Strawberry Basin

Approach

See the Getting There section of the main page for direction to the trailhead at Strawberry Campground.

Route Description

Start at the trailhead at the far end of the lot of Strawberry Camground. You will be taking a right at every junction except the last to the summit.

The first 1.3 miles are a forest hike up to Strawberry Lake. At Strawberry Lake you can either go around the east side for .5 miles or go around the west side for .9 miles to a junction at the south side of the lake. The more scenic, in my opinion, is the west side with better views and more tranquility. At the south side of the lake you will come to a junction with a small sign for Little Strawberry Lake, take it.

This next section is .9 miles long and is more forest travel to Strawberry Falls. About 50 yards after the junction at Strawberry Lake, you will take a right onto a larger trail and follow it to the falls. The falls are 60 feet high and really cool.

Above the falls you will reach another junction and take the trail to the right to Strawberry Mountain. The next 2.5 miles are up and along the ridge on the west side of Strawberry Lake and pass through pine and sagebrush forest past some ruins of an old cabin. Shortly after the cabin, you'll reach a meadow and have your first views of Strawberry Mountain. You'll go to the wall between Strawberry Mountain and a smaller subpeak to the south and climb switchbacks to gain the final ridge to the summit. Once on the ridge you will come to another junction with a sign for Strawberry Mountain to the right. Take it.

The next mile or so traverses the east side of the mountain through scree and talus fields to the north side of the peak. Here you come to another trail junction with a sign for the Onion Creek Trail. Turn left here onto the obvious trail up to the summit. It's about a quarter mile of short switchbacks through talus to the top.

To descend you can go back the same way or take the Onion Creek Trail down to the road into Strawberry Campground. Beware though, after you do all this hiking, the road back to the campground is a mile of uphill and not a fun way to end a long hike.

Length is 6.4 miles to the summit and gains about 3320 feet of elevation.

Essential Gear

None needed. You can filter water along the stream to Strawberry Lake and up to the Falls. After that, the only source of water is a small stream in the meadow about 2 miles from the summit.

Miscellaneous Info

If you have information about this route that doesn't pertain to any of the other sections, please add it here.

Images

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