First trail run of the year

So for the first run on the year I decided I would run on a trail that I was somewhat familiar with. I even though I have not set foot on this trail in 10 plus years. So off to the trail-head I went.

Lake Serene
The trail starts outside the town of Index just off highway2. The length of the trail is about 7 miles to the lake and back. The elevation gain is almost 2000ft. There was a good amount of people on the trail the parking lot was 85%-95% full, not bad considering that this was one of the only nice days that we have had in area this year.

Map and slope of trail. This was made using map my run with data collected from my GPS.

The Gear
GPS- My newly acquired Garmin Oregon 450.
Small flash light- There is a old mine I thought I might want to go in, it was pretty cool 10 years ago.
My old FOX water camel-backpack- Carries water and TP and everything else.
Shoes- NB Minimus. wrong shoe for this trip.
Phone camera combo

The Mighty Smart, and some dude doing some cold stretching for the hike.

Parked the Mighty Smart and started rolling up the trail
The first part of the trail is on the old road that takes you up to where the old trail started. There was also a mine there15-20years ago. Its was easy going. Where the old road ended and the new trail started was nearly seamless because of vegetation growth and erosion, amazing.
Farther up the trail splits, to the right takes you to the falls, go left and your going to the lake. Were the split is according to my gps is near where the Mine located, so this is close to were the old parking lot use to be. Back in the day you would climb along the falls to the lake, it was much more direct. It was also dangerous, in fact all the trail books would not give the location of Lake Serene until the trail was upgrade.

I took the fork to the left and headed to the lake, the run was fairly easy at this point. I stoped to take a few pictures of some water falls the first one was at a bridge.

Waterfall though the trees. As seen from the second small bridge on the Lake Serene trail.

Stream below the waterfall. As seen form the second bridge on the Lake Serene trail.

Then a few hundred yards down the trail I stopped at another water fall with a nice pool beneath it

Cool waterfall along Lake Serene trail.

Pool below waterfall on the Lake Serene trail.

From here the trail stated to climb up rather quickly(see elevation chart),on granite rock rubble with some stairs mixed in on the switch backs. My legs were not so happy with me but I pushed on. About one mile from the falls is were snow, slush and, mud were on the trail as well.
Some places were pretty slick, this made me wish I had some chains for my shoes. I continued on and up crossing a few open snow fields. When I started crossing this one(picture below), I heard a distant rumble of an avalanche.  

Open snow field crossing on the Lake Serene trail.

This can make you a bit nervous when crossing these open areas because they are not exactly flat and it was getting warm rather quickly.

Beautiful view from an open snow field on the Lake Serene trail.

400-500 yards passed the above picture and I was at the lake.

Lake Serene, I used Photosynth on my phone to create this picture.

While at the lake I rested a bit, had a seat on the log bridge and enjoyed the sights and the sounds. It was awesome every minute or so you could hear and see avalanches coming off the mountain. Some were like water falls of snow. The sound was like thunder, very cool to be there for the show.

In the center you can see a small avalanche falling from the cliffs. Lake Serene

The way back down was quick and uneventful. I was wishing that I had worn shoes with a rock plate on the bottom. The granite rocks on the trail were all pointy side up and I was wearing a thin, minimal trail running shoe.

Overall it was a great run and a great day. Time on the trail was an 1:30. I spent an hour up top resting and watching so the total time was 2:30.  Good times

You and check out the trial run through map my run, Click Here

Thanks for reading my blog,
David.