We slept in and enjoyed some coffee in the morning before hitting the trail around noon. Not knowing exactly where our hike would end, we parked the car at the Bears Ears Trailhead, along with the 6 or so other cars there.

The view of Funnel Lake from Adams Pass. We were climbing up, but the plateau to the west blocked our view. We saw a group descending from Adams Pass not far from the trailhead.

Shannon hiking towards Mount Chauvenet.

Mount Chauvenet from the north.

Shannon cresting the ridge to views of the peaks of the South Fork drainage.

The view of the South Fork drainage from the plateau. The massive Grave Lake is visible in the middle.

Panoramic view. In addition to Grave Lake, note the high flat top of Musembeah Peak on the horizon and the massive cliff face above Spearpoint Lake at left.

Shannon strolling across the plateau high above the South Fork.

One more shot from the high point before descending. Baptiste Lake is just barely visible in this photo, as is the top of Mount Hooker. We’d soon come much closer to all of this wild terrain.

Views of Peak 12030 above the Chauvenet Valley as we descended towards Valentine Lake. We originally planned to come up this valley and join the trail at the junction of the Bears Ears and Lizard Head Trails, but opted for the trail route to get into the mountains a bit quicker.

Descending towards Valentine Lake.

The meadow below Little Valentine Lake.

Views of Lizard Head Peak across Valentine Lake. We discussed making camp at Valentine Lake for the night, but opted to continue to the South Fork Lakes, as we had a bit of daylight left in the day.

We didn’t see any signs of a use trail branching south from the Moss Lake Trail, but we picked up this use trail after wandering through the woods for a few minutes. I suspect this is the old trail through this area.

Peaks of the South Fork, and the South Fork Glacier. An interesting field study of this glacier is discussed on this University of Maine website.

Shannon enjoying some evening light on the old trail towards the largest of the South Fork Lakes.

After a mile or so on the old trail, we cut off to intersect the lowest of the lakes (Lake 10462) and found a nice campsite on a bench with fantastic views. Evening light was waning, so we took care of our camp chores quickly so we could enjoy the sunset.

The view directly across the lake.

Looking towards the outlet of the lake.

One more evening shot of the headwaters.

Last light of the day on some small cumulus clouds overhead.

I was very happy to be back in the Winds at the end of this day. The beginning of the hike wasn’t too exciting, but after cresting the climb we were treated to nonstop beautiful scenery. And on top of that, we had been treated to perfect weather today. Not a bad start to the trip! Our plan for tomorrow was to hike to Baptiste Lake via Spearpoint Lake and Grave Lake. That would mean some cross country miles and a big climb early in the day, but then some relatively easy trail miles at the end of the day.