Lakes Trail - Sequoia National Forest - Pear and Emerald Lake

[garyp]

Hello all I thought I would share my mini on my recent trip to the Lakes Trail in Sequoia National Forest.
You can find some information on the hike here.
http://www.redwoodhikes.com/SequoiaNP/PearLake.html

However I don't think that site does the trail justice.

This was an overnighter with my wife and I. Just something to have fun with and our goal was Pear lake. So we had to be up at buttcrack early to get to the ranger station to get our permit. Just a hint, on this trail it is impossible to reserve a permit. You would think you could but you can't. on the plus side the permits aren't hard to obtain.



You can only camp at two lakes out of the four, Emerald and Pear. Emerald has 10 sites, and Pear has 10 as well.


You start off in the middle of the parking lot in the and slowly but steadily work your way from 7200 feet to 9900 feet if you go the Watch Tower route, or you will top out at about 9600 feet if you go the Hump Trail route.

So for your first 1.8 miles it is a steady incline. The trail is pretty straight no switch backs at all.







At 1.8 miles you will come to a junction. Alta trail will continue on your right and the Lakes Trail continues on your left. Take the left and here is where the fun begins. Alta requires a permit as well.



The trail will start off slowly going up and then you will start your switch backs. In about .5 miles from the junction you will have another junction.




If you go the watch tower route, you go from about 8000 feet to about 9900 feet at the top of the watch tower. The hump which I have not gone on does rapidly increase in elevation from the looks of it.


On your way to the watch tower you will see things like this.

and this








When you get to the watch tower you know it. It is beautiful and you will have some great shots.






and when you look straight out you will see this.










If you have a fear of heights be carful. Maybe this isn’t the trail for you.



So after a mile of you leaving the Watch Tower you will enter Heather Lake. It is a nice day spot area. (No CAMPING ALLOWED) but the Brook Trout are good sized here. up to 9 inches.

You know your at Heather due to the log jam.





After heather lake you will notice that the trail levels out some with fewer switch backs but you will have ups and downs. Emerald Lake is 1.1 miles away from Heather.


Your almost to Emerald when you see Alder.








Now our goal was to get to Pear, however we met many back packers who were going to pear, and guess what? They didn't have a permit. So my wife and I decided to stay at Emerald due to less people. A group of about 15 college kids passed us and we said oh hell no. I can hear the partying already. I wanted to enjoy the outdoors not the party crowd so we decided to Stay at Emerald. On the plus side, Emerald and Pear does have Vault Toilets.

Since we were at Emerald we decided to look around, now we would have been there a lot sooner had my wife not dehydrated herself by not drinking water. When we were at the Watch tower she only drank .5 liters from the beginning to there. So we stayed about an hour until she finished 32 oz of fluid. Yes I made her drink it. She was pale and didn't listen. Next time I know she will listen.

So on our exploration of our overnight home we went to the lake and found this.




We had to bring 1 amenity. A chair. Yes it was wonderful to sit down.





We met a few friends while we were there.
<iframe width="640" height="360" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/-yGGioLAsbE" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>








I woke up at 5 am and watched the sun rise in the mountain.

I am going to frame this one.


I decided to do some fishing while we were there.






and about 11 am we packed up and headed back.

One thing if your going to do this trail, bring bug spray, the mosquito's are horrible. Worse at heather but they are there none the less.

[garyp]

Here are more pictures http://s810.photobucket.com/user/gar.../Lakes%20Trail

http://youtu.be/-yGGioLAsbE

[Dogwood]

THX. I needed that.

[rocketsocks]

THX. I needed that.

uh huh, thanks Gyarp!

[jimmyjam]

Nice. Thanks for sharing. I'm so jealous- I am going off to sulk now.

[jumbojimbo]

Great pictures! My son and I did the hike to Pear Lake June 2013 and had a great time.