Hikes in Washington: The Chapman Lake Trail

Basic Information

• Name: Chapman Lake Trail
• Where: Cheney, Washington
• Distance: 2.2 miles
• Maximum Elevation: 2,240
• Elevation Gain: 107 feet
• Time: 1-2 hours
• Difficulty: Easy
• More Information: Spokane County website

Google Earth Map of the Trail

Directions

This hike is located just outside of the small town of Cheney.  To reach the trailhead from Spokane, take I-90 West about 15 miles and then exit onto Highway 904 to Cheney.  Stay on the highway and drive through downtown Cheney.  On the outskirts of Cheney take a left onto Cheney-Plaza Road.  After about 10 miles take a left to stay on Cheney-Plaza Road.

About a mile up the road is the unmarked trailhead pictured below:

Parking

There is no designated parking lot for this hike.  There is a small pull over area adjacent to the trailhead and across the road from it that can fix maybe 6-7 cars.

Narrative

Another lake in the Channeled Scablands south of Spokane with an interesting history is Chapman Lake.  The lake located just outside of Cheney was once was a popular fish location accessed by a resort ran by decades by a man named Ole Dybdall.  The Dybdall family got started in the Chapman Lake area when they opened a mill there to grind the wheat that farmers would bring in from the nearby fields.  After the closure of the mill the family opened its resort.  Old Dybdall died under mysterious circumstances when his store burned down in 1990.  He was 88 years old.  Below is a picture of the resort:

The land was then inherited by a family member who by 2011 decided to close access to the lake.  In 2014 a deal was being worked by the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife to buy the property, but the owner’s death in 2016 stopped the sale when the new owners decided to keep the property.  Currently Chapman Lake can only be accessed by a 2-mile roundtrip hike through publicly owned forest that surrounds about half of the lake.  It is legal to put a boat in the water for those willing to carry it that far.

On a recent weekend my kids and I decided to do the short hike to Chapman Lake, but were not about to carry a boat with us.  From the trailhead there is a road we thought was the trail, but it led to a gun range that appeared to be heavily used:

So we went back to the trailhead and followed the fence to a small trail that followed Rock Creek:

Rock Creek is what drains Chapman Lake.  This stretch of Rock Creek is really quite beautiful and all this water eventually ends up in the massive and mysterious Rock Lake further downstream.

As we continued up the trail, Rock Creek began to widen and become more like a marsh than a creek:

Eventually we had no large trail to follow and instead had to follow a very faint trail through the trees:

The trail ascended up one of the many small rock escarpments in the area.  What trail there was left to follow became extremely difficult to see:

While walking through the trees we came upon an old water pipe.  The pipe was once used by the old Chapman Lake Mill that once stood in this area.  People hiking to the lake should not hike down to see what remains of the mill because it is on private property:

Passed the old mill we could then see some of the buildings from the old Lake Chapman Resort:

Soon enough we found ourselves on the shore of Chapman Lake:

It looks like at some point somebody did carry a boat in, but has since been destroyed by the elements:

From the shoreline we hiked up another small escarpment to get more views of the lake:

Here on the escarpment I took out my DJI Mavic 2 Zoom – Drone to take some aerial views of the lake.  From above, the inverse C shape of the lake was noticeable with the resort located on the bend of the C.  In the far distance the 5,883 foot Mt. Spokane could be seen:

The northern portion of the lake was easily far wider than the north end.  On the far northern shore is where the water from the nearby Turnbull National Wildlife Refuge drains into:

Below is a view of the peninsula of land that sticks into the lake to give its shape.  There are no trails over there and it can only be accessed by boat:

Here is an aerial picture of Rock Creek that flows out of Chapman Lake:

This next picture shows where Rock Creek passes under the Cheney-Plaza Road near the trailhead:

The below picture shows the view looking east towards Idaho where the forests can be seen giving away to the Palouse hills of southeastern Washington:

In this next picture looking towards the south, the terrain feature known as Steptoe Butte could be seen in the far distance:

After taking a few aerial photos, my kids and I decided to hike further in towards the south part of the lake.  There was no trail and we had to navigate through the various rocks and escarpments:

Along the way my kids and I saw a lot of garter snakes slithering around.  Anyone paranoid of snakes may want to avoid this lake:

Besides snakes we also saw a lot of these yellow wildflowers as well:

We soon found ourselves descending down to the shoreline:

The views of the lake were very nice, but the ability to actually fish in the water is limited because most of the shore is a high cliff:

On the most southern end of the lake it turns into a swamp where it is very easy to access the water from:

We stopped once again here to deploy my DJI Mavic 2 Zoom – Drone to take some aerial photos of the southern area of the lake.  In the below picture the cliff line on the left is what we followed to reach the swampy area of the lake:

This next picture shows the shoreline that was across the lake from us:

Here is a closer look at the swampy area of the lake that when looked at from above is much larger than when seen from the ground:

I next flew my drone along the escarpment above the route we took to reach Chapman Lake:

I was surprised to see that on the very top of the escarpment there is a little pond:

After taking the pictures with my drone we then proceeded to hike back to the trailhead.  Once black at my truck the first thing we did was do a tick check.  For anyone hiking in the vicinity of the Turnbull National Wildlife Refuge, it is important to check for ticks.  My kids and I all wore pants and long sleeve shirts because of the ticks.  I did find a few ticks on my kids clothes and one was in my daughter hair.  When I got home later, my wife found one on me she had to take off.  So definitely take tick checks seriously when hiking in this area.

Conclusion

Overall the hike to Chapman Lake made for a fun adventure since we largely had to choose our own path through the woods to reach the lake.  The hike is short and easily accomplished by young kids. There are some very nice views of the lake and for those that want to carry in fishing gear, can even fish this lake as well.  Just be respectful of private property and be careful of the ticks.