Thompson Peak, Sawtooth, Idaho

Thompson Peak, Sawtooth, Idaho

Total Mileage: 12.3 mile

Total elevation gain: 4,000 feet

Scenery: 10
Solitude: 7
Difficulty: 7

Our itinerary: 1 night 2 days

Day1: Hike to unnamed lake, set a camp, summit Thompson peak
Day2: Hike Out

INCREDIBLE VIEW!

I loved the scenery: both the lake and from the summit.

I first learned about this hike on a random person's blog. Since we had decided to go to Sawtooth for summer adventure, I studied the area by books and internet. For books, I used "Backpacking Idaho" by Wilderness Press. The book is more focused on a long backpacking, mostly over 30 miles. For Thompson peak, although more than half is off-trail, the distance is 12 miles, so the book didn't cover it. On the blog I saw the Thompson peak looked really nice. Why not doing it?

Lake!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

There are two ways to do: a long day hike or overnight backpacking. We thought it would be great to spend a night at a lake. Half way to go to the lake is on the official trail, but after that technically not official, but used trail are there all the way to the lake. The lake is amazing. It is surrounded by Thompson peak and spire-like mountain. The water color is greenish blue reflecting sun. Beautiful. Some people hike to for the lake. Without summit, it is still worth coming to the lake. We set up a tent at the lake, then went off to the Thompson peak with a day pack. From here, it is officially off-trail. 

On the way to the top

This is probably a most popular off-trail hike in Sawtooth, so there are enough carins for us to navigate to the top. Basically it is not technical, just a lot of scrambling on talus. Tiring but doable if if you have stamina. Talus we climb is in the left picture. You can get an idea. 

 

 

Almost there

 

The last portion of climb was very steep: the next picture. Then the view was waiting after that. The lake we set up tent was now right under the summit. I had never seen the lake in that way. Almost like I was looking at the lake from just above it. It was unbelievable I was at the lake level several hours ago and now looking at the same lake in a totally different way. The same lake appears different from the top. Color was different, shape was different, size was different, although it IS a same thing.

From the top

We saw a nice couple from Idaho. They did Thompson as a day hike. They were really surprised that we came from all the way to Idaho from Mass! They are from Pocatello, 4 hours away from Sawtooth. They said that they were debating how many hours to drive for hiking, but they said that we totally beat them.

We took a lot of picture, ate a lot of food, and enjoyed the view a lot at the top!

Camp!

Spending a night at the lake was really pleasant. This is my favorite camping spot among the entire Idaho trip, although it was a little windy and due to that not Mr.N's favorite spot. Yes, indeed it is not a good place to pitch a tent if it is very windy, or there is a risk for thunderstorm. However, it was sunny day and no thunderstorm that day, so it was okay to do that. The view was incredible in the evening differently. The lake color became much more dark blue, the rock became much more dark brown. By sun setting gradually, the entire world color kept changing. How lucky eating dinner with seeing it. 

sunrise

This camping spot was awesome, because not only having the entire lake view by ourselves, but also having great view on the other side. We were able to see pretty pink color with alpen glow over the mountain range in the evening, then in the morning we were able to see a beautiful sunrise. It is nice to see White Cloud mountain range where we were backpacking a few days back. There is a distinctive white color mountain in the range and from Sawtooth the white mountain was really visible since that white is extremely different from surrounding mountains. It was really beautiful standing out like princess! After we enjoyed sunrise and breakfast entirely ourselves in peace, we hiked out. GREAT!