The day after a nice hike to Timberline and Gertrude Lakes on my first day in southern Montana hiking in the Beartooth Mountains, I set out on my second hike in the range to Black Canyon Lake. This trail hadn’t been on my radar for long, but when I saw pictures online earlier in the year, I knew I had to make my way to the Beartooths just to see this lake!
The lake would definitely not disappoint, and the hike getting there turned out to be more adventure than I was expecting! Most of this hike is along a nice, groomed, flat trail, but the approach to the lake takes you into the woods and away from any sort of maintained trail! Fallen trees, overgrown bushes, tricky creek crossings, and massive boulder fields made reaching this lake a true adventure!
Miles/Elevation:
14.8 miles
2,178 feet vertical gain
About Custer National Forest:
Primarily located in southern Montana, Custer National Forest encompasses nearly 1.3 million acres of wild land. While most of the forest’s land can be found in south-central Montana, the forest does contain exclaves in south eastern Montana and South Dakota.
Jointly run with Gallatin National Forest as Custer-Gallatin, the combined area of the two exceeds 3 million acres. The forests include numerous wilderness areas that encompass hills, highlands, and high mountain ranges, perhaps most notably the Beartooths along the Montana-Wyoming border.
There are numerous campsites located throughout Custer-Gallatin National Forest, both dispersed and organized. Most use areas do not require fees.
Getting To The Trailhead:
The trailhead accessing Black Canyon Lake is the Lake Fork Trailhead just off of Highway 212 in southern Montana, the Beartooth Highway. From Red Lodge to the north, head south on 212 for about 12 miles. Then turn right onto a short, paved access road to the trailhead. From the south, it is about 16 miles heading north from the Wyoming border on the Beartooth Highway, turning left rather than right to reach the trailhead.
Parking is free, and the parking lot and access road are fully paved.
The Black Canyon Lake Trail:
The West Fork Trail:
From the trailhead, hop onto the trail and immediately follow it over a bridge crossing the Lake Fork of Rock Creek. You’ll be following this creek for the majority of the hike, but you’ll only cross it this one time right at the beginning of the trail. Once across, turn right onto the West Fork Trail!
Always be sure to follow the 7 Leave No Trace Principles when in the outdoors!
The West Fork Trail begins as a wide, well graded, mostly flat path through the woods. You’ll be on it for the next 5.5 miles or so, but fortunately it is a great path for making good time. The gentle grade combined with the smooth surface and width make for a sort of hiking highway through the woods!
Once on the West Fork Trail, you won’t be getting too much for views. Most of your time will be spent hiking through dense pine forest along the creek, and while you will get some nice peaks at the peaks around you, most of your views will be trees!
The Lake Fork of Rock Creek will be your main companion on the West Fork Trail! This trail doesn’t get too much for traffic beyond the first mile or so, so human company is mostly hard to come by. However, the sounds of the raging creek to your right will be your nearly constant companion! I thought this would be called a river based on its size, but apparently it’s a creek!
This is grizzly country so make sure you are bear safe!
There isn’t much for milestones on the West Fork Trail. At some point the trail switches from a double wide path to a single track trail, but that change is mostly gradual, and there aren’t any memorable markers to call back to, so all I can say is it happens at some point!
After an intersection with the trail to Lost Lake, you’ll quickly arrive at a bridge crossing the Lake Fork of Rocky Creek, and an unmarked trail junction. This is where you’ll be leaving the nicely maintained trail for the adventure that is the climb to Black Canyon Lake! After sitting down on the edge of the bridge for a snack, I set off towards Black Canyon Lake!
Bushwhacking:
Always follow basic trail etiquette when on trail!
When you leave The West Fork Trail, the trail to Black Canyon Lake seems like it’s going to be pretty nice! It’s really wide, it goes under some nice trees, and there’s nothing really in the way of a nice walk through the woods! You’ll climb away from the creek for a couple hundred yards, veer right, and then enter into an absolute mess.
My optimism around a nice leisurely walk to Black Canyon Lake was crushed right around this moment. What started off as a beautiful trail quickly became an almost unfollowable track through fallen trees, mud, and overgrown bushes of every kind. Trees were down everywhere, there was tons of mud, and everything was overgrown.
Make sure you visit Glacier National Park if you are visiting Montana!
Following the trail here is extremely hard to do, and at times, it essentially disappears. This was my first real experience traveling off trail through overgrown terrain, and while I do have a fair amount of experience in the mountains, it was a new, challenging, experience. I would definitely recommend that you know what you are doing and are prepared for a challenge if you attempt this hike!
However difficult the forest is to traverse, using the terrain around you, you can pretty much always figure out which direction to travel. Knowing you are heading towards a lake surrounded on both sides, you know not to start heading straight up into the alpine. You need to travel up the valley. As long as you do that, you’ll eventually stumble across the lake even if you were lost!
After what felt like hours of roughing it through the woods, I emerged at the edge of the forest. Ahead of me was a small, grassy, meadow. Just beyond was the start of the boulder field.
The Boulder Field:
You may be thinking at this point “whew, I’m so glad to be out of that forest, it’s an easy scramble from here!” I felt the same way, but my optimism was unfounded!
The boulder field at the base of Black Canyon Lake is gigantic. I’d say it’s at least a half mile long, all the while you’ll be climbing about 300 vertical feet. Normally a 300 foot climb over half a mile could be finished in 10 minutes or less pretty easily, but not here. You’ll be dealing with boulders the size of houses, all the way down to loose scree to reach the lake!
The path you take to reach the boulder field is super important and could save you hours on your hike. All the reviews I had read said to stay right in the trees until you couldn’t any longer. Then ascend the right side of the boulder field for the easiest route.
I did stay in the trees on the right side of the valley until I lost the trail. Then I hopped out and started scrambling. However, what I didn’t realize is that while I had lost the trail, it didn’t actually end where I lost it. The trail continues up the right side of the boulder field almost all the way to the top, but I didn’t see it. Instead, I basically went the hardest way possible!
I started the scramble through the boulders by moving forward at a leftward angle up an easy looking piece of ground. Reaching my initial goal, I then realized I had no easy options next. I eventually decided to take the shortest path considering I was out of easy options anyway. That led me into difficult class 2 terrain, crossing from car sized boulder to car sized boulder. Rinse and repeat!
After doing that for what felt like forever, I crested a knoll and was met with the beautiful sight of more boulders! I thought I was going to see the lake, but all I saw was more rocks I had to climb over. Rinse and repeat the earlier process! Finally, I eventually did see the lake!
My angle of approach to the lake was far to the left, almost exactly where I read not to go! When I finally saw it, I was literally even with the left shoreline! However, the views made me immediately forget all my anger at doing such a stupid and difficult hike!
The view of Black Canyon Lake is honestly one of my favorites that I’ve come across. The stunning blue tint of the water is the first thing that catches your eye. Thanks to the glacial dust in the water, you get magnificent bright colors!
Immediately above and behind the lake is the striking Spirit Mountain, a blocky 12,000 foot plus hunk of rock and ice. Framing the entire thing are vertical walls of stone on your left, and steep rock strewn slopes leading to exposed ridges on the right! Far in the background, the summit of 12,000 foot plus Beartooth Mountain is also visible!
It’s a legitimately awe-inspiring view, and it feels that much better because you really had to earn it! At this point, you’re close to 8 miles from the trailhead, at the top of a gigantic boulder field, on the other side of a thick overgrown forest! The quiet and solitude of this place tops it all off! I hadn’t seen or heard another person for hours!
Hiking Out:
Now, I had the unenviable task of getting out of here! First, I had to cross and descend the boulder field.
I knew that the way I came up the boulder field would suck to go down, so I decided that I would traverse across the boulder field laterally to the right side and follow what should be the easiest path. The initial crossing from left to right was more of the same as earlier: lots of big rocks and slow going.
However, after crossing to the right side and heading back downhill a ways, I found something resembling a trail! The word trail might be a bit generous, but it was a path that I could follow, and I could travel way quicker than across the rocks!
Now that I could move quicker, the descent went by fast, and before long, I was at the bottom of the boulder field, reentering the forest. The trail through the boulder field was steep and loose, but it was much better than hopping across gigantic rocks for hours!
Back in the woods, the going was as slow as ever, and for some reason, I actually found it much more difficult to follow the trail than I did on the way up. I quickly found the point where I lost the trail on the hike up, and then from there, continued descending.
After a few minutes, I reached a creek crossing that I honestly had no memory of! I could see on my Alltrails app that I needed to get across it, and I was on the correct route according to the app, but I could not figure out where I had come across earlier! After walking up and down the banks for 10 or so minutes, I found some rocks, hopped across, scrambled up the slope on the other side, and rediscovered the trail!
Back on the “trail,” progress was difficult and slow, but consistent. I continued my push through the brush, overgrown bushes, fallen trees, and mud, and before long I reemerged back at the creek and clear trail! From here it was an easy walk out!
The last 5.5 miles of the day were a quick but boring 5.5 mile hike out. The walking was easy on the gentle downhill slope, but man it was pretty boring, not gonna lie. The views hiking out are even less interesting than on the way in, and by this point in the afternoon, I was starting to see more people. By the time I got within about 2 miles of the trailhead, it was starting to get legitimately busy!
Eventually, I made it back to the first bridge, and emerged back at the parking lot. This was a long day, with long stretches of boring, uneventful hiking, and long stretches of challenging, off trail terrain. While I’m not in a hurry to do this trail again, I can 100% say it was an incredible day in the mountains, and an awesome hike that you should definitely do!
Topdown Lifestyle Rating: 8/10
Black Canyon Lake itself is one of the coolest places I’ve ever hiked to. The stunning beauty of the lake combined with the brutality of the mountains surrounding you, not to mention the legitimate remoteness of the lake make for a truly special place.
I struggle with rating this hike though because while Black Canyon Lake itself is so spectacular, the hike getting there is not. The bulk of the hike along the Lake Fork of Rock Creek (the first and last 5.5 miles) is very uneventful hiking, and while the approach to Black Canyon Lake is much more interesting, it’s an off-trail mess, which to be fair some people like.
While I love Black Canyon Lake, I think I have to give this an 8/10. It pretty much is a textbook example of an 8: great final destination with an underwhelming or overgrown trail getting there. While the final destination here is exceptional, it still is perfectly described as an 8/10 for me.
All that said, this is probably the best 8/10 I’ve ever hiked, and you should definitely do this hike if you are able!
Pros:
- Stunning views
- True wilderness experience
- Easy to access paved trailhead
Cons:
- Not many views for first 6 miles
- Off trail bushwhack to lake
Alternative Hikes:
When to Hike to Black Canyon Lake:
This trail will take you over 9,000 feet in a northern state, so the biggest factor to consider is snow. There will likely be snow here until well into May, and probably into June. Peak hiking season in Montana is July and August, but you should be able to hike to Black Canyon Lake from June to September or October.
I generally prefer hiking early in the season, but all I can say is the best time to hike this loop is once the snow has melted. Whether that’s May or June is impossible to say. Keep an eye on the conditions, or just wait until late June and you should be good pretty much any year! Although, the fall colors would be awesome!
Links For Further Reading:
Black Canyon Lake – Montana | AllTrails
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