Photos from this trip can be found here.
Rainy season plus the unpredictable mountain weather make winter the best time to visit Eastern Washington. To keep from overheating and snake encounters, we’ve slowly shied away from hiking in the barren Channeled Scablands during summer months.
We first visited this part of Moses Coulee a year and a half ago, after having accidentally stumbled upon the area on the drive home from either Steamboat Rock or Monument Coulee east of here.
Photos from this trip can be found here.
Following our previous route, I parked just off Jameson Lake Road due east of the only waterfall in the vicinity. A trail led to the bottom of the waterfall, then a faint hikers path to the left worked its way up steep scree below basalt cliffs to the top of the waterfall.
From the pool above the waterfall to top of the coulee required some exposed moves. I highly recommend attaining the coulee rim by hiking up Jameson Lake Road three-quarters of the way to the lake, and then look for an opening through the cliffs.
Photos from this trip can be found here.
Scrambling east along the coulee line, I couldn’t help but to turn around constantly and take photos of the grand coulee curvature to the south. Good views were all alongside the rim, not much to see but flat land north of us.
Clouds slowly dissipated as we got closer to Jameson Lake. I didn’t expect to see people in the area during the off-season and without water activities. Atop the cliffs overlooking Jameson Lake, we continued to hike north until a fence prevented us from going farther. I assumed it’s all private land north of there.
Photos from this trip can be found here.
We enjoyed a long and quiet break above the lake and then reversed our route to the south. From the aforementioned opening through basalt cliffs, we reached Jameson Lake Road at the road bend and hiked back to the car in the warm, sunny afternoon.
Access: Jameson Lake Road
Gear: none