FirefinderFire lookouts of the US

Fire lookout · Skagit County, Washington

Hidden Lake Peak Lookout

Also known as Hidden Lake

A 1931 L-4 cab on Hidden Lake Peak, staffed until 1958, then saved from abandonment in 1961 by a volunteer club and still used as an emergency hiking shelter.

Visit & stay

Not rentable. As far as we know, this lookout cannot be booked for overnight stays.

Access

Open to the public. Reachable by trail in the Mt. Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest; used as an emergency hiking shelter, not an active fire lookout.

Can you climb it?
Yes
Road to the top?
No, you have to hike
Trail
Popular hiking summit near North Cascades National Park.
Staffing
Not staffed (as of 1958)

Facts

Status
Standing
Type
Ground-level cabL-4 gable-roof groundhouse cabThe design: L-4
Built of
Wood
Built
1931
Height
Unknown
Elevation
6,732 ft (2,052 m)
Agency
U.S. Forest Service
Land
Federal land
Location
Skagit County, Washington
Coordinates
48.49533, −121.20486
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 8 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-wa-hidden-lake-peak

View from the cab

What you see from the cab: every ridge out to about 93 miles, the named peaks in sight, and other fire lookouts within view, worked out from terrain data in your browser.

Downloads about 4.0 MB of terrain data the first time.

Or see what it could see on the map: the ground in its line of sight.

History

Then and now

  1. 1931 BuiltGable-roof L-4 cab built by Larsen Bros. Construction atop Hidden Lake Peak.Sources: nhlr.org, npgallery.nps.gov
  2. No record between 1931 and 1958
  3. 1958 Last staffedStaffing ended when the Forest Service closed many north Cascades lookouts.Source: nhlr.org
  4. 1961 RestoredDr. Fred Darvill and the Skagit Alpine Club obtained a special-use permit to restore and maintain the structure.Source: nhlr.org
  5. No record between 1961 and 1987
  6. 1987 Listed on the National Register of Historic PlacesListed on the National Register of Historic Places (significant year 1931 per nomination).Source: npgallery.nps.gov
  7. 1996 Added to the National Historic Lookout RegisterRegistered on the National Historic Lookout Register, July 9, 1996.Source: nhlr.org
  8. No record between 1996 and 2025
  9. 2025 RestoredMaintenance work done on the lookout.Source: firelookout.org
  10. TodayStandingIt still stands, as far as our sources know.

Old maps of this spot

USGS topographic maps from the years a lookout stood may show it, often as a small symbol labelled “Lookout”. See the old topo maps around it on the Firefinder map, or find every scanned sheet of this spot on USGS TopoView (click the spot there to list them, with dates and downloads).

Story

Researched 4 Oct 2026, fact-checked.

The U.S. Forest Service put up the Hidden Lake Peak lookout in 1931, a gable-roofed L-4 cab set on the summit rock, built by Larsen Bros. Construction as part of a wave of Mt. Baker-Snoqualmie lookouts raised that era.1,2 It did its job as a fire lookout for about three decades, staffed into the 1950s, before the Forest Service pulled staffing from it and many other North Cascades lookouts in 1958.1,3

The building might easily have been left to rot after that, as happened to plenty of its neighbors. Instead, in 1961 a doctor, Fred Darvill, and the Skagit Alpine Club stepped in and got a special use permit from the Forest Service to maintain it.1 That volunteer stewardship is the reason the cab is still standing today rather than another cleared site like nearby Anderson Butte, whose 1930s lookout was torn down in 1964.4

The lookout was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1987 and to the National Historic Lookout Register in 1996.2,1 It sits on a popular hiking route in the Mt. Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest, right at the edge of North Cascades National Park, and today functions as an emergency hiking shelter rather than a staffed fire station.3 The National Historic Lookout Register's page on the tower lists it as available for rental, though other sources describe it simply as an open shelter for hikers, so it's worth checking current Forest Service guidance before planning on more than drop-in emergency use.1,3 It is not staffed or watched; hikers who reach it should treat it as the aging, volunteer-maintained structure it is.

  1. http://nhlr.org/lookouts/us/wa/hidden-lake-peak-lookout/ ↩
  2. https://npgallery.nps.gov/AssetDetail/NRIS/87001184 ↩
  3. https://www.firelookout.com/wa/hiddenlake.html ↩
  4. https://www.fs.usda.gov/recarea/mbs/recreation/hiking/recarea/?recid=17672 ↩

Photos

Photo of Hidden Lake Peak Lookout
Photo: National Historic Lookout Register (nhlr.org) · All rights reserved · source
Still standing the day after a windstorm with 155 mph winds 2/13/2011
Still standing the day after a windstorm with 155 mph winds 2/13/2011 (2011)Photo: National Historic Lookout Register (nhlr.org) · All rights reserved · source
Viewing westerly
Viewing westerlyPhoto: National Historic Lookout Register (nhlr.org) · All rights reserved · source
Hidden Lake Peak with Hidden Lake in background
Hidden Lake Peak with Hidden Lake in backgroundPhoto: National Historic Lookout Register (nhlr.org) · All rights reserved · source
Hidden Lake Peak with Hidden Lake in background
Hidden Lake Peak with Hidden Lake in backgroundPhoto: National Historic Lookout Register (nhlr.org) · All rights reserved · source
Covered with hoar frost Oct. 7, 2008
Covered with hoar frost Oct. 7, 2008 (2008)Photo: National Historic Lookout Register (nhlr.org) · All rights reserved · source
February 2015
February 2015 (2015)Photo: John Scurlock, via National Historic Lookout Register (nhlr.org) · All rights reserved · source
Hidden Lake in 1980
Hidden Lake in 1980 (1980)Photo: the Fire Lookout Museum and Bob Pfeifer, via firelookout.com · source
Hidden Lake in 2014
Hidden Lake in 2014 (2014)Photo: the Fire Lookout Museum and Bob Pfeifer, via firelookout.com · source
Hidden Lake in 2014
Hidden Lake in 2014 (2014)Photo: the Fire Lookout Museum and Bob Pfeifer, via firelookout.com · source
Hidden Lake in 2014
Hidden Lake in 2014 (2014)Photo: the Fire Lookout Museum and Bob Pfeifer, via firelookout.com · source
Photo of Hidden Lake Peak Lookout
Photo: Nick Archibald, via Wikimedia Commons · CC BY-SA 4.0 · source
Photo of Hidden Lake Peak Lookout
Photo: TrailChick Washington lookout guide (trailchick.com) · source

Photos keep their own rights and are shown with credit. Is one of these yours? You can ask for a different credit or for removal.

Sources

  1. National Historic Lookout Register (NHLR) Gave us: name, location, county, elevation, register numbers, agency, ownership, dates, photos, links National Historic Lookout Register (nhlr.org) · All rights reserved (American Resources, Inc.); facts extracted only, no prose copied. · retrieved 4 Oct 2026
  2. Forest Fire Lookout Association (FFLA) - US lookout lists Gave us: type, status, register numbers, links Forest Fire Lookout Association (firelookout.org) · No licence stated; facts extracted only, no prose copied. · retrieved 8 Oct 2026
  3. firelookout.com -- Rex Kamstra's Forest Fire Lookout Page Gave us: design, dates, photos, links firelookout.com · No licence stated on the site; facts only (coordinates, elevation, built/destroyed years, design, agency). Photos mirrored with the site's stated credit. · retrieved 4 Oct 2026
  4. Forest Fire Lookout Association chapter reports Gave us: dates, links Forest Fire Lookout Association, chapter and restoration-grant reports (firelookout.org) · No licence stated; facts only (dates, names, the kind of work done). Every note is our own wording and every event links to the FFLA report it comes from. Positions are copied from the NHLR, FFLOS and FFLA records. · retrieved 8 Oct 2026
  5. Wikidata -- US fire lookout towers (Q748998 and subclasses) Gave us: register numbers, photos, links Wikidata · CC0 1.0 (Wikidata). Images keep their own Commons licence/credit. · retrieved 4 Oct 2026
  6. OpenStreetMap -- fire lookout structures Gave us: what it is built of, register numbers, access, links © OpenStreetMap contributors · ODbL 1.0. (c) OpenStreetMap contributors. · retrieved 4 Oct 2026
  7. FOREST LOOKOUTS -- western US (Ron Kemnow's weebly sites) Gave us: links Ron Kemnow's Forest Lookouts sites (westlookouts, californialookouts, idaholookouts, montanalookouts, oregonlookouts and washingtonlookouts .weebly.com) · No licence stated; facts only (county, land manager, status word, coordinates where the page's own map widget gives them, township-range-section, height and design hints, links). The site's own newspaper quotes, citations and narrative are not reproduced. · retrieved 8 Oct 2026
  8. TrailChick: Washington State Fire Lookouts Gave us: photos, links TrailChick (trailchick.com) · No licence stated; facts only (county, land manager, coordinates, elevation, lookout type, years built). The guide's text is not reproduced; its card photos are listed with credit to TrailChick, for the project's photo mirroring. · retrieved 8 Oct 2026
  9. WillhiteWeb.com: Washington Fire Lookouts Gave us: links WillhiteWeb.com · No licence stated; names and page links only (the site's photos and text are not reproduced). · retrieved 8 Oct 2026
  10. Firefinder research Gave us: summary, design, status, agency, access, staffing, visiting details, dates, links, fact-check Firefinder research (sources cited in the story footnotes) · Our own research notes; each fact cites its source in the lookout's story

More about this lookout elsewhere

Firefinder takes facts (places, dates, numbers) from these sources and writes its own words. See all sources and licences.