30th birthday Wallowas Extravaganza

49 miles of hiking • 12000' elevation gain • 6 nights

I was turning 30 on September 5th, and I used that as an excuse to do something I'd always wanted to—take a long meandering trip through the Wallowas. It turned out fantastic. We had gorgeously sunny, warm weather during the day with frozen nights. We spooked up families of grouse, met a herd of elk, drank coffee and watched salmon run in the Minam, and caught our fill of fish.

The upper reaches of the Minam River is definitely a place to return to—a deep low elevation wilderness full of wildlife and a lack of human presence. It's amazing the Lakes Basin is only a couple miles away.

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We started from the Two Pan trailhead and headed up to Swamp Lake for the first night.

The next morning, we headed south and descended to the Minam River trail. We were fully expecting the descent to be much easier than it was—this trail disappears in places and is steep and waterless the whole way down. That, combined with southern exposure, meant it was hot, dusty, and horrible. We slept along the Minam for night two.

Day three, we headed up to Tombstone Lake. It was a very cold night with a low into the 20s. My wife Christy doesn't handle those kinds of temperatures well, especially without a fire.

So, on day four, we decided to backtrack down to the Minam instead of continuing on to Traverse Lake for another fireless, cold night. We slept again along the Minam further upstream than two nights prior in a beautiful meadow.

Day five, we had a short and easy hike into Minam Lake. This was also my birthday. Two friends and I had brought small packrafts and four-piece kayak paddles along on the trip, so arriving early to Minam Lake on the warmest day so far was a delight. We swam and paddled and fished from the boat for a solid six hours.

Having arrived at Minam Lake a day early because of skipping Traverse Lake, we opted to spend the day in the Lakes Basin, and sleep along the East Lostine River for our final night. Our trip led us through some of the least used parts of the Wallowas, so it was shocking to step into the Lakes Basin at Mirror Lake and see the absolute mayhem unfolding. Tents were pitched on the trail, we ran into an exasperated ranger trying to track down a group of 15 tents, and hoots and hollers were carrying over the lake. Ah, sunny weekends in the Lakes Basin. The East Lostine River valley was glorious and quiet, though.

Waking up on day seven, I felt used up, quiet, and ready to re-enter the world.

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