 Starting off on Slide Lake Trail, photo by Martha Rasmussen Slide Lake trail starts off on a steep winding trail through enormous boulders from a ancient slide of long ago. This is the same slide that formed the destination of this trail, Slide Lake. When you are driving to the Slide Lake trailhead on the scenic Illabot Creek Road, just after crossing the Illabot Creek bridge you can look up northeast to the peaks and see the rock ledge where these boulders once fell from.  A wall of boulders as trees adapt to their environment, photo by Martha Rasmussen Over the many years the forest has adapted to its rocky surrounding creating lush forest, abundant wildflowers and occasional views of the rock face above. As you hike along the trail you will hear streamlets flowing somewhere below in the boulders and Otter Creek paralleling the trail. This is the drainage of the lakes above.  The largest pond before reaching Slide Lake, photo by Martha Rasmussen The trail is only only 1.2 miles and though the trail starts rather steeply it levels off winding through forest and shortly comes to a pond before reaching the lake. When looking at the outlet of the pond it is very clear to see how this enormous slide created a dam holding the water back.  |
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