Day 0
Saturday, August 1, 2026
We got to Packwood around 9pm last night. We went to bed quickly, trying to get as much sleep as possible. We were awake at 5:15am and out by 6am, heading into the park. We made it to the White River information center by 6:45am, and waited in our chairs eating breakfast snacks and canned coffee until 7:30am when the ranger station opened. We were first in line to work on our permit, and we were able to obtain the two changes to our permit we’d been hoping for! The process took more half an hour, but we left with our permit all in order.
From there, we headed to White River CG to see if we could find an open campsite for tonight. We managed to snag one of the only open spots, paid for the site, chatted with the ranger, set up our tents, scouted out the backpacker site and the resupply pickup area, and then headed back to the ranger station 10 minutes down the road to label and drop off our buckets. We were all set for our start tomorrow and had a cozy site for tonight.
With everything else in order, we headed up to Sunrise to go to lookouts and explore Sunrise to see if it was worth the 0.5mi side trip. There were some beautiful viewpoints and a nice gift shop, but the food bar does not have hot food anymore. There were only a few refrigerated items for purchase. We wandered around, ate a picnic lunch surrounded by Greyjays, explored the educational displays at the visitor center, and bought some souvenirs before heading back to camp.
We cooked dinner, repacked our bags, and got ready for tomorrow morning. It’s been remarkably cold today, ranging from low 40s to the low 60s, and breezy. And it will get to ~37 degrees overnight tonight. Thankfully, it will be a little warmer but still cool tomorrow for our biggest day of climbing the entire trip. We headed to bed early, both because we were tired from the late day and also because it’s so cold we wanted to be in our warm sleeping bags.
Day 1
Sunday, August 2, 2026
12.22 miles, 5787′ gain/2841′ loss
We were up at 5:15am this morning, and headed out from White River CG by 6am. We drove around the 1.25 hours to the Box Canyon Trailhead and set out on the Wonderland Trail by 7:30am.
Emily and Jacob hiked together and I set out in front at my faster pace. The trail climbed immediately and kept an uphill theme for the majority of the day, with a 2:1 ratio of climbing to descending. The trail bed was mostly wide and packed dirt. As I hiked higher into the cool 45-55 degree air, I got closer to the clouds and soon was hiking in and out of socked-in sections. I hiked quickly to keep my hands warm but cycled rapidly between dripping sweat and frigid hands.
Before arriving at Indian Bar campsite and my first water filtering stop, I saw my first bear of the trip. I was descending to a little stream and the bear was at the same height as me but on the other bank. It quickly turned and ran away from me. It was an interaction with enough space between us to feel comfortable.
At Indian Bar, I filtered 1.5L and moved more snacks into my waistbelt. Then I continued uphill, ascending the valley. Soon I was almost completely socked in, aside from occasional views of the deep rocky valley off to my left. As I got closer to Panhandle Gap, I had two small-to-medium snow crossings but they were soft and easy to manage.
At the top of Panhandle Gap, the other side wasn’t socked in so I got some epic views! As I headed down towards the lakes, I was treated to seeing a group of 6 mountain goats trotting along snow on the side of the mountain. The goats then went over to the lake and I was able to get some wonderful photos.
As I headed towards Summerland campsite, I saw numerous marmots in the grass and flowers, all fat and happily eating afternoon snacks. I made it to the campsite by 2:30pm. I looked at all of the 5 sites and settled on Site 5 for a quiet, flat experience.
In my down time before Emily and Jacob arrived around 5:30pm, I set up my tent, retrieved water from the stream, filtered water, and chatted with a few fellow backpackers and dayhikers. I was reading in my tent when they arrived, and they were thrilled to find their run club friend Megan camped out at Summerland too!
They set up their tent and we went over to Megan’s site for dinner and conversation. Once we all got too cold, we headed back to our campsite for some tent time.
