The payoff may not be worth the work for some hikers, but if you like your trails rough and love a classic Cascades Range, old-growth, valley hike, put the Dingford Creek Trail to Myrtle Lake on your list.
Myrtle Lake is pretty enough, surrounded by big, snaggy mountain hemlock and Alaska cedar, but unspectacular as gems of the Alpine Lakes Wilderness go. However, Myrtle is just a sampler of myriad surrounding lakes that hikers capable of wilderness route-finding could explore on a backpack trip.
And the forest is deep and primeval.
By Greg Johnston | June 2, 2005
