Backpacking the Grand Sawtooth Loop is a six-day, roughly 71-mile circuit through central Idaho’s Sawtooth Wilderness that strings together one alpine lake after another: Sawtooth Lake, the Baron Lakes, the Cramer Lakes, Hidden Lake, Ardeth Lake and the Ten Lakes Basin, before finishing along the South Fork of the Payette River. We started and finished at the Grandjean trailhead and hiked it clockwise in early August 2025.
Every summer, my friends and I try to plan one big group backpacking trip. In 2025, that trip was the Grand Sawtooth Loop. None of us had done much hiking in the Sawtooths, if any at all, and the photos we’d seen looked different from the Sierra and Cascades trips we know best: jagged granite ridgelines, mirror-flat morning lakes, and long valleys of burned forest coming back to life in wildflowers.
The annual trip started with Jason and I running an annual half marathon near a national park. In 2019, the race we were planning to run in Colorado was on hiatus, so we shifted to a big backpack trip instead, hiking the Wonderland Trail in Washington with Derek. Since then, the group has grown.
The crew this year was Jason, Derek and his daughter Sophia (17 at the time), Ben, Adam and me. Derek and Sophia flew into Boise and drove a rental car to meet us. Jason, Adam, Ben and I drove over from Bend in my Land Rover Discovery, about seven hours.
The Grand Sawtooth Loop is a lot harder than the mileage suggests. Days 1 and 2 are the big ones: nearly 4,000 feet of climbing on the first day with a full load of food, then a 15-mile Day 2 that drops about 3,200 feet to Baron Creek and climbs nearly 3,000 feet back up to Baron Lake. After that, the days get shorter and the scenery gets better.
Map of the Grand Sawtooth Loop & Elevation Profile
Day 1 climbs from Grandjean up the Trail Creek drainage, through a section burned in 2024’s Wapiti Fire, to a pass above Sawtooth Lake. We camped near the lake and watched a lightning storm roll over after dark.
Day 2 starts with a morning walk along Sawtooth Lake, then drops through the North Fork Baron Creek drainage to Baron Creek, where we had lunch. The afternoon is a long, hot climb past Baron Creek Falls to Middle Baron Lake.
Day 3 crosses Baron Divide, drops to Redfish Lake Creek (the first real stream crossing of the trip), and climbs the Mount Cramer Trail to Middle Cramer Lake and its waterfall.
Day 4 climbs above Upper Cramer Lake through a high alpine cirque to a pass, drops to Hidden Lake, then passes Virginia, Edna and Vernon Lakes before a steep pass and a rocky descent to Ardeth Lake.
Day 5 crosses Tenlake Divide with a view into the Ten Lakes Basin, then follows Benedict Creek past Lake Ingeborg and Spangle Lake to Smith Falls, where we camped beside the confluence.
Day 6 is a 14.8-mile walk out along the South Fork Payette River, past Elk Lake and down a granite gorge to Baron Creek and the Grandjean trailhead.
Clockwise or counter-clockwise? We went clockwise, which front-loads the climbing and gives you the easy days at the end. It did make the first day a pretty long, tough one, but it worked well for us overall.
Getting There & Logistics
The Grandjean trailhead is on the South Fork Payette River road, about 30 minutes from the town of Lowman, Idaho. If you’re flying in, Boise is the nearest major airport, roughly a three-hour drive. We stayed in a shared cabin in Lowman the night before and the night after the trip. It was a great way to start and end: dinner at the Sourdough Lodge before, and a hot shower and a real meal at the Sawtooth Lodge after.
Parking at Grandjean was no problem, even in early August.
Permits & Regulations
No fees, no reservations, no bear canisters required. The Sawtooth Wilderness uses a free self-issue permit that you fill out at the trailhead register. Unlike the Wonderland Trail, there’s no lottery, no assigned campsites and no itinerary to commit to in advance, so you can adjust the day lengths on the fly. We did exactly that on Day 1, stopping short of our planned lake because everyone was tired from the climb.
Although bear canisters were not required, we used Ursacks to store our food securely at night, anchoring them to a tree outside of camp.
What to Expect
- Wildfire. The 2024 Wapiti Fire burned more than 129,000 acres. We hiked through burn on three of the six days. The upside is a forest floor full of fireweed, paintbrush and aster. The downside is no shade and ashy, dusty trail on hot afternoons.
- Trail condition. The trail was in much better shape than I expected after the fire. Crews had clearly done a huge amount of deadfall work. The one exception is the steep, rocky descent into Ardeth Lake on Day 4.
- Water. Plentiful nearly everywhere, though a couple of the creeks on the Day 2 climb were dry when Adam went through. Plan to fill up when you see good water.
- Creek crossings. Redfish Lake Creek on Day 3 and the South Fork Payette crossing first thing on Day 6 are wide enough that most of us swapped into water shoes or went barefoot.
- Weather. Afternoon thunderstorms on Days 1 and 2 forced us to wait out lightning before exposed sections. Nights near 29°F on the last morning.
- Swimming. Nearly every camp has a lake or pool next to it. Adam counted 14 swims over the six days.
Planning Resources for the Grand Sawtooth Loop
- Sawtooth National Forest / Sawtooth Wilderness – Wilderness regulations and conditions
- Boise National Forest – Grandjean trailhead is on Boise NF land
- Adam’s write-up – Day-by-day journal with side-quest routes and photos
- Derek’s write-up – Another perspective on the same trip, with a trail map
Postscript
Would I do anything differently?
- Pack more food. I was pretty happy with what I brought, but ended up with just enough. A little extra would’ve been nice.
- Test my equipment beforehand. My air mattress went flat at night. There was a hole that I could not find until I got back home. Thankfully, Derek loaned me his foam pad that he normally used as a sit-pad.
- Add a layover day. We breezed through this loop pretty quickly. There are some nice side trips that would be nice for a zero- or low-mileage day to add time for exploration.
- Bring water shoes. Redfish Lake Creek on Day 3 was a good place for a long foot soak.
- And for other perspectives on the same trip, read Derek’s trip report at 100Peaks.com and Adam’s journal at Adam’s Treks.
Originally hiked between August 3-8, 2025 with Jason Fitzpatrick, Derek Loranger and his daughter Sophia, Ben Novinger, and Adam Salinger.
Jeff has hiked and explored trails for over 50 years, covering everything from casual canyon walks to rugged multi-day Sierra routes. He started SoCalHiker.net in 2010 to document the trails he loves — and to make it easier for others to discover them.
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