On the way in we were not paying very close attention and turned right on the dirt road that crosses the trail instead of just crossing the road and continuing on the trail.  Fortunately the dirt road ends up pretty close to the trail again and we only had to bushwhack a little through the woods to get back to the trail.  Twin Lakes is an picturesque little spot for lunch.  The dogs had a blast running around the shore and in the water.  We passed the spur that goes up Mount Margaret without noticing it on the way to the lakes, but found it on the way back.  The spur is marked with a cairn and goes up steeply from the trail to Twin Lakes and Lake Lillian.  The summit had views of the Alpine Wilderness to the north, the wildfire haze to the east, and a couple of the volcanoes, Klickitat (Adams) and Tahoma (Rainier), to the south.  There were ripe blueberries and huckleberries all along the trail and we also identified fireweed, sitka mountain ash, and pearly everlasting.

Day hike Saturday September 4. 

My intent was to do a hike made popular by experienced scramblers of WTA: Tinkham/Abiel/Silver peaks in that order. However I discovered I am simply not at that level of scrambling, so I made an impromptu loop of the area instead. 

I began at the FS-9070 parking area where the PCT intersects. Took the PCT south, to a cairn spur trail heading up Silver Peak, and followed a sharp left climbers route noticeable at the first flat clearing. This takes you up Tinkham. That's where it got extra steep and overgrown for a short while, prior to reaching a rocky area before attaining the ridgeline. Another hiker was around to point me in the right direction for the scramble thankfully, and I made it up. 

At this point I decided I wasn't able to make the return trip back down to Silver Peak trail, so I made my new plan. After summiting, I followed the Tinkham East Boot trail down to the PCT where it runs around Mirror Lake. Some sections of this are very steep prior to reaching the lake, although not as intense as my ascent prior. At the lake there were a few campsites still open, but I noticed plenty of folks still heading in for the weekend as I made my way past, towards the turnoff for Twin Lakes. 

Heading down Cold Creek trail towards Twin Lakes I observed an abundance of wild blueberry and huckleberry, just past the first few blowdowns. I spent an hour foraging in this area, afterwards I met a pair of backpackers warning me of a ground wasp nest (with aggressive wasps) they encountered near Twin Lakes, right off the trail. One of them had gotten stung and also mentioned a family of hikers were stung as well. I decided to doubleback up to the PCT as my route back to the 9070 parking area to avoid it. 

Best part of PCT was the frog in one of the ponds. Tried to catch a photo but it slid into the mud. 

RT 7.5m/2350ft 

To the "editor" at WTA, Twin Lakes is a place!  And a fantastic camping spot as well.  Look on the map!

From The Everett Herald, August 8 2021  A quote from you:

"Now we have a new tool to help hikers and trails. We recently released a feature on wta.org that offers personalized suggestions of hikes you might want to add to your to-do list. The new tool is designed to educate, spark curiosity and shift focus from a small number of often-recommended trails to the many trails that Washington has to offer."

Prove to me this isn't just lip service because you're losing readers to other sites, like the new one, TREAD, and leave my new entry for Twin Lakes up.  I've been pushing this idea for years!

Now my Report:

I didn't do the loop I came for, but did a loop just the same.

I was hoping to do a probably 20 mile circle around Gold Creek.  I left my bike at Snoqualmie Pass PCT North Trailhead.  Drove past the ski areas, parked the truck across I 90 from Lake Keechelus, at the end of the pavement on the frontage road.  I was going to ride my bike back to the truck at the end.

I walked up the gravel road to Lake Lillian Backdoor (Rocky Run Creek), about an hour.  I made it to Rampart Ridge above the lake in an hour, another hour to highest Rampart Lake.  There is still some snow around the lakes, like old times.  There were some people swimming and jumping off the rocks, it was hot!

At the Lila Lakes, I took the trail from the N end of the biggest one (with the island).  What I remember to be a good path disappeared in the meadow, I went too far R and wasted time figuring out where to go.  I knew it was going to take me another 2 - 3 hours at least to get to the PCT across the ridge top, with the hardest part just before.  I needed to get an earlier start.  Decided to take what I learned and come back in the next couple weeks to try again.

There were more swimmers in Lila Lake, lots of nice folks out hiking along the ridge, both the way I came in and the trail from Rachel Lake.  When I got to the downhill turn to the trail up from Rocky Run Creek I checked my watch, 3 o'clock.  Since my truck was at the freeway I decided to hike out past Twin Lakes and Lake Margaret on the official Lillian Lake Trail.  I wasn't sure how far it was but knew I had plenty of time for a one way.

Trail climbs beyond the turn, passes lovely Twin Lakes, postcard perfect with lots of excellent camp spots.  Caught up to some other hikers who assured me I had time to get to signed Margaret Lake and out before dark.  Took the steep trail down to the lake, got some pictures and headed back up.  Switchbacks are well graded so the climb out isn't as bad as you expect.

One thing there is no running water on this trail, only ponds and lakes.  Good thing I had plenty from the other parts of my trip.  There is an all summer source running across the trail on the east side of Lake Lillian, one above the highest Rampart Lake, a couple others.

Made it to the road, then TH parking.  2 cars, people I had encountered on trail, asked if I was alright and offered me a ride down, but I was close to the truck at that point so graciously declined.  Got to the bottom at 6:20, nearly 10 hours since I started.

This is a fun way to extend your Backdoor trip if you find you have time.  Wouldn't be a terrible walk from the Margaret TH to the Backdoor TH if you hadn't planned ahead, so no need to.  Or bikes, or 2 cars.

When I do my grand loop, I will get an earlier start (7?), and drive to the Backdoor TH rather than parking on the frontage road, worry about getting up to the truck at the end of the day.  Much of the gravel road can easily be biked up, and I could do it in the dark if I had to.  But this was good too, and I hadn't been to Twin Lakes or Lake Margaret before.

And this, the Chevron at Snoqualmie Pass has Michoacana ice cream bars for $1.50, less than in town!  Decent gas prices, too.