The core Enchantments are located within the Alpine Lakes Wilderness area of Washington’s central Cascades. Widely considered one of the best hikes in the world, it is also wildly popular. But with good reason. A hike in the Enchantments takes you past sublime alpine beauty in the form of icy blue lakes, towering rock formations, a roaring creek, and grazing mountain goats.
If you can score a coveted and rare backpacking permit, this seems like a great way to truly enjoy the splendor of the Enchantments. If you are a strong hiker, however, the entire traverse can be done in one long day, which is what we did in August 2025. Here we share our experience and tidbits of information that may prove useful if you’re planning your own hike.
Trail Statistics | Our Hike
Logistics
Trailhead Shuttle
The vast majority of hikers begin this point-to-point hike at the Colchuck/Stuart Lake trailhead and end at Snow Lakes trailhead. This results in 2,000 feet less of elevation gain over the total hike and gets the hardest climb (up Aasgard Pass) out of the way early in the hike.
We parked our car in the lot at the Snow Lakes trailhead and used the Loop Connector shuttle service to take us to the Colchuck/Stuart Lakes trailhead. This shuttle only runs on weekends and spots fill up fast, so booking in advance is essential. We paid $25/pp for seats on the 4am shuttle.
Day Use Permit
If you are completing this as a thru-hike in one day, you can obtain a free Day Use Permit at the trailhead (see photo below). After filling this out, half the permit gets deposited in the box at your starting trailhead, while you attach the other half to your pack. When you finish your hike, simply slip the remaining half of your permit into the box at the final trailhead. Pro tip!: Pick up your Day Use Permit at the Snow Lakes trailhead and fill it out while you’re waiting for your shuttle.
Parking Fees
Whether you park in the Snow Lakes trailhead parking lot or along the road, your vehicle must display a valid Northwest Forest Pass, America the Beautiful Pass, or Day Pass ($5), which can be purchased online, at some stores in Leavenworth, or even at the trailhead.
The Big Day | Our Experience
We had discovered the Enchantments traverse 5 years ago and picked out the date of our hike 9 months prior. At last the day had arrived and with good weather in the forecast, we were incredibly excited. This made the 3am wakeup call slightly more bearable. After finding a spot in the Snow Lakes lot, filling out our permit, and catching the 4am shuttle to the Colchuck/Stuart Lakes trailhead, we set off at 4:30am.
The first hour or so of the hike was in the dark, so we concentrated on keeping up our pace and letting groups of others pass us. The trail was very crowded and had some traffic jams early on owing to the fact that most people arrived via shuttle at one time. The trail mainly passed through the forest, skirted some boulder fields, and involved a few bridge crossings.
After about 2 hours of hiking, we reached Colchuck Lake. There really aren’t enough superlatives to describe the beauty of this lake, framed by rocky mountains in the distance. After marveling for a few minutes and enjoying a quick snack, we pressed on.
It took about 45 minutes to carefully make our way across a boulder area with Colchuck Lake to our left. From there, we were standing at the foot of Aasgard Pass, arguably the hardest part of the hike. From here, we needed to climb straight up jumbled talus. Straight up = an elevation gain of 1,900 feet in less than one mile (!!). Even though we were in the shade the entire climb due to the early morning hour, this climb was soul sucking and difficult.
At times the rock was loose and slippery and the trail, even with the cairn markings, was hard to follow. We heeded the advice to stay to the left of the grove of evergreen trees and made out just fine. As we climbed higher the views got better and it was amazing to see the aquamarine Colchuck Lake sparkling below.
Every time the summit appeared to be “just in front of us”, it was actually a false summit. But finally, after almost 1.5 hours of climbing, we reached the top of Aasgard Pass and celebrated! We were greeted by our first mountain goat sightings, including this cute little kid resting on a rock.
From here, the trail was mostly downhill but what we were most excited about was seeing all the beautiful lakes in the Upper Enchantments.
Isolation Lake was the perfect spot to relax and recover from our long climb up Aasgard Pass. We celebrated with Snickers. From here on, the amount of hikers really thinned out. Some people were staying overnight, others headed back to the Snow Lakes trailhead, and others completed the thru-hike. But for the rest of the day we rarely saw more than a handful of people at a time.
The landscape at the top was surprisingly barren with lots of rocks and even covered with snow at times. It was up here that we continued to see a ton of mountain goats. In fact, across the entire day we saw 24 total!
The amount of lakes, each seemingly more beautiful than the next, left us in awe. They are certainly aptly designated with names like Perfection Lake and Inspiration Lake.
As the hours passed, we stopped multiple times for brief snack breaks and also at a running stream to filter drinking water. We brought a portable water filter as it would be brutal to carry the amount of water you’d need to be out hiking (in the heat, no less) for 12 hours.
How gorgeous are each of these lakes? They would all make an amazing camping spot.
We eventually reached a steep cliff face and from there we left the core Enchantments to make our way very steeply down trail. We were so glad it wasn’t raining because we couldn’t imagine how slippery the rocks would be when wet. Some parts of the trail were a bit tricky .
From here, we reached a view of the Snow Lakes and Nada Lake where we paused to eat our lunch. After this point, the trail felt absolutely never-ending. The heat was picking up (it was close to 90 degrees Fahrenheit the day we hiked) and there was surprisingly little tree cover, so we were very exposed. At last, the Snow Lakes parking lot came into view, but once again, it took longer than we would have liked to cover the one mile to reach it. Over 12 hours after we began our hike, we arrived at our car, hot and exhausted but elated at what we had just accomplished.
Dinner that evening was a cause for celebration and we throughly enjoyed steins of beer, pork schnitzel, and a gigantic slice of Black Forest cake at the Andreas Keller Restaurant in Leavenworth. And then we promptly went to bed at 7:30pm. 🙂
Thru-hiking the Enchantments in one day is no easy feat. We would put the difficulty of this hike up there among the other most difficult single day hikes we’ve completed including Half Dome in Yosemite and Rim-to-Rim in the Grand Canyon.
Numerous search and rescue operations in recent years have put a strain on emergency services in the area which are already stretched thin. If you do decide to undertake this hike in a day, know your limits and make sure to adequately prepare. This includes training in advance, gaining a deep understanding of the route, and bringing along adequate nutrition and hydration methods. And please remember to practice the 7 principles of Leave No Trace.
