Eightmile Lake: Hiking in Leavenworth

I spent Labor Day in Leavenworth with my siblings and family. We picked a nice hike, in a popular area, and had a lovely trek up to Eightmile Lake.

The hike starts at Eightmile Lake Trailhead, which is ~3 miles off of Icicle Road. My navigation app told me it would take about 40 minutes to get there from the Starbucks in downtown Leavenworth. This seemed strange because—in terms of mileage—the hike isn't that far away.

The added time is due to the rough road conditions once you turn off Icicle Road. This is the same trailhead for Colchuck Lake and Stuart Lake, so it gets a lot of traffic. The gravel road isn't exceptionally narrow, but it has many potholes that make the going quite slow.

It didn't take us a full 40 minutes, but pretty close to that. We arrived at the trailhead around 8:20 a.m. and appeared to get some of the last available spots. It was the Saturday of Labor Day Weekend so—naturally—it was going to be a busy day at the trailhead. Luckily, we had the foresight to try and leave Leavenworth early and avoid fighting for a parking spot. This was the right decision.

We saw, what appeared to be, more than a hundred cars parked along the road leading up to the trailhead. Our spots were quickly poached as we got into our cars to leave around 12:20 p.m. Starting this hike early is certainly something that someone should keep in mind to avoid the hassle of finding parking.

The Trail

Below is an image from Maps3D. The red line is the trail to the lake. The blueish line on the left is the trail to Colchuck Lake and Stuart Lake. The highest peak in the top left is Mount Stuart and the pointy peak next to that is Sherpa Peak.

Out-and-back I tracked the trail at 6.35 miles. The trail is a little steep at the beginning but gradually levels out making it quite enjoyable. There are views of Dragontail Peak and Colchuck Peak to the south that are a nice reprieve during this steep section of the trail. The total elevation gain is around 1,300 ft.

The trail follows Eightmile Creek as it drains from Eightmile Lake. In 2017, the slopes around Eightmile Lake and parts of the creek were burned by the Jack Creek Fire.

This leaves the trail mostly exposed, but shade can still be found when desired.

We found the trail to be well maintained and easy to follow.

Eightmile Lake

The fire damage can be seen when you compare an image on the WTA page to the ones that we took.

To see the comparison, take a look at the header image for the Eightmile Lake Trail page on Washington Trails Assosciation. Then, come back and view the image from our hike below.

The mountainsides are obviously missing some green. It's worth noting that the above picture was taken later in the season and the lake level has dropped (estimated by my vision) 10-12 feet.

There is camping allowed at the lake by permit and we could see a few camps on the northside. Even though the area has been damaged by fire, and the lake was low, it is still a beautiful destination. The water is clear and cold, fish can be seen surfacing on the water, and the surrounding mountains frame the entire landscape.

The trail approaches the lake from the west, which is the direction the creek drains, and we were surprised to see a large excavator sitting on crushed rock. However, I didn't think twice about why it was up there or how it got up there. Turns out there is much more to the story.

Dam Bureaucracy

As I was writing this post I wanted to discover what fire had burned through this area. In the process, I not only discovered the name of the fire but, also, the controversy and crisis that it sparked.

I found the name of the fire in an article from the Seattle Times, How a crumbling dam in the Enchantments could change our understanding of the PNW wilderness, by Evan Bush. The article discusses ramifications that stemmed from the Jack Creek FIre. Below I will summarize some of the events that are presented in the article. However, I recommend reading the article for the full story.

The fire destroyed the vegetation around the lake which meant that more water was going to flow into-and-out of Eightmile Lake. Also, unknown to many, is the presence of seven small dams that were built decades ago to control water runoff into Iclcle Creek from some of the Enchantments. One of those dams is on the west end of Eightmile Lake.

The dam at Eightmile Lake was already old and crumbling and its health became a crisis as the power of the lake grew due to the increase in run-off after the 2017 fire. In the article, it's said that engineers estimated the surge in Icicle Creek could reach 15 feet if the dam were to fail. This put downstream homes at risk.

Tony Jantzer, who is the manager of the Icicle & Peshastin Irrigation Districts, had to act quickly to avoid this crisis. However, he faced many bureaucratic issues in his quest to get an excavator up to the lake to relieve pressure on the dam. Eventually, he was able to orchestrate a helicopter drop at the expense of $97,000 dollars to airlift to equipment into the lake.

This is a large expense. The danger was temporarily reduced, but it's too big of an expense to repeat for the excavator to be airlifted out of the area: it's stranded.

The water rights on Icicle Creek have a large number of stakeholders. The article details the many plans that have been proposed, some very expensive plans, to reconstruct water flow from the Enchantments into Icicle Creek. To the best of my knowledge, the work is still ongoing.

My favorite part of the article is the authors' anecdote on President Gerald Ford's decision not to veto a bill passed by Congress to declare the Enchantment's, and surrounding areas, part of the protected Alpine Lakes Wilderness.

President Gerald Ford nearly vetoed the bill before a White House visit from then-Washington Gov. Dan Evans, who brought a coffee-table book of landscapes from the alpine lakes. Evans’ meeting was meant to last just a few minutes, but aides couldn’t pull the president away

“He looked through every page,” Evans said of Ford in a recent interview, before deciding any place so beautiful deserved preservation.

As mentioned, even after a wildfire and in the presence of large construction equipment, the lake is still a wonderful destination.

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