North Fork Sauk River, Pilot Ridge — Tuesday, Jul. 31, 2007

North Cascades > Mountain Loop Highway

My son and I decided to make Pilot Ridge, PCT and the Sauk River trail our yearly outing and enjoyed the solitude and great views. We arrived at the Lost Creek bridge closure at noon and were on the trail following lunch. Walking in 2 1/2 miles via the road to the Sloan Creek campground went quickly as did the next 2 miles on Trail #649 to the crossing of the Sauk River via logs and the start up Trail #652 to Pilot Ridge. Drinking lots of water at the Sauk River and also along the first two thousand feet is most important as it is dry on Pilot Ridge till you arrive at Blue Lakes. We chose to set up camp at the top of Pilot Ridge having arrived around 7 PM. Good views in all directions. We broke camp at 7:30 AM the following morning beating the heat of the day to Blue Lakes. We had lunch rehydrated at the upper lake and then scrambled up Trail 652A and over the pass to Trail 650 dropping down to Dishpan Gap. We took the PCT 2000 north Indian Pass and then on the camp at Reflection Pond. We awoke late and hiked on up PCT past White Pass and then started dropping down on Trail 649 where there were some blow-downs and trail overgrowth. Red Creek was also a log crossing. Arrived back at truck at 6 PM.