Four members of the Spokane Mountaineers left very early in the morning for the five hour trip from Spokane to the Two Pan trailhead near Enterprise, Oregon. We originally intended to hike along the east fork of the Lostine River and camp at Mirror Lake...we were so anxious to hit the trail that we accidentally hiked up the west fork trail instead. Fortunately, this mistake turned out to be a good one. Mirror Lake gets the most traffic; instead, we ended up having Minam Lake almost entirely to ourselves.
Above: Minam LakeThe plan for today: hike from Minam Lake to Mirror Lake, set up camp, and tackle Eagle Cap without the heavy packs.
Above: our first view of the lakes basin. Mirror Lake is the large lake on the left; Eagle Cap is the prominent peak on the right.Above: the view from Eagle Cap. The east fork of the Lostine River meanders through the valley on the left. Mirror Lake (and somewhere on the far side of the lake, our tents) is on the left; Moccasin Lake is on the right. The prominent peak on the right is the Matterhorn.
Above: the view of Glacier Lake from the summit of Eagle Cap (our intended camp for Tuesday and Wednesday nights).
Above: a snowfield below Eagle Cap. There are not many places where one can do this in August!
Above: back at Mirror Lake, watching the alpenglow on Eagle Cap.
Today we packed up camp to travel to Glacier Lake, but we split into two groups for the trip. The 'short hike' group traveled over Glacier Pass to the lake, a distance of approximately 3.5 miles. I was on the 'long hike' -- we took the route past Moccasin, Douglas, Craig, Lily, Lee, and Horseshoe Lakes, then up the West Fork Wallowa River and past Frazier Lake before arriving at Glacier Lake. This route was around 12.5 miles; it was a hot day so we stopped a couple times to swim along the way. We arrived in camp with plenty of time left to watch the amazing sunset.
Above: a black & white shot of Glacier Lake. We kept hearing/seeing rock fall from the large snowfield on the peak in the upper right corner. 
Above: sunset at Glacier Lake. The only thing better? Sunrise!
- Wednesday, August 15, 2007
Today I woke up at 6am, and I started taking pictures of the amazing sunrise before I even got out of the sleeping bag. I was afraid that the light wouldn't last, but it did. I walked three-quarters of the way around the lake (no easy thing, as rocky as it is, and me in tevas). I hoped to walk all the way around the lake, but was stopped by a section of sheer cliffs along the shoreline. I had to retrace my steps all the way to camp. It was 8am before I made it back, but I had taken some spectacular pictures and discovered Upper Glacier Lake and a couple small ponds along the way.
After breakfast we packed up enough food and water for the day and took a day trip over to Prospect Lake (no formal trail, but the route was fairly obvious). Prospect is deep and very cold, but I guess that's to be expected at above 8,000 feet elevation. We then scrambled up and over the ridge to drop down to Little Frazier Lake. By the time we reached the lake a storm had started to move in and it began to rain. We picked up the Hawkins Pass trail to continue down, then took the main trail back to Glacier Lake from Frazier Lake. By the time we got back to camp we could hear thunder in the distance, but the storm never did materialize.
Above: Minam Lake
Above: our first view of the lakes basin. Mirror Lake is the large lake on the left; Eagle Cap is the prominent peak on the right.
Above: the view of Glacier Lake from the summit of Eagle Cap (our intended camp for Tuesday and Wednesday nights).
Above: a snowfield below Eagle Cap. There are not many places where one can do this in August!
Above: back at Mirror Lake, watching the alpenglow on Eagle Cap.
Above: a black & white shot of Glacier Lake. We kept hearing/seeing rock fall from the large snowfield on the peak in the upper right corner. 
Above: sunset at Glacier Lake. The only thing better? Sunrise!
