A great early-season backpacking destination, Packwood Lake is surrounded by old-growth forest and the ridges of Goat Rocks Wilderness.

ITINERARY

• day 1 – Packwood Lake trailhead to campsite: 5.5 miles, 475 ft. gain, 455 ft. loss
• day 2 – day hike: 6 miles roundtrip, 385 ft. gain/loss
• day 3 – hike out to trailhead: 5.5 miles, 455 ft. gain, 475 ft. loss

TRIP PLANNING

• best months: May – June
• location: SW Washington; nearest town: Packwood
• land management: Gifford Pinchot National Forest: Goat Rocks Wilderness
• trail conditions: Packwood Lake Trail #78
• hike description: Washington Trails Association
• permits: self-issued at the trailhead
• trailhead pass: NW Forest Pass required

Note: This is a super popular destination and campsites fill up early on weekends, so going midweek is highly recommended. The Forest Service has been working to education people here on low impact practices, with multiple signs at the trailhead and along the lake with instructions to bury your poop. Trash is also a problem here, and we picked up quite a bit in our campsite on this trip. If you plan to backpack here, bring a trowel for proper human waste disposal and pack out all of your trash. New in 2025 is a compostable toilet next to the ranger station at the lake.

Day 1

This was my third time backpacking at this location. It’s one of the few places to go in late May and early June without snow or mosquitoes, and the scenery is much different than a typical lower elevation rainforest trip. For this trip, we started on a Thursday and planned to hike out on Sunday, although we ended up cutting the trip short and hiking out on Saturday instead due to rainy weather moving in.

There are two trails to the lake – we took the hiker trail. There’s also a gravel road that is closed to vehicles but open to bicycles and OHVs, however, they aren’t allowed to go past the bridge once you reach the lake.

The hike in is easy, heading through forest alongside a ridge for most of the way – and there’s not much elevation gain.

I love entering wilderness areas and collecting pics of the signs.

About half way to the lake, the trail heads through an open rocky area before heading back into the forest.

There’s a small dam operated by Energy Northwest. This is looking towards the dam. The color of the water is incredible!

When we arrived at the lake, the surrounding area was shrouded in clouds.

With close to twenty campsites at the lake, I wasn’t concerned about getting a site since we hadn’t seen very many people so far, but I wanted to get the same campsite I’d had the last time I was here, so I hurried to see if it was available. Lucky for us, it was. This site is on a small peninsula with great views of the lake and Johnson Peak in Goat Rocks.

Day 2

For a day hike on the second day, we continued on the Upper Lake Trail for several miles.

I’m not sure what made this happen on this tree, but it’s fascinating.

Near the end of the lake, we crossed a small stream and checked out two additional campsites in this area.

From one of the campsites is a view of Mount Rainier.

Past the lake, the inlet area is quite swampy and full of skunk cabbage.

We ended our hike at this stream, Big Bob Creek. I’d crossed it when I was here last year, but the water levels were higher this time and we had lunch here before heading back to camp.

Day 3

On our last day, which was a Saturday, people were streaming in and filling up all of the camps. This is to be expected here, and the solitude that we had the previous days was now gone with the crowds. We hiked back to the entry to the lake to and took a lunch break to soak in the views, then headed back to camp. As we got closer, the weather changed, with high winds and gray clouds moving in. Several in our group decided it would be better to hike out now rather than in the morning, so we packed up and headed out.