Maple Pass Loop lives up to the hype with dramatic views

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My second hike in the Northern Cascades was even better than the first one I did yesterday. This area is just fantastic. We hiked Maple Loop Pass. We went counter clockwise, which I would recommend. I should have studied the map a little better. We passed the turn off for Ann Lake and did not add the mile onto our hike. I would take the hike out and back the next time on this trail. Continuing on there are great view down to the lake. There are switchbacks past the lake that start you going up again.
The views out above Ann Lake of the gray granite walls, the red and yellow meadows with the evergreen trees mixed in and blue sky are truly stunning.
We reach Heather Pass and I was slightly confused. A pass usually means the top and the trail starts down, but in this case it was the pass from Heather Lake. The meadow was a stunning red. We crossed the meadow and had a view of the back side of the mountain. We will switchback up the front side and not around the back. We got back on the trail going up to the Pass. As we went up we could see down to Heather Lake. It seemed like a mile out, maybe next time we will hike to it. The trail continues around the far side of Ann Lake but six hundred feet above it.
We crested the “top” false summit and had views north and south, but we still have another mile or so and 400 feet of elevation gain to the true top of the pass. Getting to the top felt great. We could see the trail heading down so of course, we needed to summit the granite peak off to the right. We saw a couple people up on the top so we know it could be done. They said there was some scrambling but it was not difficult. We left our packs and poles at the base and headed up. There was a path mostly and there was rock scrambling for 20 feet of so, but we made it up and the views were spectacular.
The hike down across the face and switchbacks we saw from the top were cool. Once we hit the end it dropped off the left side (Northwest) and it went down. It went down steep. We did see Rainy Lake to the south and Ann Lake to the north right off the top and then a steep drop all the way down. This is the steep side and I am glad we went counter clockwise. I used my poles and did little videoing on the way down. This was a fantastic hike.