My favorite backpacking location in the fall is Indian Heaven Wilderness. On this easy trip, we camped at Blue Lake and explored trails through meadows filled with brilliant colors.

TRIP PLANNING

• trailhead: Thomas Lake
• best months: September – October
• location: SW Washington; nearest town: Carson
• land management: Gifford Pinchot National Forest: Indian Heaven Wilderness
• trail conditions: Thomas Lake Trail #111
• hike description: Oregon Hikers – Blue Lake Trail
• permits: self-issued at the trailhead
• trailhead pass: NW Forest Pass
• note: Camping is only allowed at 16 designated campsites in this area, with campsites at Thomas Lake, Heather Lake, Eunice Lake, Sahale Tyee Lake, Blue Lake, and Tombstone Lake. If these campsites are all full, then you’ll need to hike a bit farther to find a camp outside of this area.

ITINERARY

• day 1 – Thomas Lake trailhead to Blue Lake: 3.4 miles, 740 ft. gain
• day 2 – day hike Old Cascade Crest + PCT loop: 4.7 miles, 375 ft. gain
• day 3 – hike out: 3.4 miles, 740 ft. loss

Day 1

I took my husband on an easy backpacking trip to my favorite place in the fall – Indian Heaven Wilderness. It’s been seven years since I hiked in from the Thomas Lake trailhead and I’d forgotten how pretty this part of the wilderness is. A very popular location due to the shorter drive and easier access from Portland, I was still surprised to see that the parking lot was almost full when we arrived on a Thursday morning.

Within the first mile, we passed Thomas Lake, then Dee and Heather Lakes.

There were more mushrooms here than I’d seen before… on the hike in we saw a lot of coral mushrooms and red fly agaric (Amanita muscaria) mushrooms.

After a couple of steep uphill sections, we turned right to stay on the Thomas Lake trail and were soon hiking by a lot of meadows filled with fall color.

Indian Heaven has over 150 lakes and ponds which attract hordes of mosquitoes earlier in the summer. At this time of year, the mosquitoes are gone and water levels are low in the lakes.

As we got nearer to Blue Lake, the trail heads downhill through forest. We were hoping to get a campsite at the west end of the lake or near the peninsula, but both were already taken. Instead, we found an empty site at the top of hill above the lake. I’d stayed here once before and really liked how large and private the campsite is. Plus there’s a side trail from camp to a small pond not accessible via the main trail.

It was much colder than expected at night, with temps in the upper 30s and a steady wind (and gusts up to 25mph). We ended up going to bed early both nights of this trip just to get out of the wind.

Day 2

We opted for an easy day hike, taking our time in the morning to warm up before getting started. From our camp, we headed back on the Thomas Lake Trail to the Old Cascade Crest Trail – unmarked and unmaintained trail that goes through meadows and by more lakes before ending near Junction Lake.

Another type of mushroom that we saw a lot of were boletes, a lot of which looked like hamburger buns. Or pancakes.

When we reached Junction Lake, we stopped for a long lunch break.

As we hiked back to camp on the Pacific Crest Trail (PCT), my husband asked me about bears in the area. I responded that in the many times I’ve hiked and backpacked here, I’ve never seen signs of bears. Of course, not long after that, we saw a bear in a meadow we had just hiked through! We were on a trail above it and stopped for a minute to make sure we saw what we thought we saw. The bear turned and made eye contact with us, then scampered away as black bears usually do. I took a photo but it was too blurry to use, likely due to my excitement at seeing the bear.

Soon we were hiking around East Crater through a burn area from a 2017 wildfire. Fireweed fills sections of the understory with its pretty pink flowers.

Most of the PCT section is forested. We were happy it was protected from the wind, which we soon again found at camp.

This mushroom made me want pancakes. It looks perfectly done!

Day 3

The last morning of trip had the nicest weather, so we took our time before packing up for the hike out. Blue Lake had been unpleasant to spend time at up until now, so we explored around the lake.

As we left on a Saturday, we passed at least 30 backpackers and more day hikers coming in. At the trailhead, cars were parked along the road for a long way. At this time of year, it’s definitely a good idea to visit mid-week if you can.