Ba Peak

Ba Peak (8,142ft)

Getting ready to ski down from 8000ft

Nov 20, 2021

15 miles

Chris and Reed were interested in climbing Bulger peaks this winter, so I decided we should do a shakedown trip before winter starts. Ba Peak is a good choice to prepare for winter Bulgers. The route up it avoids avy terrain, it is a reasonable distance for a winter day trip, and is in an area of Washington that is generally drier this time of year. Ba Peak is also a top 200 peak I still need.

Snow conditions were tricky to predict, though. NOHRSC was showing around 8″ of snow in the 10 mile stretch between the Twisp River Sno Park and the south creek trailhead. That sounded borderline driveable, but if it was an underestimate it probably wouldn’t be driveable. I decided to bring my snowmobile just in case. I wanted to make sure it was all in working order before winter anyways. If we needed to use it then two of us would ride on the sled and one would get towed behind on skis.

The route

We met up at the Twisp River Sno Park Friday evening and the snow coverage was thin – only an inch or so at the lot. I decided to scout out the road the rest of the way to the trailhead just in case. If the snow got deep a few miles in I would tow the sled to there and we’d ride in the rest.

I unhitched the trailer and started driving up. Partway I was blocked by a big tree over the road, but I was able to axe it out and keep going. The snow depth got to about 6″ but never deeper, and I made it all the way to the trailhead. That was good news for increasing chances of reaching the summit, but I was a bit disappointed since we wouldn’t get to ride the snowmobile. (I planned to ride it up highway 20 Sunday anyways, so it would at least be worth it to tow it out there). I then drove back to the sno park.

Climbing up from Louis Lake

We got a few hours of sleep then were up and driving out by 3am Saturday. Reed’s car even made it to the trailhead. We started up on skis at 4:30am, but after we crossed the bridge over the Twisp River the snow covereage decreased and we were forced to carry our skis. I think NOHRSC overestimated coverage there by quite a bit, unfortunately.

We actually had to carry our skis up to 4600ft before the snow was deep enough to use them. Around that point Chris’s boots were causing problems and he had to turn around. Reed and I continued up, him on snowshoes and me on skis. It was smooth skinning to Louis Lake.

Looking up at the summit

I hoped to ski across the lake, but unfortunately the ice was too thin to support body weight. So we cut through the trees on the north side. Luckily the snow was getting deeper and smoothed over some big talus fields on the west end of the lake.

We climbed past upper Louis Lake, then the terrain got steep around 6400ft in the basin SE of Ba. Travel looked difficult for Reed in the snowshoes, though wasn’t too bad for me in skis. Reed decided to turn around early and I would bag the summit solo. My route avoided avy terrain so it would be safe to solo.

I skinned up to the northeast ridge of Ba Peak until the terrain steepened about 100ft below the summit. There I ditched my skis and put my crampons on. I frontpointed up the last steep icy bits with my whippet to the false summit. Then I ditched my poles and whippet and scooted au chaval style across the airy knife edge summit ridge to the true summit by 2:30pm.

The view from the summit

Clouds were just starting to roll in, which made for an interesting undercast towards Lake Chelan. I got great views of snow covered peaks all around. I hung around for 20 minutes admiring the view, then headed down. I downclimbed back to my skis and then the fun began.

Heading back down

The snow was icy near the ridge but soon turned to fun powder. I avoided a few rocks poking out up high, but then had fun powder turns through the larches down lower. I followed my tracks through the pillowed talus field down to Lake Louis by 3:30pm, then switched to skins.

It was much easier going following my tracks back, and I skied down to near 5000ft before I needed the headlamp. At 4,600ft I put the skis on my back and continued the hike out to the car by 6:45pm. Reed had already made it back and started driving home, and Chris was waiting in the car.

We drove back to the sno park and Chris drove home while I hitched up the snowmobile trailer and drove to the Silver Star Sno Park for the night.