One night backpacking trip starting from Salmon La Sac. We headed up the Cooper River Trail at a quick pace arriving at the road crossing to Owhi Campground. We moved through the camp area which can get a bit confusing with the social trails and walking through peoples camps basically. Probably had been better to just walk the road to Pete lake TH.
A lot of cars at the TH and passed by a few groups along the trail. Stopped for lunch at the lake with many people already camped out there. I forgot how beautiful the views of Chikamin and Lemah were.
We then started our way up Waptus Pass. It was obvious immediately that not many people had made their way up there this year. Trail has some steep switchbacks that are often exposed to the sun, we stopped often in the shade when we could. At approximately 4000ft we started to hit patches of snow and a lot of mud/standing water on the trail. None of these were difficult to step alongside or over. Ran into a couple at the pass that was headed toward Polallie Ridge from Waptus.
The descent into Waptus was steep on some loose rock but we got down pretty fast. We found a nice spot at Quick Creek Camp deciding not to bother with the Horse Ford. Saw maybe 6 people on the other side from us. A nice breeze kept the mosquitoes away for a bit until later in the evening.
It was a beautiful moonlit night with fantastic temperatures. I opted for no rain fly which was great. Heading out around 830am the day was already heating up. Mosquitoes were out in full force for about halfway down the Waptus River trail pushing us to move along faster. Mud and some running water at points along the trail.
Overall the entire trip was a fantastic loop at about 23 miles and 3600ft gain. None of the obstacles along the trail were enough to cause any real issues. Only saw one other person along the river until we got to Salmon La Sac.
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