Northern Cascades National Park - Beaver Loop Backpacking

I took my annual "big" backpacking trip a few weeks back. Todd, Allen, Steve, and I went to Northern Cascade National Park and did the Beaver Loop trail in four days. We did the majority of our hiking on the first three days - covering 43 miles.


All in all the trip was decent. It definitely did not have the most breathtaking scenery for much of the trip. We spent a lot of the time in the woods, and the weather was only so-so. We got a good amount of rain while we were hiking, and some while we were sleeping. Luckily the weather cooperated when we hit Whatcom Pass, which had some great views, and when we were chilling in camp.


We drove up most of the way on Wednesday afternoon, taking off form work at about 3:30. After getting our permits on Thursday morning and parking my car at the trail head, we headed down about 1 mile to the Ross Lake "Resort" where we picked up a water taxi and headed up Ross Lake to Little Beaver. The weather was terrible. We the proceeded to hike another 12 miles to the Stillwell camp. The views were honestly pretty boring. There were some large Cedar trees and lots of wet underbrush -- but nothing all that exciting. Here is a photo of us on the shore of the Little Beaver river:





Luckily the rain let up when we got to camp, allowing us to easily get all setup. Stillwell is a good campground near the banks of the Little Beaver river. I would give it a 7. The views were not spectacular, but it was peaceful. We did not see anyone the entire day (after being dropped off) ... which was pretty cool.


We ended up having a campfire at night -- something that I rarely do while backpacking. This turned into our thing, and we ended up doing it every night. Thanks goes to Allen for being the fire master :). Stillwell camp also randomly had a lawn chair. It was quite nice :P.


On day 2 we took a 13 mile day trip up Little Beaver river to Whatcom pass. This was probably one of the highlights of the trip. The weather was good enough -- a bit cloudy but with patches of blue sky. It decided to rain on the way home a bit -- but big deal :).


Here is a photo as we climbed towards the pass:





Here is a photo (with some blue sky!) of Allen and Steve on top of Whatcom Pass with Challenger Glacier in the background:





Here is a photo looking down the Little Beaver River Valley that we had hiked all the way up through:





On day 3 we packed up camp and headed back towards Ross Lake with our destination at 39 mile camp (about 11.5 miles from Stillwell). About 4 miles in, Steve sprained his ankle. Doh. So, we got to our planned camp at about 2:30 (after making really good time), and decided to push an additional 5.5 miles out to Big Beaver camp on the Ross Lake. It is a lot easier to walk on a sprained ankle on the first day before it has a whole night to swell up. This turned out to be a great decision. 39 mile camp was not bad -- but it was not great either. The Big Beaver camp, on the other hand, was amazing.


Most of the hiking on day 3 was pretty uneventful. There were a few marshes and such -- but really nothing to write home about. Here is a photo of Ross Lake from our campsite at Big Beaver.





On day 4 Steve went and talked to some of the other campers at Big Beaver and bummed a boat ride off of them back to Ross Lake resort, decreasing our hike out (on his bad ankle) by 6 miles :).


Here is a photo of Todd and Allen standing on the boat dock at Big Beaver looking over Ross Lake.





Here is a photo from our boat ride back:





I am having some trouble uploading to my website right now ... so uploading my photos is going to be a bit delayed.