Crawfish Lake Trail #1606

 The Crawfish Lake Trail #1606 is accessed from the upper end at the Upper Crawfish Lake Trailhead or the Crawfish Creek Trailhead. Both trailheads are short distance from the Elkhorn Drive Scenic Byway (Forest Road 73).

Crawfish Lake Trail offers a short and moderately steep access to the northwest side of the Elkhorns and North Fork John Day Wilderness. If you begin at the Upper Crawfish Lake Trailhead trail users will descend down an old dirt road (closed to motor-vehicles) for about the first half-mile. The trail then sideslopes and contours around the hillside with great views of Crawfish Basin and Elkhorn Mountains. The last half-mile climbs through thick stands of young fir, spruce and lodgepole pine and crosses Crawfish Creek along the northwest edge of the North Fork John Day Wilderness to the lake. This section of the trail is about 1.5 miles.

For trail users beginning at the Crawfish Creek Trailhead, the trail climbs along the creek going through ghostly stands of trees burned in the 1986 fire, and conitnues to climb to the Crawfish Lake which is located inside of the North Fork John Day Wilderness.

At a Glance