Aug
2001
Wind Rivers: Green River Lakes Loop
Posted by Carl Hutzler
In 2001, we took our first hike in the Wind Wiver range of Wyoming. The range is located about 75 miles southeast of Jackon Hole, WY. The main “big town” near the Winds is Pinedale, WY. Our router started in the northern edge of the wilderness in an area called Green River Lakes and would continue up to the continental divide and then back down a drainage area in a loop to our starting point.
We spoke with a ranger before we got going and showed her our planned path. The ranger was very helpful and warned us that part of the route we had chosen had been badly burned many years back. The trail in this area was not very well maintained she told us. Of course we looked at the route on our map and it clearly showed a nice black dashed trail. How bad could it be? We went off-trail all the time. Any trail would be easy for us even if it was “not maintained” very well.
So on a beautiful crisp morning, we set out around the lakes on the northern side. I took a lot of pictures on the way around. Fairly soon we found our trail headed up to the north to Clear Lake. It was a fairly steep but fairly short climb which only got steeper as we neared the first plateau. Lots of bolder hopping, some trail, and a lot of just picking a path.
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