Cramer Lake

Cramer Lakes and Alpine Lake July 1997

The Sawtooth Wilderness area has many lakes and trails to hike and explore. This is a three day hike and we call it "The Saga of The Four Lakes and Lake Creek". We did this in July 1997 and it was the first ever backpacking hike for Pam. Our packs were heavy. We took tents instead of tarps and even my pack was heavier ( I think of myself a lightweight backpacker) due to the additional weight of the tent. Pam carried a Sierra Design Clip Flashlite tent for herself and Max. Carol and I split the weight of a Sierra Design Meteor Lite CD tent.

There were just the three of us, Marge, daughter Carol and friend Pam and oh yes, Max. We started out from Redfish Lake Lodge and after parking our car in the hikers lot, we were ready to catch the boat which will take you to the end of Redfish Lake and to the trail head. This saves about a five mile walk on the flat following the lakeshore.

(The picture above is Middle Cramer Lake)

The elevation at the trail head is 6,600 ft ( 2012 m ). We have a late start today so we are planning our first night camp at Flat Rock Junction. This is where the trail to Alpine Lake goes right and the trail to the Cramer Lakes crosses the creek.

Before we left, my daughters Boss had asked her to see if we could move a darn old rock that was right on the trail. Well as you can see in the picture, we didn't even budge it, but it got good reviews; Carol and her seventy year old Mother doing Trail Maintenance.

The next day we decided to do a day hike into the Cramer Lakes, but first we had to ford the Redfish Lake Creek, we did this in the morning and it was not too bad. We hiked up to the first Cramer Lake and then up to the second lake where we ran into snow, so we decided not to try to get up onto the Cramer divide as we had hoped.

Now it is later in the day and we are back at the ford of Redfish Lake Creek, this time the water seemed higher and was running faster. Max the dog was a very good and quiet dog, but he absolutely refused to swim across the ford of the creek, so here in the next picture you see Pam starting out and carrying

Max across, and in the following picture you see Marge nearly across and yelling "Wow, this water is Fast" We all made it back to our camp, and had a good dinner, a little wine and then the mosquitoes came out and we dived into our tents for the rest of the evening.

The next morning we take a different direction and head up some very long steep switchbacks to Alpine Lake. Here the snow was just around the edges of the lake but lots of snow was still on the mountains.

In this picture at the lake, Max is making up with Carol. He is really a terrific dog, he never barked the entire time.

We are on our way back down in this picture and the wildflowers are in bloom and the weather is just right, nice and warm.

Back at camp we have lunch, then take down the tents and pack up all our gear. We hike back down to Redfish Lake and sit on the raft until the boat picks us up and we enjoy the ride on the lake back to the lodge. Once there we sit outside in the warm sunshine and eat a big hamburger.

We all had a great time, however Pam never did come backpacking again.

The picture below is Alpine Lake and you can see how much snow is still on the mountains and it is the middle of July.

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