Dan gave me his parameters for an enjoyable hike. As usual, I used them to eliminate trips in the class of Mt. Everest, but considered everything else in play. After a fair amount of back and forth Dan got a hold of one my books and chose the Talapus and Olallie Lakes trail. I had done this on the way to Pratt Mountain with TNAB and a LONG time ago in the snow with Local Dan. Talapus and Olallie Lakes are nice enough, but nothing special.
We got going later than expected, about 10am and were at the trailhead at 10:30. The trail is good and easy. The first mile and a half to Talapus Lake sped by and as we stood on the log jam at the Talapus outlet it was clear Dan was feeling good. After Tokul took a dip we continued on. Rather than going to Olallie Lake we jumped on the Pratt Lake trail and circled around the basin gaining slow elevation until we were at Pratt Saddle.
When Local Dan and I had come up in the snow this was as far as we had made it. We had already patched Vancouver Dan's heal a little bit so it was questionable whether we should try for Pratt Lake. It was only another mile, but it was a drop of 700 feet and the thought of coming back up that hill weighed heavily on both our minds. Dan pounded a banana and we headed down.
The trip up to Pratt Saddle had been pretty much what I had expected. The weather wasn't great so the views from above Olallie were exclusively of the lake rather than the mountains beyond. The trail has touches of the alpine, but aside from the beargrass it wasn't much different than the Twin Falls trail. Wee...
Starting down into the Pratt Basin, though, we found it much better. The trees were bigger and the sun was slowly coming through the mist and trees behind us. The trees gave way to a big talus field on the shoulder of Pratt Mountain, though we couldn't see the summit. (Big surprise. From Pratt's summit I couldn't see the lake.)
Below the talus we were in the midst of a huge field of blueberries. The berries were mostly partly ripe. Every once in a while we'd find some that were ready, but for the most part they were too tart to enjoy. As we got closer to the level of the lake the berries got better and better. We exited the trees and slowly descended along the eastern shore through more talus until we arrived at the outlet at the north end of the lake.
Tokul immediately dove in. Nothing too special there. She did her normal freak out and sprinted around the connecting trails before chilling out while we ate lunch.
Sucker holes of blue opened and teased us with better weather, but in the end the clouds maintained their grip on the sky and we packed up to head back. The climb out was pretty uneventful until near the top when Tokul began shaking her head and skittering about on leash. What the... oh OW! I felt the sting in my calf and told Dan it was time to kick it into gear to get away from the bees. The sting swelled quickly, but went down almost as quickly.
In the end we probably did about a mile more than we should have, but it was all good after a couple of Vitamin I in Dan's drinks.
Total distance was about 8.4 miles and 2,300 feet of gain.
