6 replies to this topic

[Weasel]

This was a hike I considered doing last October, but dropped in favor of the Odessa loop. This summer, I was determined to hike to Mills and Jewel Lake, and once I got there, I had plenty of time, food and water so I opted to make the trek over to Lake Haiyaha and complete the loop.
The loop starts at Glacier Gorge TH and goes past Alberta Falls on its way to Mills and Jewel Lake. There’s a bit of backtracking back to the Loch Vale/Glacier Gorge trail junction, where I picked up the unimproved trail to Lake Haiyaha. From Haiyaha, I continued down to Dream, Nymph and Bear, before hiking back to my car at the GG TH. Shuttles weren’t running yet in early June, or else I would’ve gladly taken one from Bear Lake to GG instead of walking the extra 0.8 miles.

***WARNING – Math ahead***
Total mileage for the loop is a bit hard to figure out because different sources give different mileage for the unimproved trail to Haiyaha. Official sources give the distance as 1.0 to 1.1 miles, Tom Veik’s trail guide shows it at about 1.6 miles from the Loch Vale/GG junction to Lake Hiayaha itself, while a sign near Hiayaha lists the mileage as 1.7, not including an additional .25 miles to the lake itself (which would put it at almost 2 miles total, about double the official mileage). In any case, it’s about 2 miles to the LV/GG junction, and another 0.7/1.1 miles to Mills and Jewel, respectively. Double that for backtracking, and I had gone about 4.2 miles when I started on the unimproved trail. Lake Haiyaha to Bear Lake is around 2.1 miles, and another 0.8 miles from there to the Glacier Gorge parking lot. So, without the unimproved trail, total mileage is around 7.1 miles. Adding in the questionable distance (plus another 0.25 for backtracking from Hiayaha to the main trail) brings the total distance up to somewhere between 8.3 and 9.1 miles, depending on which source is correct. It took me about 7 hours to hike, including lots of stops for photos (about 2 hours total at Mills and Jewel, with a couple photos here) and probably 15-30 minutes searching for the correct trail on the unimproved section (I lost the real trail at least 3 times).

[Weasel]

So now that the math is all done, I can tell you the hike was great. The trail up to Mills was in good shape, with a few wet areas from snowmelt, and very quiet. I think I only saw one other person until I got to Mills, and then several groups passed me while I was standing around taking photos. The bugs/mosquitoes were pretty thick around Mills and Jewel in some areas, but it was totally worth it for the views. By the time I left Mills around 10 am, there were a fair number of people at the lake and hiking up to it.

I met up with a very hungry and aggressive chipmunk on the trail near th e Glacier Creek footbridge. I’ve seen them run up to people in parking areas, but never out on a trail like this. She jumped up on a rock and begged for food to the point where I thought she was about to launch herself onto me. On the ground, she crawled up on my foot, and sampled the tips of my hiking poles. As I walked away, she followed for awhile until the next victim came along.

Ready to attack:


The unimproved trail to Lake Haiyaha is just that – unimproved, full of rocks and tree roots, and not always easy to follow. Because it doesn’t seem to get a lot of traffic, the trail can be somewhat faint in areas, and any trail leading off it looks like it “could” be the main trail. It’s mostly level for the first section (up until these pools), and then starts to climb and get wetter as it heads up to Lake Haiyaha. At one point, it appears you have to cross a creek/stream by stepping on a few large rocks to continue on the trail. On the other side, there are probably 4 trails to choose from, all of which die out into nothing. The real trail does not cross this stream (at least not here) but instead take a 90 degree left turn and crossed later on a footbridge. I was fortunate to meet up with another hiker along the way, and even though we hiked separately, we both managed to get lost at the exact same places, so we would combine forces to figure out where the trail was supposed to be, and then continue on our way.

The unimproved trail got increasingly wetter and more snow-covered the closer I got to Haiyaha. The only “bad” section was a 100 foot long walk across some steep snow, where a slip would send you sliding down about 30 feet into some trees. This wasn’t as bad as some of the snow covered sections leading to Dream Lake, as I would later discover. There were a lot of cascades along this section of the trail.

[Weasel]

Lake Haiyaha was pretty interesting. It’s surrounded by huge boulders, which you must scramble over to see the lake itself. I never did get all the way to the outlet end – I was getting tired, there were a lot of boulders to scramble over to get there, and it looked like a storm was coming. The trail to/from Haiyaha back to the main trail was at least 50% covered in snow.

From here, it was basically all downhill to Dream Lake. There were several sections where the trail was buried under a lot of snow – you could see where the trail was supposed to be, but had to walk 20 feet or so above it to be on somewhat level snow. A slip would mean an awfully long slide downhill, because these sections were pretty steep. I’m sure once the snow is gone there’s no danger, but the hillside directly below the trail is pretty steep, and with nothing to stop me if I slipped I was a bit nervous about crossing the snow. My hiking poles came in pretty handy here.

After that, there’s not a whole lot to report. I think just about everyone has been to Dream, Nymph and Bear Lakes. (I hadn’t been to Dream or Nymph yet). On my way down to Bear, I felt a few drops of rain, and saw some pretty threatening clouds. I made it back to the GG parking lot, gladly changed my socks (I was developing a small blister) and got out of there. About 45 minutes later, I was sitting along Hwy 36 just off Bear Lake road when a big thunderstorm came rolling through. The mountains I had just been hiking in were almost completely obscured by rain, there was lots of thunder and lightning, and I was very glad I had gotten up early and completed my hike before the storms hit.

I have some more photos here from this hike.

[Aaron]

Thanks for the report!!

--Aaron
(I love all the reports starting to come in! I love this time of year! Thanks to everyone who's shared a report with us!)

[weatherbe]

Great report Weasel! Thanks!

Weather

[Veik]

Total mileage for the loop is a bit hard to figure out because different sources give different mileage for the unimproved trail to Haiyaha.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

This is a problem for a lot of trails. Even the park service doesn't agree with itself sometimes. Take for example the Pear Lake trail. The trail list that the park service gives out lists the distance as 6.5 miles. But the trailhead sign says it's 7 miles. Sometimes you just have to make your best guess.

By the way, I just updated the Trail Guide for the Glacier Gorge area and made all the hikes longer because of the new trailhead.

[Weasel]

This is a problem for a lot of trails.  Even the park service doesn't agree with itself sometimes. Take for example the Pear Lake trail. The trail list that the park service gives out lists the distance as 6.5 miles. But the trailhead sign says it's 7 miles.  Sometimes you just have to make your best guess.

By the way, I just updated the Trail Guide for the Glacier Gorge area and made all the hikes longer because of the new trailhead.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I agree, the NPS doesn't agree with itself. I didn't realize that the GG hikes were all .3 miles longer than they're listed (because of the new trailhead) until I hit the trail. It's not a huge difference, but still...it is a huge difference at the end of a long hike. I especially remember the Odessa loop last fall, when I didn't find out 'til the very end that the shuttle bus stop was something 0.7 like miles from the TH.

FWIW, I would take your mileage for the unimproved section as being more accurate than the NPS' quoted figure. It sure seemed longer than 1 mile.