Chocolate Lakes Loop
South Lake, Bishop Creek · near Bishop · Eastern Sierra
Hiking
At a glance
- Difficulty
- strenuous
- Route type
- loop
- Distance
- 6.5 miles
- Elevation gain
- 1,800 ft
- Time needed
- day
- Best season
- Mid-July–early October
Permits and booking
- Permit required
- No
- How the permit works
- No permit for the day loop. The connector between Ruwau and the Chocolate Lakes is a steep, faint use-trail — carry a map. Starts at 9,820 ft.
- How hard the permit is to get
- 0 of 5
What is here
- Features
- Long, Ruwau & Chocolate Lakes · Bull Lake · A cross-country use-trail saddle · Chocolate-brown metamorphic peaks
Worth knowing
- Dogs
- Allowed
- Good for a first timer
- No
Hiking detail
- Intl tip
- Do it counter-clockwise (up to Ruwau, over the saddle) so you descend the steep loose section. Carry a map — the mid-loop connector is unsigned and easy to lose.
The guide
The best pure day-loop in the Bishop Creek drainage — it climbs the Bishop Pass trail to Long Lake, cuts up to Ruwau Lake, then…
In the Guidebook
Everything above is yours for free. The written guide to Chocolate Lakes Loop — what it is actually like, and what we would tell a friend before they went — comes with the Guidebook.
Getting there
- Coordinates
- 37.1683, -118.5636