Beach and Dryad Lakes - Yellowstone National Park - 8/4/15

scatman

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Our third day hike on our Yellowstone trip consisted of a hike along the old Plateau / Arnica Creek Trail to Beach Lake, then following a one way marked route to Dryad Lake before exiting at the Natural Bridge Trailhead.

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Overview map of hike

We hit the old trail about 7:30 in the morning with a very light rain greeting us. It would end up raining off and on throughout the day. Our route started off at the service road gate located near Arnica Creek. As we hiked up the road, we passed the trail junction for the old Howard Eaton Trail before meeting up with the original road from West Thumb to Bridge Bay. Once across the road, we began hiking up the trail towards the Arnica Creek Meadows. All the way to Beach Lake, we continually ran into bear scat.

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Ready to begin

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The original road from West Thumb to Bridge Bay

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Originally part of the Plateau Trail then became the Arnica Creek Trail before no longer being maintained in the 1960's.

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Bear scat along the trail

After a mile of hiking along the trail through the trees, we broke out into the meadows along Arnica Creek. These meadows happen to be one of my favorite places in Yellowstone. The meadows are lush and marshy in places but are absolutely gorgeous. This time, we had an added attraction - beaver dams. On my previous two trips to Beach Lake, beavers had not inhabited the Arnica Creek drainage, but now there were three dams with lodges along the creek.
As we made our way up the meadow, a large bull elk came into view on the opposite side. We watched him for a good five minutes before he realized we were there and ran off into the trees.

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Breaking out into the meadows

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The meadows along Arnica Creek

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More meadows

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Arnica Creek

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Beaver Dam

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Beaver lodge

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Arnica Creek Meadows

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There is a bull elk looking directly at us just left of center on the far side next to the trees

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@McGimpkins, getting a picture of the elk

The meadows are roughly a mile and a half in length and soon we find ourselves back in the trees. At this point the trail becomes a little difficult to follow but eventually we pick it back up again and are one our way. In three tenths of a mile we reach a relatively recent burn that the old trail at first skirts then plunges into for half a mile or so. The fireweed in the burn is spectacular as its pinkish color contrasts against the black of the burned trees. We took a quick break and then made our way the last mile to Beach Lake.

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back into the trees

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Fireweed in the burn

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I've got to hike through this Sh#t! Scatman Jr. needs a break

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Beach Lake

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Beach Lake

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@McGimpkins trying to dry his feet off at Beach Lake

Once at the lake, we took a more substantial break to fuel up for the section between Beach and Dryad Lakes. We were going to attempt to locate the one way marked route and follow it religiously to Dryad Lake. While the distance we covered between the two lakes was only three miles, it took us four hours to hike due to taking time to look for the next marker ahead of us and the tremendous amount of blow-down between the two lakes. It turned out to be rough stretch.

We were able to follow the markers all the way to Dryad and when we reached the lake we stopped for a late lunch.

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Downed marker on the way to Dryad Lake

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Making our way between the lakes

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Jr. at another marker

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The path ahead

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Ouch!

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A small clearing between the lakes

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A quick break - markers become more difficult to find after this

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Getting close to Dryad Lake

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Arriving at Dryad Lake

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Dryad Lake

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Dryad Lake

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Lunch break at Dryad

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Elk antlers

When we finished with our lunches, we hiked along the north shore of the lake to the outlet where once again we started hiking through meadows. The grass in middle of some of these meadows was chest deep! It actually tired us out a bit walking through the grass. As we hiked through the meadows, we came upon five different grizzly digs - a place where the bears have dug up the ground in order to find ground squirrels.

As the drainage narrowed as we approached Natural Bridge, we took a game trail up to the top of the ridge where we had a nice view down the other side. Along the ridge we saw a big buck and once again had to work our way through downfall. Eventually we made our way off of the ridge right at Natural Bridge where a yellow bellied marmot kept a watchful eye on us. After taking a few pictures of the bridge, it began to pour so we hiked out the last mile and a half in the rain.

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Meadows below Dryad Lake

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Chest high grass

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A grizzly dig

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More meadows

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View from the other side of the ridge

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Natural Bridge

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Natural Bridge

Well, another fun day. We finished up about 6:30 in the evening for an 11 hour day for 13.4 miles. I really enjoyed the meadow hiking on this trip. The portion between the lakes was slow going but it was nice to find and follow the old route. The only other creatures we saw besides the elk and the deer were some frogs, butterflies, robins and mosquitoes.

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I guess there never was a maintained trail east of Dryad?

There is supposed to be a fairly recognizable game trail from Dryad to the Trout finger meadow off Hayden. Did you see any sign of that?

Cool beaver dam!

Did Jr crack up when you fell?

Great report!
 
I really like the Arnica Creek drainage. At least the part I remember seeing, before it got dark. :) But those meadows are really beautiful.

Looks like a lot of something has been walking around those lakes. What kind of tracks did you see?
 
I guess there never was a maintained trail east of Dryad?

There is supposed to be a fairly recognizable game trail from Dryad to the Trout finger meadow off Hayden. Did you see any sign of that?

Cool beaver dam!

Did Jr crack up when you fell?

Great report!

@Keith - I didn't see any sign of it, that doesn't mean it is not there, its just that we couldn't take the time to do a thorough search to hook up with it. Supposedly it is a bison highway but I didn't see any sign of bison in the meadows below Dryad Lake. I guess that means you and I will have to go back in and explore some more!

Jr. and Ryan both got a good chuckle out of it, but I reminded them that I was the only one who knew how to get us out of there.

Yeah, the beaver dams were neat though I've still never seen a beaver in the wild.

I really like the Arnica Creek drainage. At least the part I remember seeing, before it got dark. :) But those meadows are really beautiful.

Looks like a lot of something has been walking around those lakes. What kind of tracks did you see?

There is no question that our bushwhack in the dark along Arnica Creek will go down in our hall of fame!

I promised Ryan that he would get to see grizzly tracks at Beach Lake along the beach since every time that I had been there in the past there were always a good set to see. But lo and behold the only tracks at Beach and Dryad were elk and lots of them.
 
I guess that means you and I will have to go back in and explore some more!

Loop starts at mud vulcano, goes out to Hayden Valley, down the trout finger meadow, over to Dryad....

Book it for 2018? 2019? Ugh.
 
Yeah, my calendar is pretty full too but we've got to get back in there before I'm too old to make it that far. :moses:
 
That's a cool natural bridge. Nice report.

According to the information sign at Natural Bridge, it was formed due to ice and water as opposed to wind like the arches in southern Utah.
 
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