Stash Lake

Drainage: Clarks Fork (MT)
Approaches: Lady of the Lake Trailhead — 9 mi, 7 on trail, 2 mi off-trail; 3,550 ft up · Goose Lake Jeep Trail — 7 mi, 5 on trail; 3,400 ft up · From a Splinter Lake camp — 2 mi, all off-trail

Elevation: 10,001 feet
Fish: Yellowstone cutthroat (FWP)
Coordinates: 45.09211, -109.83533
Bugs: Minimal on our visit

Getting there

Lady of the Lake Trailhead, on a thru hike that exits at the Clarks Fork end of the Beaten Path. Two vehicles. We dropped one at the exit trailhead, drove back around to Lady of the Lake, and started walking. There is no loop option here. Without a shuttle you are walking the whole thing twice.

FWP puts Stash at nine miles from Lady of the Lake with the last two off trail, or seven miles from the Goose Lake Jeep Trail with the last two off trail. Most people reach it the way we did, as a leg off a camp at Splinter Lake.

The hike

Day three. We broke camp at Splinter that morning and carried everything. This was not a day trip out and back, it was the start of moving camp toward the exit.

From the Splinter camp it is two miles and about 1,150 feet of climbing. No trail. Nothing on the ground, nothing on the map worth following. You pick your line through the gaps in the rock and climb until the ground levels onto the shelf where Stash sits at 10,001 feet. It took us two hours with full packs. The straight line distance is under a mile, so most of that two miles is terrain making the decision for you.

The lake is small, 3.5 acres. FWP lists Yellowstone cutthroat.

Weasel is a little under half a mile south southeast and Surprise another quarter mile past it, which puts three lakes inside two thirds of a mile. It is the densest water anywhere on the route.

Tips & safety

• Navigation: the entire two miles from Splinter is route finding, and you are doing it under a loaded pack. This is not the leg to be figuring out your map for the first time.

• Camping: Stash sits on an open shelf at 10,001 feet, above treeline. There is no timber to break wind and no sheltered pocket right at the water. The lake is small and the ground around it is rock and shelf rather than duff. Anyone camping here should expect a fully exposed site and plan for weather accordingly. Weasel and Surprise are both within two thirds of a mile and no better sheltered. We passed through without scouting sites, so take this as terrain description rather than a report on what is available.

• Shuttle: the thru hike ends at a different trailhead than it starts. Get the second vehicle placed before you leave, not after.