Lost Lake- Mt Hood 4/12/14

PH Field Guide

5.5 miles 280' EG
Garmin Track 

Today we headed up to check out Lost Lake in the Mt Hood National forest. 

View of Mt Hood from Dee

We arrived around 1130 am and there were a handful if cars there.

The road into the day-use are is still gated, so we parked just outside of the gate and hiked down the road toward the lake.

Entry Hut

From the day-use area, we headed around the lake trail in a counter-clockwise fashion.  

We stopped at the dock in front of the lodge and then continued on.

As we rounded the lake, we quickly came to a nice viewpoint of Mt Hood.

Mt Hood from Lost Lake

crystal clear water

enjoying the view

The trail was in pretty good condition. There were only a few blow downs that we had to navigate around.

one of the blow downs

a fungus among us

there are boardwalks along a lot of the trail

a cabin on the far side of the lake

rootball

a small waterfall running over fire red roots

hills on the other side of the lake

The worst part of the trail were the dozen or so snowfields we came across.  About half of them were pretty sizable ones and we post-holed our way through them with only a minor injury.

bandana doubles as a wrist wrap

one of the deeper spots

a view of the snowbank from the other side of the lake

We completed the loop and decided to stop at a lake viewpoint for some lunch and sunbathing.

Diego in his throne

our lunch spot

We ended up spending about an hour just soaking up the sun on the bench before heading back to the car.

Diego enjoying the sun

On the way home, we stopped at the East Wind drive-in for an ice cream cone (we ended up waiting about 40 minutes for 10 minutes of tasty treat).

It was a nice outing that ended up more of a challenge than we anticipated.