Turn the Corner

Day 3, Friday, June 19, 2015
Start 42-155XL upper terminus of Lost Lake Trail, mile 1490.5
End 43-163WT, creek near Wyoming border, mile 1507.0

Way back at the Dumont Lake trailhead was a notice, dated 2014, of the closure of Lost Lake Trail because of fire.

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The notice was old and no longer in effect, and some ranger forgot to take it down. On the other hand, the regular trail might be rough going due to fallen trees or standing snags near the trail. Just in case I will try the alternate route suggested on the fire notice.
The CDT has numerous alternate routes, but I typically stay on the choices that have published GPS waypoints, which does include a few major alternates, but just a few. Luckily I had downloaded the alternate route map for Three Islands Lake Trail on my GPS app, and the trail was actually shown on the map, not always a certain thing.

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The trail follows a mountain stream for a couple thousand feet elevation change, and the map showed accurately where the trail crosses the stream, helpful since the first quarter of trail was completely hidden under several feet of snow.
Around 8AM the first glimpses of trail appear, and soon after the trail is easy to follow. Soon the trail was totally dry, so welcome after an intense couple of days trudging through snow.

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Just past Three Island Lake I meet two women with a dog coming the other way, day-hiking. Later, near Seedhouse Campground, I met a man next to an RV who was supporting a group of hikers doing a south-bound section. I must have missed them by taking a different route. They brought snowshoes to do the part of trail I just completed.
The man mentioned they had a lot of rain, and had to do a couple of wet-foot crossings through streams swollen with snow melt, in the section I was just starting.
I saw a sign for a bridge out, recommending a detour.

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I followed the likely dirt road, which came to another wet-foot crossing.

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But looking at my map, I saw a nearby disused dirt road, closed and nearly hidden by weeds. But the map showed a bridge over the river on that old road, and sure enough it was still there.

I started climbing a 4WD track past a burned area of beetle-killed trees, so shade was non-existent. By 2PM I was soooo hot– oh yeah, this is why I wanted to start the hiking too early.

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The rest of the day was on jeep/atv road, welcome for being dry and snow-free. Eventually the road climbs to 10k feet, and a few patches of snow and wet trail appear, pretty easy after the past days.
I camp near a water source, because I do not see certain water on the map for several miles. Perhaps because of snow melt we will find seasonal water sources. Let us hike and find out!

Author: Jim, Sagebrush

Jim (trail-name Sagebrush) codes audio software for Windows, Linux, Android, and embedded systems. When not working at sagebrush.com, he enjoys backpacking, which this blog is about.