Black Canyon Lake Trail

Black Canyon Lake is a hard, 13.3-mile out-and-back from Lake Fork Trailhead 2. Follow Lake Fork Trail #2 for about five miles, then take a faint spur toward a high alpine lake below the Beartooth peaks. Allow about seven to eight hours and roughly 2,300 feet of climbing. This is a full day for hikers comfortable with route-finding and rough ground, not a casual lake stroll.

The first stretch follows Lake Fork of Rock Creek through a shaded lodgepole-pine canyon. It is the easier-to-follow part and shares trail with hikers and horseback riders. Pass the Lost Lake turn and watch for the large footbridge; the Black Canyon branch is faint and easy to miss.

The spur climbs through fallen timber, crosses two creeks and gives way to a large boulder field. Route descriptions place the key turn differently: some describe the near side of the bridge, while an older account describes crossing to the right bank at timberline. The best mapped branch follows the informal path from the bridge, but its trace ends a few hundred feet from shore. Cairns mark the rocky finish. If you lose that line, don't force a route across the boulders; this is not a marked, maintained path to the lake.

At about 9,289 feet, Black Canyon Lake is a 79-acre glacial lake in a tight high-country basin. The blue-green water sits beneath Spirit Mountain and Grasshopper Glacier. The view is the payoff for the long approach, so leave time to look around before retracing the same way.

Open fires are prohibited in the Black Canyon drainage. Keep camping and fires at least 200 feet from lakes and 100 feet from flowing water, and follow the area's food-storage rules.