Sawtooth itinerary

[samtfischer]

Hi everyone,

Looking to plan a roughly 5-6 day backpacking trip in the Sawtooths and I'm thinking about doing this itinerary. There's an "Alt day 1" that I was considering in order to be able to hit Sawtooth Lake, but I feare it may be too much for either the first or last day. I've heard that this area is mostly recovered from the wildfires, but if I'm wrong let me know! Was thinking of going North to South, but any reason this route could be better the other direction? Also open to the idea of setting up camp somewhere and doing a day hike or two to somewhere else, but unsure if that's even necessary. Open to thoughts! Thanks for your input.

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[Bob]

Need a little more info:
Are you trying for a loop or point to point....... You have a ton of trails marked with no real start or ending point ...... I assume starting at Sawtooth or Redfish ending at Petit lake. You have hit pretty much everything to see on trail....
Sawtooths are up and down...think about what mileage can you do comfortably.... Add you mileages again...I get roughly over 70 miles from Sawtooth to Petit. You have a 17M and 14M stretch...those will be real long days. When I plot map miles, the on the ground miles in mountainous terrain generally runs 12% more.......

 

[samtfischer]

Was thinking of starting at Redfish and camping at different lakes along the way. E.g. Day 1 ends at Alpine Lake, Day 2 goes from there to Smith Falls, etc, with the ending being at Pettit. But unsure if Redfish->Pettit is the way to do it or if it’s better to start at Pettit and end at Redfish (or Iron Creek as an alternative).

 

[Bob]

You have a bunch of passes either way. I'd ride the boat first...then you don't have to worry.