Independence and North Lakes — Saturday, Jun. 7, 2003

North Cascades > Mountain Loop Highway

Not wanting to hike in extreme heat (anything over 80 is extreme for us) we opted for a pleasantly cooler Sunday. Coal Lake Road is completely open to the end with no obstacles. The views along the way are very impressive. Strangely, for as popular as Independence Lake is supposed to be, the road up was quite narrow in places. The trail to Independence Lake is snow free until you reach the far end of the lake. Admittedly, it was the hardest elevation gain of 20 ft I've encountered. The ups and downs over a mile were almost not worth it. But continuing on, our goal was North Lake (or the ridge above it). After Independence Lake, the trail gets really steep switchbacking upward. There's one huge blowdown we had to crawl under. We turned around at a small creek crossing at 4500 ft. Although snow was minimal on this trail, the snow bridge on this creek crossing looked to be quite tricky. Better safe than sorry. Except for minor patches on the trail, there are large snow patches at the north end of Independence Lake. Bugs were out but did not require chemicals. Several trees across the trail.