Sunday, J—, T— and I (and their dog N—) drove out the Columbia Gorge to the Bonneville Trailhead to go hiking up to Gillette Lake. It’s a nice drive, the better part of an hour out I-84 then across the Bridge of the Gods to the Washington side, and back over to the immediate area of Bonneville Dam.

We hit the trail around 9 am, which is a late start for me hiking, but were still the first ones out from that point. We spent about two and half hours on the trail, which is a long time to hike 5.5 miles, but that included me going slow on some steep sections, a bunch of messing around when we actually got to Gillette Lake, and my right knee getting funky on the downward slopes near the end of the hike.

The place was, as usual for the Pacific Northwest, stunning.

View back toward the Oregon side, fairly early in the hike

Hiking through a stand of trees, also early in the hike

Prayer flags on the trail in one of the clear cut areas

The trillium are in bloom, though this one was a bit distressed

Gillette Lake its own self as seen from the trail heading down to the shore (the lake lies in a steep bowl valley)

A bit of pareidolia as we approached the lake itself — this looks like a bear to me

J— in the woods by the lakeshore

Gillette Lake up close and personal

Looking across the lake up at the crest where the trail brought us out of the woods

The water was very clear, and very green

Gillette Lake is fed by a lovely, noisy stream

The dog enjoying the stream

J— crossing the stream (I decided not to try that bridge with my poor balance)

The bridge I did use, a few hundred yards upstream from the lake

View of the stream from the bridge

Happy dog by the lakeshore

As usual, more at the Flickr set.

Photos © 2012, Joseph E. Lake, Jr.

This work by Joseph E. Lake, Jr. is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.