heart lake trail

This is my favorite trail of all in Sitka. It's got some easy parts and some tough up and down hill climbs (for an out of shape 55yr old lol!) but it's a short hike - about an hour to the end, with many places for your dog to get a drink, many lakes, streams and waterfalls. I also love the Harbor Mountain and Mosquito Cove trails but not so many places for your dog to get a drink, which was important for our Husky.

I hiked this trail several times. In the summer you can pick lots of salmonberries along the trail. Views of Heart Lake and Thimbleberry Lake are breathtaking with the mountain landscape in the background. There is a small dock with a little row boat on Heart Lake that anybody can use. It does leak a little but not very fast. You can easily use a cup to keep the water from building up inside.

Started the hike at Thimbleberry/Heart Lake at a paved parking area near waterfall that can be seen from the road. It was a beautiful hike which had some steep incline/decline, benches along the trail for resting. Both lakes were such amazing views. Wild blueberries and salmon berries were ripe for tasting. Crossing of a forge of a waterfall to complete the trail was truly a great surprise. A must trail for viewing beautiful Scenery of Sitka. Trail ended near The Fortress of the Bears which was 3.5 miles.

A quiet, peaceful walk through lush Forrest with a rushing stream, waterfall, and a beautiful lake. Very we'll maintained trail.

This was just a short, easy hike up a well marked trail and then you see this beautiful lake, it was picture perfect. As others have said, it is bear territory, so stay aware. We didn't see any (mid June) but we did see their droppings. We stopped on our bike ride through Sitka.

The literature rates this trail as moderate; I would say it's actually more on the easy level. Beautiful scenery and views. Bear sign is present so be sure to make plenty of noise when hiking here.

I wish I could upload a picture I took of the lake, the sun was hitting just perfectly. It's got a hill or two nothing to difficult.

This is just a trail past a couple of lakes for the most part. Watch for bears in the spring.......there have been known to be one or two aggressive ones in the early part of the year.

Sitka has many well maintained trails and HLT is one of many. Meander through lush mossy, green magic of the Tongass National forest. Great during summer and spring months. Bring bear spray and hike in groups of three or more.

Nice even terrain. A few hills to hike up but not to bad very pretty adn quiet we take our dogs and they love it.

This is one of the easiest trails we hiked on in Sitka. The trailhead is about 3-4 miles from town on the left side. There is a free and a decent size paved parking area. The signs for the trail are on the left. The trail starts by climbing gently and gradually among tall trees on the gravel wide section crossing the wooden bridges. From the bridge to the Thimbleberry Lake there is not much elevation changed but it is still a pleasant walk. The day we hiked there we did not see any other hikers but once we got on the less maintained trail from Timbleberry Lake and headed to Heart Lake we met many people with kids and dogs, on foot and bikes going both ways. This became very popular tail. There was one steeper section with a bench to sit and have a look at the path below. Once we got to the top of this section we heard loud barking of dogs. After few minutes we hiked down to the lake while dogs continued barking. We got to the lake and barking dogs were still there. The Heart Lake is in a lovely setting. Four dogs were running and barking. Two other dogs arrived and six dogs, encouraged by their owners, barked as loud as I never heard before. Dogs were happy running freely without leashes, chasing each other and sticks owners threw to them. It is always fun to see dogs under control on trails but noise these six dogs were making diminished our peaceful visit we planned to Heart Lake. I would go back to this trail for a quick and easy evening or early morning walk to Heart Lake. However, a thought of listening to ear piercing barks echoing on the lake makes me rethink a whole idea of revisiting this trail. Still I feel this is an attractive trail. I wish there were rules in regard to dogs being under control while in areas where other visitors want to enjoy peace and beautiful surroundings. I need to add that we hiked on many trails in Sitka and we saw dogs often but this was only one place where dogs encouraged by owners never stopped barking. We left after about 15 minutes.