Desolation Peak

Desolation Peak (6,102ft)

May 7, 2022, 2:30am – 10pm

45 miles hiking, 8 miles biking, 10,000ft gain

I was looking to do a long hiking trip to a remote location to mix things up from my regular snowmobile + ski trips. I wanted to try to put on a lot of hiking miles, which, at this time of year, meant finding a trail at low elevation. I also wanted to climb a peak, though. It looked like a potential weather window in the northern cascades, and Desolation Peak seemed to fit the requirements.

Desolation Peak is an above-treeline peak deep in the North Cascades near the Canada border overlooking Ross Lake. It is perhaps most famous for the fire tower on the top where Jack Kerouac spent the summer of 1956 as a fire lookout.

I’d previously almost climbed Desolation Peak in November 2020 when I circumnavigated the Prophet Massif by foot and packraft. I had spent the night camped on Cat Island, and in the morning had hoped to climb Desolation Peak, but the weather didn’t cooperate and I had ended up just paddling out.

People generally climb Desolation Peak by either taking a water taxi up Ross Lake to the base, or canoeing to the base. It’s still too early in the season for the water taxi to operate, and the road in from Canada to the north side of the lake is badly washed out from November storms, so I knew it was unlikely there would be boats on the lake, or other hikers on the peak.

There is a trail on the east bank of the lake, though, and it is mostly below 2000ft, so would be snow free. It’s about 22 miles in from the east bank trailhead, though highway 20 is still closed so it’s not possible to drive to that trailhead. But it’s possible to drive to within about 4 miles of the trailhead at the Ross Dam trailhead.

I considered involving my packraft to paddle up or back or both. But I knew from my November trip paddling ross lake that progress could be very slow in the wind, and from an early April trip I knew the lake gets lowered in the spring (it’s a reservoir) and there are dead trees sticking out that can be tricky to navigate in the dark. I would likely need to paddle up and/or back in the dark to fit in Desolation Peak in a day, and the wind was supposed to be kind of strong. I really wanted to get in a lot of hiking miles, so decided I would bike to the East Bank trailhead, then do a 45 mile hike to get Desolation Peak.

Based on recente satellite images it looked like the summit would be snow covered above 3,000ft. I decided to bring a light pair of snowshoes for this. It would have been fun to ski, but skis are heavier than snowshoes for the long approach. My rule of thumb in the spring is if at least half of the approach is melted out, then I don’t bring skis.

I made it to the Ross Dam trailhead Friday night and camped out. There was only one other car in the lot, and I suspect the bad weather forecast turned most people away from the usually-crowded Ruby Mountain, which uses that trailhead. It rained off and on during the evening but finally ended around 2am, when I started up. I biked around the gate, and soon coasted down to the East Bank trailhed.

I hid my bike in the woods locked to a tree and continued on foot. The trail is very well-graded and there were hardly any blowdowns, so I made good time at around 3.5 mph. All winter and spring I’ve been used to averaging 1 mph when skiing and breaking trail, and it felt nice to put on miles quickly.

I made it through Hidden Hand Pass and then around 5am was able to turn off my headlamp. It was drizzling on and off and I got pretty wet pushing through bushes, but then the rain eventually eased up as forecast. I continued up the lake, getting brief glimpses down to the water around Roland Point and May Creek.

The water was surprisingly low, much lower than back in April 2021. Tree stumps were poking meters out of the water, and it would have definitely been tricky paddling through that in the dark. I would guess the resort won’t start operating the water taxi until the lake level gets a bit higher.

I hiked over some big suspension bridges near Rainbow Point and Devils Creek, and they were 50ft above the water. Interestingly, all the islands I’d paddled to in November 2020 like Tenmile and Cat Island were now connected by land to the shore, so they were no longer islands.

By late morning I reached the end of the lakeshore portion of the trail near Cat Island and started hiking up the last 5 miles to Desolation Peak. I switchbacked up to around 3,000ft before hitting snow. There I tied my trail runners to a tree and switched to my hiking boots.

I soon lost trail in the deep snow and continued postholing straight up in crampons. It appeared the peak had gotten quite a bit of fresh snow the previous day. There were brief breaks in the clouds and I got occasional views down to the lake. I pushed up higher through the whiteout, and eventually reached the gentle south ridge. There I switched to snowshoes and plodded up to the summit by 12:30pm.

The lookout tower was all boarded up and buried in snow, and looked like a small place to spend a few months. Occasional cloud breaks continued, and I got excellent views down to Ross Lake. It was very dry and I’m not sure how anyone would launch a boat from the Hozomeen side, even if they could drive there. North and South Hozomeen peaks looked very intimidating just to the north passing in and out of the clouds. Those peaks are very far in if the road from BC is not passable.

I got a few pictures looking down to the lake, then it started snowing hard and turned back to a whiteout. I started back down around 1pm and soon made it back to the safety of the trees.

I plunge stepped back down until I could regain the trail, and soon switched back to my trail runners. Back at the lake I ditched my pack and scrambled down and across to Cat Island. I figured it would be nice to tag the peak again, especially now that it was easy to walk to since the water was so low.

I returned to the trail and made good time back out, arriving at my bike just after dark. I quickly pedaled back up, arriving at the truck around 10pm. The whole trip I hadn’t seen a single other person, though I bet once highway 20 opens next week and the ross lake resort starts operating water taxis later this month the area will get a bit more crowded.

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