Upper Mad River Trail, Blue Creek — Friday, Aug. 19, 2011

Central Cascades > Entiat Mountains/Lake Chelan

Easy backpacking through beautiful terrain, but the bugs are fierce and the forest service road very rough. Call the Entiat ranger station in advance to find out whether the trail is snowed in or muddy, and whether the trails are open to motor bikes on a particular date for seasonal closures. The roads to Maverick Saddle are poorly marked, and very rough and steep after passing Deer Camp. From Highway 2 take Highway 207 to Chiwawa River Loop road, then to FS road #6100 (marked Lower Chiwawa Road). At Deep Creek turn east on FS road #6101. Other intersecting FS roads are not marked, but when you reach Deer Camp turn north up the hill. This is where the road is steep and rough, and you will scratch the sides of your vehicle at some places. Very few passing turnouts but some great views from the road. I had to stop my van about 1.5 miles from the intersection of roads #6101 and #5200 at a relatively wide spot. (It took a 12-point turn with 2 spotters to turn around.) At the road junction, turn north (not taking road #5200 south) to the Mad River trailhead. Off-road pickups can get there just fine and then have plenty of parking and turning space near the trailhead. We took 7 backpackers up Upper Mad River trail (1409.1) to the Guard Station marked on the Green Trails map. The trails are well-marked and are built to motorbike specifications, which made it an easy hike for us. This was the first weekend it was open to bikes and the half a dozen bikers were uniformly polite and drove slowly when they passed us. There were signs of 5 or 6 blowdowns that had recently been cleared by trail crews. We had to cross bridge-less creeks 3 times, one that had to be forded and two that we could hop across rocks and logs. The trail was dry and snow-free, and consequently dusty. The wildflowers were out in force but so were the mosquitoes and biting flies. If we kept moving the bugs did not bother us, but when we stopped to camp and cook the bugs were awful. 30% DEET was not enough. Water is plentiful along most of the route. There are several established campsites along the way, especially at the turnoff for Lost Lake trail and the intersection of Mad River and Blue Creek trails. Past the Guard Station we took Blue Creek trail (1426) to "Two Little Lakes," marked Ann and Louise. Trail #1426 was still under seasonal closure to bikes and we did not see any on the trail. Nice swimming at the lakes if you don't mind 3-5 inches of muck on the lake bottom. Overall a nice easy hike with beautiful wildflowers that I may try in another season to avoid the bugs. The motorbikes were not as annoying as I had anticipated, but the bugs were worse than anticipated.