South Meadow Creek Lake

Pretty Rugged stuff, but with the right line a stock suspension Toyota can get up here. Some snowmelt run off made a few sections slick with wet rocks, and the last 50 feet was obstructed by snow, which we were willing to dig out for 30 minutes to be the first up this summer.

90% of the trail is currently passable. The last 10% has 3-5 ft snow drifts that are only possible if you have a winch and a lot of time.

Pretty fun and easy trail. No consequential obstacles or features. Biggest obstacle would be other people coming down and having to squeeze by. Great views and the lake has great fishing, cliff jumping, kayaking, and hiking. This is bear country so be prepared and pack in what you pack out.

The trail was easy to moderate(ish) for the first 4+ miles. It gets more technical with larger rocks the higher you go. It also becomes pretty narrow, and a full size truck will get pin-striping. A Jeep/Taco/4R would probably be fine on width. The last half mile... a stock 1/2 ton truck will probably not make it. Mostly because of a rock wash (pictured) with 3 larger boulders not passable without proper approach angle. A stock height Tundra TRD with us didn't stand a chance at that point without real risk. My 2.5" lifted Ram on 35"s with skids cut it a little too close. It will require a higher lift than a level and will need large (min. 33") tires. The last third of the trail has effectively no turn around for a large truck. It is beautiful all around, we saw no one until we came down the next day until we passed a lone SXS near the entrance. Ultimately this trail even in the best condition is ideal for high clearance jeeps/4Rs, SXS, and ATVs. Anything else will probably have you cursing!

Trail was pretty clean until it wasn’t large snowdrifts after the mine. Had to remove a couple of mid sized trees.

Long rock gardens and shelf roads, nothing impassable though.

Lg rocks, few ledges to work through. Otherwise, the trail was normal. Slow going for us in a modified suspension General.

This is a pretty fun but easy trail! Drastically easier than the nearby North Meadow trail to McKelvey Lake. I would say it would be difficult for a Subaru Outback or a full sized truck due to how tight it is but any high clearance 4x4 should easily make it up. The old mill site is super cool with quite a bit of remaining structure. The large lake at the end looked like a really cool place to camp and had fish jumping everywhere. More people than I usually run into on roads like this but I'd bet the proximity to Yellowstone had something to do with that. We will definitely do it again!

Road was rough for a couple that have been riding the last couple of days. We only made it to the old mine before we turned around. More people than we thought for a weekday.

Trail in good shape other than we had to remove 3 trees than weren’t there on the way up.

Trail was in good shape. Last hill to lake had a decent sized snow drift.