Goat Rocks Wilderness Hike
'Elk Pass' to 'Walupt Lake'

This is a shot of the 'Goat Rocks', it was taken on the way up to 'old snowe'. The climb is real steep from 'Elk Pass', up to 'old snowe', but the view is really great. High cliffs and peaks, and everything is so massive.

This is a picture of the trail following the top of the ridge. There's alot of shale rock along the trail, and the trail along this section of the hike is kind of scary. Some places the trail is no wider than your shoe width and its a steep drop off on both sides of the trail. Shale rock is real unstable to walk across and it is sharp, so I suggest taking your time across this section. I'm hiking alone, which is not a good idea. I remember thinking to myself when I was hiking across this section of the trail, that if a person was to slip along this route and start sliding down the banks...it could easily be a 'fatal' move.
What also surprised me was that this was part of the 'Crest Trail', alot of people hike through here. So I figured that the trail would be well maintained. Well, most of it is, but this section of the 'Goat Rocks' is all shale rock, and I could easily see how it would be hard to cut and maintain a trail through that kind of rock.
The view at this part of the trail is absolutely breath-taking. Also, its a real exciting part of the hike, because of the way the trail follows the ridge and the 'spooky' sections you have to walk across. I really enjoyed this part of the Hike.

This is a shot of the trail leading down toward 'snowgrass flats'. The different flowers and plants are all in bloom, and there all over the place, its really pretty.

Here's another picture of the scenery going down into 'snowgrass flats'. I thought this split rock formation was kind neat looking. Well its been all down hill from 'old snowe' and the trail has been real good.

OK, here's another map, I've install a 'X' on the map to show our present location on the 'Crest Trail'. Again, the trail is marked in 'yellow'. This whole area is the 'snowgrass flats'.

If you would like to view the 'Large Map' of the entire route then click

These two pictures of a small stream is where I ate lunch. All kinds of flowers and the cool water was really good to drink. I figure its about 4 miles to 'Sheep Lake', thats where I plan to make camp for the night.

This is where I filled up with water, and this is just one waterfall that will be along this large basin route of the 'Crest Trail'. Looking at the map I figure that I'm about 1 Mile from 'Cispus Pass', and then another 2 Miles to 'Sheep Lake'.

Here's a neat picture of the rock formation above me. I feel so small next to all these huge peaks and cliffs. As I walk along the bottom edge of this basin, I can see the tiny outline of the trail, I will be making a big "U" and about straight across from where I'm at and up about 1000 ft will be 'Cispus Pass'.

This is a picture of the 'Cispus Pass Trail Sign'. I took off my backpack and I'm taking a break. This spot is located on the top of a ridge and the view is great. I just finished hiking up a pretty long and steep grade and it was a work out. It will be mostly down hill hiking the rest the way to 'Sheep Lake' and pretty much the same all the way to 'Walupt Lake'. Looking at the map I have 2 miles to go and I will be at 'Sheep Lake'.

Check out this rock formation, they are strangely shaped like long tubular hexagon pillars. Just click to open picture.

This is a picture of a little lake that has no name, that I can find on the map, so I called it 'Star Lake', because of all the stars I remembered looking up at when I camped overnight at this spot. Its located just below 'Sheep Lake'. My pictures of 'Sheep lake' didn't turn out, or I would of included a shot so that you could see what it looked like, its pretty good size and there is some nice place's to camp. I was going to camp at 'Sheep Lake', but there was to many hikers camped there. So I found this little lake just down the trail about a mile. This little lake 'Star Lake', has some nice spots to camp also.