Weekend road trip to Washington's North Cascade Loop in a BMW X3 M40i

I did the same route back in August 2023, along with another car enthusiast in his Porsche Boxster S.

BHPian mobike008 recently shared this with other enthusiasts:

July 26 & July 27th, 2025- Weekend Trip

As most of you may know, I live in Washington State and this is our second stint, as we lived here for around 2 years in our first stint. During the first stint, I didn’t get much opportunity to explore but, since the last 4 years, I have explored every inch of Washington state (as is my habit, as I am a hardcore nature and outdoor lover).

There is so much to do in this state that even if you don’t step out of this state, it will keep your outdoor hunger satisfied for the whole year.

Washington is an outdoor paradise. A few things that are so amazing here are the following :

Proximity- Distance is always the biggest consideration in the US. In Washington, you can enjoy the beautiful outdoors right at your doorstep (in my case) to a maximum of 150 miles (3 hours). Within this distance, there are usually tons of things to do and you are spoilt for choice from the diverse nature available in this state.
Diversity- It’s an amalgamation of Snow Capped Mountains, Oceans, Beaches, Rainforest, Lakes and Islands. Making it a treasure cove for folks who love to explore outdoors.
National Parks- Blessed with 3 National Parks- And, we are going to go through one of them today.

Fun Fact : People think it rains a lot in Seattle. The fact is, New York City gets more rain than Seattle.

I like to visit the same place in different seasons- Each place looks and feels totally different in each season- Summer, Fall and Winter (I omitted spring as it’s a season for just leaves to fall giving an opportunity for fresh green leaves to come for the summers).

With that background, I wanted to share today about our 2-day trip into the North Cascades Loop, which is iconic and a bucket list for many people. A large section of this loop is usually closed from November to May each year due to heavy snow (However, it is still accessible by a longer route, which we never did).

North Cascade Loop is ~ 500 miles in total and can be done either way

Option 1: Seattle->Lake Diablo-> Winthrop-> Lake Chelan-> Wenatchee-> Leavenworth- Seattle
Option 2: Seattle-Leavenworth-> Wenatchee-> Lake Chelan -> Winthrop -> Lake Diablo- Seattle

We chose Option 1

I did the same route back in August 2023, along with Team BHPian- Crackhead in his Porsche Boxster S. We both did this route of 500 miles (800 kms) in about 13 hours which included multiple stops to enjoy the scenery, lunch and pizza stops. In a way, it was like a Cannonball Run because there are multiple scenic points and we rushed through them as we wanted to do it in a single day.

We normally visit Lake Diablo or Lake Chelan or Leavenworth or Wenatchee standalone as all are absolutely spectacular places and can be done as a day-trip.

Without further ado, let’s dive into this photoblog.

Our Drive Loop Map.

Lake Diablo- July 26, 2025

Lake Diablo- December 2023 (Exact Same location in Winters) !!

BMW & Porsche at the exact same location 2 years apart.

Yours truly with the Porsche Boxster S.

Lake Diablo

Lake Diablo is one of my all-time favorite drives with my car pals. This is 2.5 hours from home and we normally hit Diablo lake at least 4-6 times in a year as each season this place is completely different and it’s got great mountain roads for some fast and thrilling drive which is “tailor-made” for the BMW.

I was stunned to see a boat ride for the first time in Diablo Lake and we decided next time around we need to do that boat trip.

The color of the lake was stunning due to the glacier melt, leaving a lot of mineral residue which when the sun falls on it, emits these amazing blue/green colors. These are iPhone pictures and cannot do justice to the actual color of the water.

It was breathtakingly beautiful !!!

Mom is excited about the trip.