The Silver Lake Expedition

Silver Lake

Silver Lake is a georgeous lake perched just past Poodle Pass above Monte Cristo in the Mt. Baker Snoqualmie National Forest. But, I get ahead of myself! Silver Lake is also about 5.5 miles from the trailhead, 4 miles of which is relatively easy as it first existed as a railroad, then as a gravel road, now as a washed gravel road turned trail (aka, instead of crossing the bridge that was wiped out, you cross a very large log the size of a bridge).

You can see our log/make-shift bridge in the background.

The trail led to the historic and closed town of Monte Cristo, which was founded for mining purposes.

Welcome to Monte Cristo!

Unfortunately (fortunately?) the trail didn’t stay as easy. On one hand, we had to haul our beavy packs up a steep narrow trail. On the other, there were a lot less people that far up than there were down at the Monte Cristo campground. After a really long hike, we crested Poodle Dog Pass to the lake. I was a little worried about the attack poodles and had my knife ready, but they didn’t make an appearance. When we arrived, a group (of about 8 people) was resting and enjoying the view, so we swept in and found the best campsite. The other group ended up with a higher up site with a better view.  After setting up our tent, minus the rain fly that we left at home for weight purposes (trusting the weatherman), we grabbed our food and went down to the lake to cook. It was one of the absolute best places we’ve ever eaten! Well, most restaurants don’t have the same number of mosquitoes, but the view was gorgeous!

After dinner, we settled down in our tent to avoid the mosquitoes and fell asleep around 7:30 to the sight of mountains and beautiful blue sky. It didn’t last. We woke from our nap around 10pm to the view of dark clouds rolling in from over the peak. That’s the last time I trust a weatherman. We pulled out the one emergency blanket we had with us and started using our emergency line to rig a tiny rainfly over the most vital points. Fortunately a wonderful guy from the larger group saw our predicament and donated an additional blanket to the cause (he offered two). If that wonderful guy is reading this, THANK YOU! We spent most of the night hearing our makeshift, metallic rainfly blowing in the wind, but the feared rain never came.

Our Campsite

Our spaceship, er, tent with makeshift rainfly

It was all downhill from there…literally. We packed up early the next morning and hiked down the mountain. The trail seemed much shorter heading out and we were happy to provide information on the trail to people we saw on the way, experts that we were! After a cheerful hike down (I spent a mile or two singing), we drove back to Lynnwood, indulged in cheeseburgers and prepared for the coming week.

Our Trip Down

Adios Mt Baker Snoqualmie National Forest!

-JMB