Trip Report - Mt Hood via Old Chute - 12/5/20

Looking up the Hogsback shortly after dawn

I’m pretty sure Mt Hood is the first volcano I ever saw in person. When I was 12, I flew into Portland with my family to visit my aunt, and saw Hood from the city. During that trip, we went backpacking in the Three Sisters Wilderness, and I summited South Sister (after an epically long slog). I remember falling in love with the mountains during that trip. So it was great to do the drive down from Seattle and finally get on Mount Hood.

Roundtrip Stats = 7 miles, 5,300’ of gain, 9.5 hrs

The trip was relatively straightforward - Becky and I slept in the parking lot, got up at 3 am and were heading up the mountain at 3:45 am. It was surprisingly gusty (out of the NW), and we slogged up to the top of the Palmer lift, when it finally started getting light. We reached the Hogsback shortly after dawn, and were treated with some beautiful alpenglow. We took a short break on the Hogsback before traversing over to the Old Chute. It was pretty sugary snow, so it was difficult to feel confident with our axe placements, but it wasn’t steep enough to be too troubling.

When we hit the ridge, we got great views of the inversion, with clouds spread out before us to the north and east. The final ridge traverse was pretty icy but wasn’t too sketchy.

For the descent, Becky and I were both happy to each have two tools, and we downclimbed a few hundred feet before turning around and plunge-stepping the rest of the way down to the car!

All in all, a great day out - thanks again to Marc for letting us borrow his car for the trip!

Looking up the ridge toward Crater Rock

Summit Traverse

Looking down the Old Chute

Look at all those climbers descending the Old Chute!

Wandering down the endless snowfields

A time for Celebration!

Trip Report - Mount Rainier via Emmons - August 1st - 3rd 2020

Well, I went up Rainier again - second time in two weeks - via the Emmons. This time I went with Becky and Toby, who happened to be in town for the weekend! We again got perfect weather and managed to pull off another great trip.

Roundtrip Stats

• 20 miles and 10,855’ of gain

• 24 hours of total travel time (3 days)

Roughly our route, hit me up if you want a gpx

Specifics

• Interglacier is starting to break up, with some cracks and holes above 8k’. We roped up on the way up and down to be careful, though the cracks are all pretty obvious.

• Ascending or descending the Prow sucks with full packs, unless you really enjoy choss. There’s probably a good line off it but we couldn’t find it.

• Camp Schurman has running water on the glacier just above camp (between Schurman and Emmons Flats) as long as it’s sunny and warm.

• The Corridor is in solid shape, with lots of small things opening up, but nothing too concerning.

• There’s a beautiful crossing under/through a serac at 11,500’ that’s still in good shape.

• At ~11,800’ the main bootpack used a bridge that is now gone. Currently (as of 8/2/20 @11 am), there’s a shitty bridge still hanging on, but this bridge has cracks on both sides, and I can’t imagine it’s going to last too much longer. See pics below for details.

• Above 11,800' and the bridge, everything is smooth sailing. The route heads almost all the way to Liberty Saddle before pushing up to the summit.

• There’s a lot of penitentes on the last 600’ to the summit, which are both beautiful and super frustrating to walk through.

Photo Story

Day 1 - from White River Trailhead to Camp Schurman

We hiked up on Friday afternoon.

Glacier Basin is beautiful, and all the wildflowers are out!

The snow on the Interglacier starts at ~7k’

There are cracks and holes opening up on the Interglacier above 8k’

Climbing down the Prow to get to Schurman takes a long time

Still climbing down the Prow

Day 2 - Chilling in camp

We spent day 2 hanging out in camp, drinking a ton of water, eating a ton of food, and practicing rescue skills, before heading to bed at 5 pm.

There’s running water above camp at Schurman (between Schurman and Emmons Flats) if it’s sunny and warm out. Thanks to Mia for teaching me the ice screw trick a few weeks ago!

Rest days are all about hydration

Beautiful camp, with some deep cracks opening up near the tents

Day 3 - Schurman to Summit to Schurman to White River Trailhead

We left camp at 12:30 am and headed up the Corridor, which was all solid, though there were definitely some smaller cracks opening up both across and parallel to the bootpack.

At 11.5k’ we topped out the Corridor and went right, through some beautiful seracs. We moved quickly through this section, but it was spectacular.

Here’s a photo of the 11.5’ serac crossing (on our way down)

“The Crux” at 11,800’

We’d gotten some beta that at 11,800’ the main bootpack led to a now-fallen snowbridge, so we went left following some faint tracks (right where the standard bootpack goes straight up a 50 degree slope and into a crevasse) and found this skinny bridge. There may be other ways across this big crack, but this is the one that everyone used on 8/2. We belayed across it on the way up and the way down.

On the way up, there was one crack (at the higher side of the bridge), and on the way down there were cracks on both sides of the bridge.

How long will the bridge last? Who knows? Is there another way around? Probably, but no one we talked to found one.

Since this is the crux of the route currently, here’s some detailed photos:

Looking back across it at 4 am

Here’s me above the bridge, putting in a picket on the way down to get a little security. If you look closely you can see cracks beneath the bridge, as well as across the bridge at both sides.

PC Becky Hunter

And here’s me building an anchor on the far side to belay my rope team across.

PC Becky Hunter

Once we were across the bridge, it was smooth sailling the rest of the way. We followed the main bootpack up and trending right toward Liberty Saddle.

Curtis Ridge in the pre-dawn light

I’d read about how the alpenglow lights up the mountain for 5 minutes at dawn, but it was truly spectacular to experience it.

Cracks near Liberty Saddle

Penitentes and the final push to the summit (big snow mound)

We summited in gusting 30ish mph winds and took shelter by the register till we were ready to descend. The descent was straightforward, and we got down in 3 hrs, including belaying the 11.8k’ bridge.

Once we were back at camp, we celebrated with some snacks and red wine, then broke camp and headed out.

Celebratory wine once we got back to camp!

On the way out, we took the lower Emmons Glacier, which was very straightforward and led right to Camp Curtis.

Looking back up across the Emmons Glacier from Camp Curtis

At the bottom of the Interglacier, we threw our 4 season boots on our packs and headed down in trail runners.

Looking up at the Interglacier as we walked out past all the wildflowers.

Hiking out took forever with our heavy packs and our tired feet, but we made it down to the car and drank trailhead beers to celebrate.

Thanks to my fantastic partners for the great trip

and to Rainier for the perfect conditions and weather!

Becky, looking cheerful after 17 hrs of being up and moving

Here’s Toby, looking excited about his 50+ lb pack.

Trip Report - Mount Rainier Carryover - up the Kautz and down the DC - June 18th through 20th 2020

I’ve been on the Muir Snowfield many times, and I’ve daydreamed about summitting many times. This photo marks the first time I’ve been able to look up at the upper mountain and know what it feels like to be up there.

Trip Stats

3 days w/ 25 hrs of travel

18.5 miles 9,900’ gain

Trip Background + Map

I visited Seattle in March of 2017, and, for some reason, biked by myself across the 90 bridge. On the bridge, I got my first full view of Rainier, and wondered (in one of the first posts of this journal) what it would require to climb it. I had no idea.

Now it’s over three years later, and Rainier was the main goal for this summer. I’ve been training since January, and ticking off other bucket list trips - Ptarmigan Traverse and the Hinman to Daniel traverse - but in the back of my mind I kept wondering whether I would get a chance to try Rainier. In mid-July, I got a call from my buddy Marc asking if I wanted to join a climb via the Kautz route, and suddenly, I was in.

I researched the route obsessively, made a spreadsheet to make sure I didn’t forget anything, and watched the weather, which looked like it was going to be perfect. On Saturday morning, I drove down to the park w/ Marc and met up with Mia and Jake. We’d opted for a slow three day trip, with a big carry-over on the last day, and we got our final group gear ready in the Paradise parking lot.

Day 1 - Paradise to Shark Fin Camp (7,600’)

You can see what’s left of the Fan on the far left side of the photo

We headed up from Paradise to Glacier Vista, then dropped off the edge down to the Lower Nisqually Glacier. The Fan looked narrow and manky, so we opted to head around to where the Wilson Glacier joins the Nisqually. There were some awkward crevasses to navigate, but it wasn’t too bad. Once we were up at Wilson Bench, we decided to head up to “Shark Fin Camp”, which doesn’t get used much, but provides a great lower camp for the route. We got to camp early - around 3:30 pm, so we took it easy.

Shark Fin Camp is spectacular

The team stands around at camp in the absurdly nice weather

Jake’s heavy and heroic group contribution.

It wouldn’t be a trip if I didn’t take a photo of Marc making/eating food

If you look closely on the right side of this photo, you can see the shadow of Rainier in the hazy air

Day 2 - Shark Fin Camp to Camp Hazard

Marc on the Turtle

This is one of the most relaxed days I’ve had on a big mountain. We woke up late to perfect weather, took forever to get out of camp, and moseyed our way up the Turtle snowfield to Camp Hazard. It was absurdly hot and still, with almost no breeze.

We set up camp at Camp Hazard right near the rock step, and walked over to check out the Kautz in the late afternoon. It looked pretty intimidating, but still in good shape.

View from the top of the rock step

We spent the evening eating and packing and feeling the altitude. My head felt terrible, and I was worried about how I’d feel the next day, but I still enjoyed the absurdly beautiful views.

Day 3 - Camp Hazard to the Summit, then down the DC to Paradise

We broke camp and headed out at 3:45 am, bags fully packed. The rock step was awkward, but there was enough snow in the second half to make it feel pretty reasonable.

Mia watches Jake downclimb the step

Then we swung over onto the Kautz, and simul-ed up the first ice step, stepping over and through broken crevasses and penitentes. This is some of the coolest snow climbing I’ve ever done.

Everyone in their own pools of light

Mia taking a hero step over a crevasse filled with icicles

Soon we were at the base of the second step, and we pitched it out. Jake took the lead, and Mia, Marc, and I tried to stay warm while dodging the falling ice that rained down from Jake’s tools.

Jake on the sharp end

Mia and Marc looking warmer than we felt

Mia following the first pitch

Marc topping out the technical bit

Jake heads up towards the Wapowety Cleaver

Mia jumps a crevasse

Upper mountain crevasses

We made it up to the summit, after crossing some pretty enormous snow bridges.

Everyone layering up on the summit

Once we got down to the summit register there was no wind, and it felt like it was 70 degrees. We all de-layered to our sunhoodies, took a short break, and then headed down the DC.

After the summit, Marc crosses the crater

Big crevasses on the DC

Looking back up at the upper DC

Finally done with the Cleaver and down at Ingraham Flats

Looking back up at the mountain from Pebble Creek

Finally back at the car!

Mia and I run to the car

Time to drink a beer

We finished back at the cars, 16 hours after leaving Camp Hazard. A long and phenomenal day out.

Only one more volcano in Washington to go - Glacier Peak - with this cold hero. We’re hoping to give it a try this summer!

This is the cold face

Trip Report - Waptus Lake + Second Half of Alpine Lakes Crest Traverse (Hinman to Daniel) - July 3rd through 5th, 2020

Hinman Tarns - the heart of the traverse

Well, I figured the Ptarmigan would be the last big trip for a bit, but I finished up a project midweek and realized I had three days off in a row, and my mom wanted to go on a chill backpacking trip. I checked the weather, and realized it was going to be perfect. I did some thinking, and realized I could get on (part of) another traverse this summer - Kyle McCrohan’s “Alpine Lakes Crest Traverse”.

When I first moved out here, my friend Robby suggested a similar-ish linkup from Snoqualmie Pass to Steven’s that he’d mapped out on Caltopo, following the Cascade Crest, but I didn’t think it would go, nor did I have the time or the skills. In the years that followed, I spent a lot more time in the Alpine Lakes Wilderness, slowly expanding my distances, and falling in love with the area.

I attempted Daniel (half-heartedly) a few years ago, with my partner Becky, when we headed up to Dip Top Pass. We approached via the East side of the Daniel Massif, and thought about tagging the summit, but ran short on time and ended up traversing to Pea Soup and then doing the horrible scramble over the side of Lynch, getting to Dip Top Pass right at sunset. So It was good we hadn’t tried. But I stared at Daniel all evening, and all the next morning, and knew I needed to come back. On other trips, I stared at the Chimney/Overcoat system, and committed to getting to that area as well.

One day, a year ago, when Kyle published his route on his blog, it all came together - a well-described, well-photographed route that seemed almost doable, with the right timing and commitment. But it was still intimidating, so I put the route on the backburner - one of those routes maybe I’ll get to someday (like Frostbite Ridge, or Kyle’s Dakobed Traverse, or Luna Peak).

Completing the Ptarmigan last weekend really unlocked this trip. I was confident in my fast snow travel, and knew I could handle the distances. I still didn’t have a partner, but knew how filled in the glaciers were on the Ptarmigan, and knew that the Foss Glacier (on Hinman) and the Lynch (on Daniel) wouldn’t have opened up yet.

I knew I didn’t have time (or interest) in doing the whole traverse solo, but I figured I could do the second half in a day, from Waptus Lake, so I set out to try.

Planning + Route

Loop Distance and Vert (as recorded on Saturday) = 27.5 miles and 9500’ of gain

I couldn’t get all the labels to come through - so the Blue route is the climb route, the Green route is the potential descent, and the Orange (w/ red line) route is my actual descent. The line from Hinman/Daniel col to Venus Col is a tentative bail, I never sorted out whether it would actually go.

I had planned a few different routes based on beta from Kyle and Seeking Ultra’s circumnavigation, which had also inspired me a few years ago. The biggest question was how I was going to get back to Waptus from the summit. Could I drop straight south from the summit to Venus, then to Spade, then to Waptus? Or would I have to descend east, and then take the PCT the long way round? Kyle suggested that the Venus descent would go, but he didn’t have too many specifics, and I couldn’t find many photos taken from Venus looking north. I assumed I’d figure out it once I was out there - the point of this traverse is that it’s an adventure.

Day 1 - To Waptus Lake

My mother (an accomplished solo backpacker herself) and I headed in to Waptus in the mid-afternoon, past beautiful swimming holes and wildflowers and horrific bugs. I’d never been to Waptus, and didn’t know how many campsites there would be, but felt confident we’d find something. We did, but there were a ton of people out there and it took us wandering until the very NW side of the lake before we finally found something. We camped and I went to sleep excited and nervous.

View down to Waptus Lake from climb to Lake Ivanhoe

Day 2 - The Traverse

I got out of camp at 5:30 am. I wasn’t sure how long the traverse would take - I expected somewhere between 9 and 12 hours depending on how sloppy the snow was - so I wanted an early start to give myself a good chance of completing it.

I headed west along Waptus, and made good time up to Lake Ivanhoe, where the troubles began.

Ivanhoe looks melted out, but the trail on the N side was infuriating.

Kyle did this route almost exactly a year ago, but the melt happened way faster last year, so I knew I’d have more snow than he did. I’d expected this would slow me down somewhat on the climbs, but would make me feel safer on the glaciers. What I hadn’t thought about it was the miles of bullshit punchy icy snow on the trails from Ivanhoe over Dutch Miller Pass to Williams Lake. This slowed me down quite badly and wasted a fair amount of strength.

Dutch Miller Gap was all snow, but it became intermittent as I dropped toward the turnoff to Williams

Looking back over Williams Lake toward the Middle Fork of the Snoqualmie (with the evocative mining rails in the foreground)

Finally, consistent snow! Time to put the crampons on and go

Once I finally got up to the bench above Williams, I was good to go. I wandered past the Chain Lakes, got up to La Bohn Lake area, then finally headed east up Hinman. The weather looked terrible to the West, but I rationalized it away by knowing that I was east of the crest, where the weather never comes!

I did lose visibility on Hinman multiple times, but the route was easy to follow - stay climber’s left of the ridge, and I figured that once I was up there, I could decide whether I felt good about the rest of the traverse.

After cutting our trip short on the Extended Ptarmigan due to low vis, I was bumming pretty hard about dealing with this bullshit again.

I summited Hinman, and waited for a bit to see what the weather would do. When the clouds suddenly cleared and the weather looked like it might hold, I went for it - bootskiing down the Foss Glacier on perfect snow and descending the 2000 ft from Hinman summit to the base of the Pea Soup waterfalls in 40 minutes. I wanted to linger and enjoy the tarns, but they were barely melted out, and I felt like the visibility wouldn’t last long, so I pressed on.

Foss Glacier - it’s a dream to descend. I felt really powerfully about this glacier - it’s sublime and remote.

Looking up to the Hinman Daniel Col (about to get into the “bowling alley”)

I sped through Kyle’s “bowling alley”, which was filled with bowling ball rocks and knocked over pins, as well as cornice chunks and wet loose slides, before getting to the Pea Soup waterfalls. I climbed the snow and slabs up to the outlet, and took a break while looking at the Lynch Glacier. This was my last possiblity to bail - I could head over to Dip Top, though getting all the way to Waptus would have been hellish. I saw a bootpack on the W Glacier, and the weather looked good, so I stopped thinking and went for it.

Pea Soup Lake, Dip Top Peak, Dip Top Pass, and Lynch Peak

Looking back down the boot pack towards the outlet and Dip Top Peak

I followed another soloist’s footprints up to the main glacier, where the visibility dropped again.

Follow the footprings and the gps track…

Finally, I scrambled to the summit, where the views were clear to the east and south, and totally socked in to the north and west.

Rainier in the distance, looming over all (Spade Lake in the bottom left)

Suddenly, I had done the meat of the traverse. I sat on the summit and enjoyed the evershifting views before beginning to think about the descent. After 20 minutes, I knew I had to get going, so I headed east, enjoying the ease of following a cattlepath.

I was not sure where to drop down to Venus, but I had planned (and mapped) the ridge that leads from Daniel to the Citadel, then dropping down to the Venus outlet. On Google Earth and Caltopo, it had looked traversable, but in person it seemed a knife edge. I could have dropped down to Circle on snow, then climbed the 700 odd feet to cross east across the ridge, then descended to Venus, but after over 8000’ of climbing, I was tired. I chose to descend the eastern bowl of Daniel then to descend the PCT.

Looking at the ridge I’d hoped to traverse (over toward Citadel, with Circle Lake frozen in the bottom left).

Bootskiing the eastern bowl was perfection, and I was down at Peggy’s Pond in no time. All that remained was the endless switchbacking of the PCT back to Waptus. I thumped my way down trail, enjoying the afternoon as it turned to evening.

Peggy’s Pond, still melting out beneath Cathedral Rock

Deep Lake is spectacular from all angles

The meadows by the Deep Lake Outlet, with Cathedral Rock to the right and the eastern Daniel Massif to the left

Wildflowers on the cliffs over Spinola Creek

I finally got back to camp at 8:30, after 15 hours of travel. I ate dinner, drank a beer (cooled in a creek), and slept hard.

Day 3 - Hiking Out

My mother and I hiked out the next day, taking a leisurely pace. I was sore, but not wrecked. We swam in the Cooper River by the trailhead, and then headed back to Seattle. A phenomenal and unexpected trip!

Leaving Waptus (and Summit Chief in the distance)

Closing Thoughts

• I’d highly recommend this loop, though I’m still not sure I’m happy that I soloed the Lynch Glacier. It felt fine at the time (though the whiteout rattled me a bit), but I don’t think I’d recommend it to anyone else, not because it’s an objectively bad idea, but because no one should ever recommend soloing anything. And personally, I think I’m going to take a break from soloing any more glaciers.

• Regarding gear:

  • I did this trip in my stiffest low tops - my Sportiva TX3 approach shoes - which aren’t waterproof, but did perfectly in all other ways. I used them last year when I climbed Colchuck Glacier to Pandora’s Box + Dragontail, then did the thru-hike to Snow Lake trailhead, so I knew they could handle steep snow, crampons, and miles of dirt walking. Someday I’ll get a pair of high-top waterproof trailrunners?

  • I was also happy to have a hiking pole, an ultralight axe, and ultralight crampons. I probably could have done it with microspikes, but I wouldn’t have felt as stable, so it wouldn’t have been worth it to me.

I realize that this setup looks ratchet as shit, but it actually climbs great - I had no footwear issues or blisters despite the 15 hrs of travel, 27 miles, and 9500’ of gain…

Trip Report - Ptarmigan Traverse - June 25th through 28th, 2020

View south toward Dome/Dana/Spire from White Rock Lakes

Well, after years of thinking about this traverse, I finally had the gear, partner, weather window, and time off, so my buddy Robby and I gave it a go.

Our original plan was to follow Kyle McCrohan’s Extended Ptarmigan Traverse, though we were thwarted by bad weather on the third day (and threatened by a worse forecast on the 4th). More on that later…

We dropped cars for the shuttle (~5 hrs of driving from Seattle) and slept 2 miles short of Cascade Pass due to the closure (which ended up being caused a totally manageable pile of snow).

Basic Stats:

• 4 days/3 nights - this felt good and doable, though with Kyle’s extension that day 4 would have been burly

• our route had 14,000’ of gain and 44.5 miles traveled
  

Basic Takeaways (photos below):

• this trip felt very early season, with a ton of snow and few patches of bare ground

• the benefit of this is that descents went fast, though the sloppy snow slowed down our climbing pretty badly

• there’s lots of flowing water, even though there’s so much snow. we never had to melt snow.

• we didn’t have to cross or come near any big crevasses

• we saw evidence of a lot of big cornice fails (saw one come off the N face of Formidable) and set a few small loose wet slides (D 0.5 at most) but generally felt pretty avy-safe

Specifics:

• Cache Glacier to Cache Col is chill, though there’s still a gnarly overhanging snow/cornice thing hanging on a rock that Kyle McCrohan documented a few days ago. When that breaks, it’ll be bad for anyone underneath

• Koolaid is still all snow

• Red Ledges are snow up to the ledge, with intermittent steep snow traversing required. With soft snow it was fine, though exposed and unprotectable

• Yang Yang Lakes is still snow camping, though it’ll be melted out sometime soon

• White Rock Lakes has good dry dirt bivies

• Itswoot Ridge is just a huge cornice

• Cub Lake is still frozen (and the climb up to the Cub/Bachelors divide is pretty horrendous

• the descent through the slide paths of Bachelor’s Creek was, to quote Jake Walker, “a human car wash” of brush and schwacking. in other words, it sucks.

Photo Story

Day 1

Despite all the posts I’ve read about the Cascade Pass switchbacks, we were up them pretty quickly, where we put on crampons (which we would have on more or less continuously.

Climbing up to Cache Col, with the view of Sahale behind us

View from descent from Cache Col down toward Koolaid Lake (invisible in this photo due to snow) and Red Ledges, with Mt. Formidable dominating the upper right of the frame

Closer to Red Ledges

The climb up Red Ledges really wasn’t that bad. Just some steepish snow climbing, which was helpfully soft, followed by alternating traversing on scree held together with red mud, and traversing more steep snow…

Almost finished

View from Spider Formidable Col toward the rest of the traverse, with the loose wet slide in the foreground

Day 2

Yang Yang Lakes -there’s no sites melted out yet, so we camped on snow here, though there’s a ton of easy access water (obviously)

We took the “snow finger” as described by Volken/McBrian out of Yang Yang Lakes area, which was the steepest snow on the traverse at probably around 45 degrees. This cut off an annoying looking spur that kept you on lower angle terrain but required more gain and distance

South Cascade Glacier and the weather begins to blow in from the northwest

Climbing down to White Rock Lakes was surprisingly steep, but with the soft snow felt very chill

Current state of White Rock Lakes - not really melted out at all…

Solid camp site w/ at least 3 good sites, though this was definitely the best

It rained and gusted all evening, so we spent about 12 hours in the tent, playing cribbage and eating all our food.

Day 3 - Here’s where we left the standard Ptarmigan…

We headed across the huge cirque, from White Rock Lakes over to Dana Glacier, then headed up southeast to the upper eastern Dome/Dana Col.

About to cross onto the Dana Glacier, looking over at Dome as it hides in the clouds

Once we were on the Dana Glacier, we lost visibility. We couldn’t see more than 40 ft, sometimes even less. I had the routes on my phone and my watch, so we just followed the lines, watched for crevasses, and waited for the col to reveal itself. It happened eventually.

Then we crossed onto the Dome Glacier, still hoping for a break in the weather, which was feeling less and less likely.

Somewhere on the Dome Glacier

We got up to 8600’ and the Dome/Chikamin Col, where we pretty quickly realized that we weren’t going any further. We wanted to summit Dome, but couldn’t even see where to start in the mist. And when we looked toward the Chikamin, we could see there was a massive drop into a yawning bergshrund, but we couldn’t even tell where the snow ended, nor whether the bergshrund spanned the entire slope.

So we sadly bailed back toward Dome Glacier and Cub Lake.

Just before we headed down, we got this view of what I think is Dome (or Dome’s false summit?) which was quickly obscured again

We didn’t regain visibility till around 6800’, when we were dropping from Dome/Dana Col southwest toward Itswoot Ridge.

Robby crossing the southern slopes of the Spire Dome ridge towards Itswoot Ridge

Here’s Robby, my heroic and indefatigable partner, looking chiq with an unnamed glacier broken up behind him

We crossed over Itswoot Ridge (still totally snowy) and then dropped down into the (also still snowy) Cub Lake Basin

Cub Lake is in the upper right third

Cub really isn’t melted out much at all

Climbing out of Cub sucked - 600 ft up 35 degree frozen avy debris with a huge slide down to the lake

We dropped northwest down the headwaters of the Bachelor Creek drainage, and then suddenly were done with snow. We wandered our way down the intermittent trail, through slide paths and alders, till we found a small site at 6200’ (wouldn’t recommend sleeping here till it melts out more)

Day 4 - back to the car!

I apologize to all of the trip reports that I may have maligned on our way down to Bachelor Creek. You were right. This section sucks.

More suck…

Finally, around 3200’ the trail become consistent enough to follow without thinking too hard. We got down to Downey and then crushed out the last 6 miles, which ended up being some beautiful (if soggy) trail.

We stashed our bags in the bushes next to the Downey Creek Trailhead and finished our trip with a 2 mile run in crocs to the Suiattle River Trailhead, where we’d left our car.

All in all, this was a phenomenal traverse. I’m sure it’s going to melt out quickly, but hopefully this trip report helps anyone trying to do it soon…