Lake Mary

 Lake Mary is a stunning high alpine lake located above Brighton in Big Cottonwood Canyon. The trail features a forest, fields of wildflowers, and some pretty great views. It is a little bit more tough, but it is one of our regular trails that we enjoy and tend to do often. The wildflowers are really showing off today, so I might have gone a little crazy enjoying them.

Quick Details:

Length: About 1.2 miles, 2.4 out and back. With a little bit of exploring and adding Dog Lake we did about 3 miles out and back.
Trail Type: Out and back, loop and connector options.
Difficulty: Oh boy, this one is a climb. DR4.
Elevation Gain: About 820 feet.
Restroom: Yes, there are flush toilets in the Brighton lot.
Dogs? No. Big Cottonwood Canyon is watershed.
Other Info:

To Get Here:

Drive to the top of Big Cottonwood Canyon, go around the loop road for Brighton till you reach the big Brighton Parking Lot. Park near the big ski map at the south end of the lot.

Super fluffy clouds above the mountains (Passenger Seat Photography (PSP)).

Entering Big Cottonwood Canyon (PSP).

Mill D North (PSP).

Lovely forest (PSP).

Mount Tuscarora and Mount Millicent above Brighton (PSP).

The Trail:

The trailhead.

This trail starts with the climb right off the bat. Ooph.

Fireweed. Yay! I was starting to wonder if we would get a good fireweed sighting this year.

Again.

Closer.

Continuing the climb. Oh boy.

Weird fireweed. Something must have happened to it.

Lots of fireweed.

Geranium.

Dark berry. Google lens suggests Twinberry honeysuckle.

Lupines.

Lots of it.

Western coneflowers.

Columbine.

Daisy like flowers.

Lots of mint.

Whoa! Lots of fireweed.

Fireweed and mint.

Another daisy like flower. I am terrible at identifying many petaled flowers so I just gave up trying.

Continuing up the steep hill.

Peaks.

Fireweed.

More daisy like flowers.

Mint and arnica.

Fireweeds.

Western coneflowers.

Fireweeds with a view.

Arnica.

More daisy like flowers.

Mutant western coneflower.

Fireweed.

There was some kind of racing event up here today. Sometimes getting a late start works out haha.

Bumblebee.

Monkshood.

I call this Dinosaur Rock, cause well, it looks like a dinosaur munching on some greenery.

Peaks.

Disc golf basket.

A little less intense climb for a minute.

There were a bunch of house sparrows flitting about. They’re so smol!

Some random utility buildings. We like to take a quick break here. It's also a very short flat section.

View back down.

Water tank. This makes a nice bench if you need one. Since we gave up smoking this trail doesn’t kick our butts as much as it used to though.

Now we need to make our way up and around that big ass boulder.

Holy crap! That biker just came down over it.

Big patch of elephant heads and a big patch of bluebells behind it.

Paintbrush.

Elephant heads.

The big boulder again.

Western coneflower.

Some remains of what I think was an old ski lift.

Little bench.

Fireweed.

Nice mix.

Paintbrush.

Corn lily.

The big boulder. I wanna say this is about the halfway point.

Monkshood.

Lots of it.

Nice flat section for a minute.

I don’t like how much UP there is on this trail, but what I do like is that there are fairly consistent breaks in the climb. So it’s not just a death march directly uphill the whole way.

Then we hit the forested section.

An adorable little squirrel friend came to say hello.

An elephant head and a white bog orchid.

A bunch of them.

Purple monkey flowers.

Lupine.

More purple monkey flowers.

Small creek flowing over the road.

Upstream. I believe it is called Snake Creek, judging by a road above being named Snake Creek Road as well as Snake Creek Lodge. Or, it might just be a spring. I don’t know.

Paintbrush and elephant heads.

Continuing along.

This one is definitely a spring.

Lots of elephant heads.

Forest.

Side trail for the disc golf course.

We got rained on just a little bit.

Back to the climb.

It’s pretty in here though.

Lupine.

Geranium.

Nice mix.

Daisy like flowers.

Pretty trees.

Across the canyon.

Closer view of Scott Hill. Which is easily recognizable due to the Mickey Mouse shaped mine tailings on it.

Continuing up.

I didn’t think the camera would pick it up, but you can see we are still being rained on a bit. It is a light drizzle though, and actually feels kind of nice.

Silver Lake and Brighton below.

Closer.

The Dog Lake split to the left. You want to go forward. I wonder what happened to the sign? 

We also get to enjoy another flat section for a bit here.

Split rock.

Big Cottonwood Creek.

Little bridge over it.

Upstream.

Nice clear water.

Downstream.

I love this spooky old tree.

Across the canyon towards Scott Hill again.

View up.

Trail over to Twin Lakes I have wanted to explore it, but something tells me I wouldn’t like it. It seems cliffy. Maybe one day I will check it out.

You would also use it to do the full Brighton 7 Lakes Loop (7.7 miles). We have not done that yet either.

Lots of arnica.

Wild rose.

Lots of arnica.

The moon.

Granite cliffs.

The next climb. Ooph, it is a little more rocky.

The creek.

Again.

Little pond.

Arnica.

Again.

Daisy like flowers.

Flower lined trail. On another short flat section.

The dam.

More flower lined path.

Rocky part.

Cute purple flowers. Google lens is suggest Mountain Coyote Mint.

The dam.

I call this last section the narrows. It is very tight between the foliage and the dam.

Continuing up.

The outflow.

Be careful through here. We saw 2 people fall today (they were okay, but still).

More wet trail.

View across the canyon.

Neat blasted rock.

There is actually significantly less water coming down through here than normal.

The final push.

We made it! Phew!

Oh boy, the lake is quite low. Normally you can only just see the tippy top of this boulder.

Mount Tuscarora and Mount Millicent above the lake.

Panoramic.

No swimming. No camping within 200 feet.

Mount Millicent.

I love seeing trees reflected on a lake. It looks like sound waves.

Panoramic.

Another large boulder. There is almost always somebody on it, so I was happy to get it for us today.

It offers a great view. Mount Millicent with some islands.

Some additional ones if the water level goes much lower.

The back end of the lake with Pioneer Peak, Sunset Peak, and Mount Tuscarora. Fun fact, before they built the dam, this back part was a smaller lake called Lake Phoebe.

Panoramic of the whole thing, which kind of distorts it s bit.

Little puddle. It must have rained up here more than just what we experienced.

Then we walked out to the back end of the lake.

You can see the bathtub ring from the normal water level.

Mount Millicent.

Looking towards the front.

Panoramic.

Nice clear water.

Mount Millicent.

Another panoramic.

Mount Tuscarora and Mount Millicent. I bet there are pikas back there in the scree field between them. Maybe one day we will go all the way around and find out for sure.

The front of the lake.

You can see itty bitty fishies.

It looks like we would be completely under water standing here if it was full.

Scree field across the way again.

The back of the lake again.

Panoramic.

Mount Tuscarora.

Mount Millicent.

Weird rock.

Dome shaped boulder.

Cliffs above.

The big boulder again.

With some fireweeds growing out of it.

Some neat yellow flowers. 

Penstemon.

Fireweeds.

Near the front of the lake again.

Random cement pile. I assume something left over from when the dam was built.

Better look at the little boulder island.

I was hoping to see the dam, but it is behind some trees and rocks.

Steep slope down to the lake from here.

The island again.

Front of the lake.

One last look before we head back down.

Heading down the “narrows”.

The outflow.

Heading downhill.

The outflow again.

The last of the “narrows”.

Random drill hole. I don’t think they quarried granite up here, so I wonder what that’s for. Maybe an unused dynamite hole? Totally random guess.

Pika.

Continuing down.

Another pika hopping between rocks.

Chilling.

Munching some leaves.

Flower lined trail.

Oh shit, a large moose just came across the trail.

We have been having a fantastic moose year! This guy makes #11 so far. Last year we only had one sighting of a momma and baby.

Back in the woods.

A quick scratch.

Then down for bed.

Eventually I pulled out the telephoto lens.

He’s handsome.

Stupid tree.

Still a fun sighting.

I think he is nibbling some grass.

Okay, that was fun, time to keep heading down.

The creek.

Daisy like flowers.

Continuing down.

The gnarly old tree again.

Lots of lupine.

With a few columbines.

Forest.

Bridge over the creek.

Columbine.

We decided to do the quick jaunt out to Dog Lake to see if there were any moosey friends hanging out there.

Lots of lupine.

2nd trail split. You can go either way, we went left today (the 1st split leads to Clayton Peak).

Lupines and paintbrush.

Flower lined trail.

Paintbrush.

Again.

Again.

Dog Lake.

With Pioneer Peak above.

Well, I don’t see any moosey friends. Alright, back the way we came.

Odd yellow flowers.

Some kind of animal hole.

Elkweed, AKA monument plant. I was just starting to wonder if I was going to see one this year! They are one of my absolute favorite wildflowers. It is a shame its a bit off trail. I love their flowers. Although zooming in, it doesn’t look like the flowers have opened yet.

They live, on average about 40 years and only flower once before they die.

Monkshood.

Lots of lupine.

Paintbrush.

Different shade.

Back to the main trail.

Scott Hill across the way.

Brighton below.

Continuing down.

A spring.

Forest.

Bluebells.

Lots of elephants heads.

A little closer.

White bog orchids.

Another spring.

The little side stream.

Elephant heads and white bog orchids.

Purple monkey flowers.

A couple of years ago they added some additional directional markers. I wish they were here the first time we did this trail, but I am glad they are here for other newbies.

Back down to the big boulder.

Flowers growing out of it.

Pretty yellow flowers.

Twinberry honeysuckle.

Monkshood.

Closer.

Drill holes. I suspect these might have also been due to an old ski lift.

Corn lilies.

Daisy like flowers.

Another helpful directional sign.

Robin.

Peaks.

Scott Hill across the way.

Lupine going to seed.

Fireweed.

Arnica lined trail.

Fireweed.

With the view.

The last little bit.

Forest.

The Alpine Rose.

Little bit of a sunset.

Almost back to the parking lot.

Disc golf basket.

Wait.. what? They used to have cute “thank you for visiting” art on this side of the sign.

Oh. They added a smaller sign on the right. Okay.

They put the bike park info on this side of the big sign. The other side has ski info.

The small sign with this years Thank you for exploring sign. This one looks familiar, but I swear they used to change it out. 

Oh yup, this is the one that was on the main sign in 2024 and 2023. 

And just so I am not accused of making things up, here is the one from 2022. See I am not crazy! Well, I am, but not about this.

2019.

And 2015.

The other side now has hiking info on it. You can see the original trailhead kiosk in the background.

Our general path today.

Fun mural on this shipping container shop.

Hah! I wonder if that was my subconscious or just happenstance, but I just realized I am currently wearing a Brighton T-shirt I bought from here a few years ago.

This restaurant appears to have repurposed old ski lift cars into little private eating booths. I couldn't find for sure if they were from here, or if they brought them in from somewhere else.

Again.

Inside you can see a table.

Doyle's Dawgs. I think this used to be a ticket office.

The creek coming out of Twin Lakes Reservoir is dry today.

The moon above Mount Millicent.

Brighton.

With fun clouds.

Heading back down the canyon (PSP). I assume this is a wall of some of the original ‘thanks for visiting’ artistic signs. I dug through my archives and these are all older than what I have documented. But, this is super fun!

Scott Hill (PSP).

Sunset lit cloud (PSP).

Continuing down the canyon (PSP). Oi, the windshield is a little dirty.

That formation kind of looks like a face (PSP). I am curious as to what it looks like up close.

Nearing the mouth of the canyon (PSP).

Well that was fun. Lake Mary is gorgeous! The wildflowers are popping. Some fun wildlife too. It wasn’t super busy. But oh boy is it a bit of a climb! Going with 9 squirrels.

As for difficulty, this is quite the climb! But at least there are breaks, DR4.

Dogs are not allowed in Big Cottonwood Canyon, so be sure to leave Fido home for this one.