Echo Lakes from trail to Tamarack Lake
11/14/2023: Echo Lakes is beautiful. You can extend the hike to multiple locations: Lake of the Woods, Lake Aloha and others. It looks like a great place to go backpacking. The views are magnificent, but you will also see views of many cabins along both Upper and Lower Echo Lakes. Hiking beyond Echo Lakes towards Tamarack Lake, the views of the Echo Lakes is some of the best I have seen. Get you camera ready.
Marg’s Notes: Echo Lakes t Tamarack Lake. Left our place around 8:30 and drove out Hwy 50. Both of us felt a bit tired. Got to our parking spot ~9:15. Chatted with a guy, Dave, about rock climbing. There was a big burn area on the way in. a bit of ice on the road too. The trail we took was the PCT. It was a bit icy at the top. I used my poles today! Beautiful hike & views. Lots of rocks on trail. We have been here before. At the Fong cabin! Stopped for lunch at Upper Echo Lake at the water taxi dock. After lunch, we put on our spikes! Really helped on the packed snow & ice. Continued on up to Tamarack Lake. There was a short “trail” to get to the lake. Had some trail mix & headed back. Beautiful return trip too, but much quicker! Back to the car ~3:00. Back to place at 4:00.
Lasagna, salad, bread
Rod’s Ramblings from the Trail: Started hiking around 9:30, temperature is about 35°. We parked at the top because it's really slick going down the hill.
After crossing the bridge and going up the hill maybe 50 yards turn right for a beautiful view.
We are on the PCT, by the way.
We are about an hour in and maybe 1.5 mi or a little bit more. The hike is absolutely beautiful. There are a lot of houses along the shore, but they are well-maintained and almost fit into this scenery. It is Crystal clear out here with not a cloud in the sky. We have seen six people so far and we probably won't see too
many more I would think. A very nice hike as we come near the end of the first lake.
There is some up and down elevation gain along the lakes.
To the end of the first lake is it about two miles. It took us about an hour and 20 minutes to do it and we were not in a hurry to get here. We are taking our time enjoying the hike.
The only drawback about
this hike is all the cabins along both lakes. However, they do blend in well and the lakes are beautiful so if you just sort of block the cabins out of your mind you have a five-star hike. But if you can’t get over the cabins and really want to take some photos without cabins in them, then you have a three or four-star hike. Still, you are in the High Sierra, and it is just
flat-out gorgeous with snow covering the mountains around the lakes, so I'll probably give it a five star anyway.
Marg just reminded me that this is a trail with a lot of variety. You have the lakes, you have the granite slabs that make it the High Sierra, you have beautiful forest, and there's quite a bit of shade. It is very much “High Sierra.”
We had lunch on the little dock poking out into the lake and took a bunch of pictures. At 11:46 we are going to head up to Tamarack Lake and see how we feel.
On your hike up towards Tamarack lake, make sure to turn around and look at the view behind you as you make your way along. You will see an incredible view of the Echo Lakes and incredible picture opportunities. Don't
use all your film here though because I'm sure there's more to see. Just going to this location to see that lake where those two lakes makes a five-star hike for sure.
The wilderness sign, Desolation Wilderness, is 3.69 miles from where we started at the trailhead.
AT 4.42 mi, we have reached Tamarack Lake. It is beautiful, of course because we are in the
High Sierra. We are the only ones here and haven’t seen another soul for the last three miles or so. This is our turnaround point.
We turned around and headed back down at exactly 1:00
Created: 2023