Soda Peaks Lake, Trapper Creek — Monday, Jun. 20, 2016

Southwest Washington > Lewis River Region

After failing to make it all the way to the lake last time, I decided to try again today. I took the longer route from the Trapper Creek trail. As other trip reports have mentioned, it is pretty steep once you get on the Soda Peaks trail, with the first few switchbacks being the worst. Once you get up onto the ridge it's not as steep, though it does still keep going up. On the bright side, it's straight down when you're on your way back. There are a few downed trees and some areas are overgrown and/or eroded. A couple of the trees are pretty big, but it's possible to go around, climb over, or crawl under all of them. All of the trees but one are on the Soda Peaks trail. There's now one down on the Trapper Creek trail, between where 132 branches off and the Soda Peaks trail begins. You can get around it, but it's definitely blocking the trail. As far as the overgrown areas, they weren't horrible, but I did regret wearing a tank top. The lake is beautiful. I ate my lunch by it and then sat there relaxing for about an hour. I saw a number of fish and a little tiny crawdad. It's a very nice place, and a good spot to rest after all those switchbacks. The bugs weren't too terrible on the trail, but they did get a bit annoying down by the lake. I got a couple mosquito bites, but I'm glad I was wearing bug spray or I probably would've gotten more. All in all, this was a lovely hike. It took me about 2.5 hours to get to the lake and maybe 1.5 hours to get back to the Trapper Creek trail head.