A peaceful, wooded hike that breaks out into an alpine lake basin with beautiful larch glades. The route follows a well-traveled trail through cool, shaded woods. The lake is a good launching point for longer trips in the basin above the lake and to Mission Peak. This is a very easily accessed destination for Wenatchee residents (20 minutes from town) and often a welcomed escape from the summer heat down in the valley floor.
The route is well traveled in winter and a week after any storm the trail is likely to be packed out, making travel and route-finding easy. Because the route is usually well packed, is often a nice wintertime hike, even if you don’t own snowshoes.
Maps: USGS 7.5’ Series: Mission Peak. View our topo map (8.5’x11” portrait/landscape or 8.5”x14” portrait/landscape). Note: use ‘Print Preview’ before printing to properly scale this map to a full sheet of paper.
Activity: Hiking, Skiing, Snowshoeing, Family Fun
Nearest Town: Wenatchee
Skill Level: 2
Fitness Level: 1
Distance: About 2.5 miles round trip to Clara Lake, or 4.5 miles roundtrip to Viewpoint 6,056’ (see map) or 6.5 to 7 miles roundtrip to Mission Peak.
Elevation: Trailhead: 4,520 feet. Clara Lake, 5,460 feet
Recommended Season: Clara Lake is nice outing most any time of the year—on foot in summer and fall, on snowshoes or skis in winter and early spring.
Access: Drive the Squilchuck Creek Road on the south end of Wenatchee up to the Mission Ridge Ski Area. Park at the end of the parking lot farthest from the lifts (north end) or in the pullouts along the east side of the road just before entering the parking lot.
Trip Instructions: From the trailhead walk uphill along what is normally a well traveled and well packed out trail. After .25 to .35 miles you’ll intersect the Pipeline Trail, a trail that contours between the Mission Ridge Ski Area and the Devil’s Gulch Trailhead (turning left takes you to Mission Ridge in .25 miles, turning right takes you Devil’s Gulch in about 2.5 miles). Go straight across the Pipeline Trail and keep climbing.
--Stay on the trail and, in another .75 miles after climbing consistently, you’ll reach the lake.
--The terrain gets far more interesting above the lake—the forests open up into larch glades and open hillsides with nice views of the surroundings mountains and the Columbia River. Viewpoint 6,056 is one nice destination that will add another 2 miles to your roundtrip outing. Meanwhile, Mission Peak is a higher, farther destination adding 4 miles of roundtrip travel to your outing. Both these destinations involve cross-country travel and you must be competent at using map and compass to plot a cross-country route to these places. The terrain beyond the lake is complex and it’s easy to get confused and/or lost if you’re not skilled. See our map for the cross-country routes
Uses Allowed: In winter the lower trail is closed to snowmobiles, snowmobiles are allowed in the basin above the lake and you will see their tracks marking the surrounding slopes.
Land Designation: This route covers a combination of Forest Service Lands and State wildlife area.
Fees/Permits: None
Reporter: Andy Dappen 6/24/06
Leave It Better Than You Found It: This should be every outdoor user’s goal. Pick up trash left by others, pull noxious weeds along your route, disperse old fire rings (they encourage more fires), throw branches over spur trails and spurs between switchbacks (make it harder to do the wrong thing than the right thing).
Important Disclaimer: Treat this information as recommendations, not gospel. Things change, conditions change, and those contributing these reports are volunteers--they may make mistakes, fail to give complete information, or may not know all the issues affecting a route. So forget about finger pointing: If things go wrong, you are completely responsible for yourself and your actions. If you can’t live with that, you are prohibited from using our information.
