My wife and I hit the Rae Lakes Loop out of Roads End on Tuesday morning, September 19 after spending the night at Sentinel Campground at Cedar Grove. The plan was to complete the loop clockwise—north via Woods Creek to the lakes and then out via Bubbs Creek.
We targeted the third day to have at the lakes before traversing Glen Pass but awoke at Arrowhead to high winds and snow that kept us at the lakes for another night. We managed to make it to Middle Rae before the gusts chased us into our tent for the rest of the day. With reports of 6 inches of snow at the Pass and one less day, we decided to head back the way we came, and hoofed it down to Lower Paradise with a 16 mile day that ended up being one the of most beautiful and scenic days of hiking we had this year. We walked alongside animal tracks at the higher elevations and the aspens were turning in the meadows.
We walked out to Roads End at noon on Saturday, but not before stopping to enjoy Mist Falls all to ourselves.
It was an amazing way to close out our summer in the backcountry. Now it's time to scroll through the forum archives for trip ideas for next year.
As an off-note: A NPS crew was just finishing up replacing the wooden slats on the Woods Creek Suspension Bridge with steel grating.
- Exploring the pools up the Paradise Valley.
- Couldn't believe how fun pulling these out of the South Fork Kings was.
- The outlet from Arrowhead to Dollar Lake.
- Brookies and rainbows were stacked in the outlet like I've never seen.
- Fin Dome peeking through the fog.
- Middle Rae after the snow passed through.
- Of all the tracks, these were some of my favorites.
- Mist Falls in the morning.
