Jamie S

Jamie S

Grizzly Lake via China Gulch Trailhead

08/01/22

Grizzly Lake & the meadow are truly wonderful places! I loved our time there, the views are majestic. I wish I had stayed another night. The actual/factual As previously mentioned this hike is TOUGH! The first 1/4-1/2 mile is deceptively easy. There is a great deal of fire damage, leaving the next 1.7 miles uphill, mostly unshaded and much of the following 2 miles (steep decline) also unshaded. I would advise getting an early start. There are dozens of downed threes in the path, that you’ll either need to climb over or around - because of the steep grade, this can be pretty scary. Another very pertinent point …. If you have bad knees, I would rethink this hike or plan on it being 2days in and 2 days out. It’s not the distance that makes it difficult it’s the steep inclines with little to no break. There is probably less than a mile of “flat or gentle” ground in the entire hike. At the bottom of the hill you’ll turn left to go to Grizzly Lake, this next 2-3 miles is much less difficult & will let you into a wonderful meadow, it was full of beautiful wildflowers & birds, we saw a few bald eagles! It was amazing 😍 I was so exhausted that we camped our first night in the meadow. The hike to that point took us an abnormally long time. We did get turned around and lost for about an hour at a downed tree walk around we lost the path. Some maintenance is sorely overdue. Which brings me to the scramble. Yikes! We were fortunate to have two very experienced members of our group come back to take our packs up! I enjoyed the way up much more than the down (again with the knees). Actually if we ever did it again, I would plan to sleep in the meadow 1-2nights and up at the lake two nights. We still had a great time- I just found it tremendously difficult. For perspective though I’m 30+ lbs overweight and 3 weeks post op from a laparoscopic abdominal surgery. However, even though we are both a little fluffy- my husband and I do use our peloton bike regularly and walk 3-4 miles3x a week so we we’re surprised at the intensity of difficulty. Much of our group were teenage athletes and they were rockstars, two other sets of parents also did a great job, and didn’t have the degree of struggle I did. We were fortunate to have such amazing friends looking out for us. While this hike isn’t for the faint of heart, it will leave your heart full of gratitude and amazement for the beauty around us - if we’re brave enough to find it.

4.0