Broken Top Crater

Broke Top Crater's unnamed lake

Distance: 15.6 miles out-and-back

Maximum Elevation: 8400 feet

Minimum Elevation: 6100 feet

Total Elevation gain: 2400 feet

Directions: From Bend, take the Cascade Lakes Highway 24 miles. Turn right at the sign for Todd Lake (Road 370). The parking area is about a half mile from the turnoff. 

One of the most spectacular alpine wonderlands in the Three Sisters Wilderness, Broken Top Crater basins a frigid lake rimmed with glacier, massive, multi-colored crags, and a scree-sloped viewpoint of all the Oregon Cascades from the South Sister north.

Mt. Bachelor

The meandering trail network from Todd Lake trailhead to the crater is pretty awesome in itself. Even from the parking lot, 9,068-foot Mount Bachelor rises up for a picturesque view.

The trail begins on a .1-mile section of gated road to a four-way intersection. If you want to take a 1.5-mile detour and hike a loop around Todd Lake, head left or straight. To continue the adventure to Broken Top, take a right on Todd Trail.

Broken Top from a distance

After 2.5 miles of forests and meadows, take a slight right/straight onto Soda Creek Trail. In another .9 mile, crossing a couple of creeks on the way, take a sharp right. On the next 1.8-mile stretch, you trod through beautiful pumice fields dotted with flowers. Broken Top’s jagged crags rise off to the left. And a note to avoid confusion: most of this stretch is actually outside of the wilderness. You’ll re-enter it just after the next intersection, which you turn left on. 

Waterfall on Crater Creek

The next 1.8 miles gets really exciting. The trail follows Crater Creek the entire way, displaying stair steps of waterfalls and chutes in rock-carved gorges. 

Broken Hand

Broken Top looms directly ahead, and is joined by Broken Hand and a couple other large buttes. By this time, the only trees still clinging to life are a few scattered groves of gnarled whitebark pines.

Here, the trail climbs briefly steep, then crosses a few gentle-sloped snowfields. Up ahead is a large moraine with a jagged gap through it – the path of the creek, as well as yours. Scrabble up through it, and welcome to the crater. 

Before you is the lake. Head around it on a well-used trail to the right, where the steep moraine levels out a little. Fragile alpine flowers dot the talus crater walls. 

Broken Top's crags above the lake

After you’ve finished checking out the lake, continue following the original trail up the north side of the crater. At the top a glorious view awaits. 

Three Sisters from Broken Top's viewpoint

Note on the Route: This is one option of several different routes to get to Broken Top Crater. For the shortest route, if you have a vehicle that can take a beating on one rough road, drive past the Todd Lake Trailhead on Road 370 for 3.5 miles. Turn left on Road 380 to Broken Top Trailhead. Follow the trail straight (don’t go left at the one intersection .4 miles from the trailhead) to the crater for a 5.8-mile out-and-back.

For a longer route that includes more creeks and waterfalls, take the Soda Creek Trail from the Green Lakes trailhead (a few miles further west of the Todd Lake turnoff). After 4.3 miles, turn left at the Soda Creek-Todd Lake junction and follow the original route the rest of the way, making for a 19 mile round-trip.

Different routes can also can be combined into a loop trip.

For more High Cascade adventures, check out my Cascade Crest page.