Devils Peak and Wallaby Peak

Devils Peak (8,081ft) and Wallaby Peak (7,995ft)

May 29, 2021

26 miles, 10kft gain

I had one day free this weekend and was interested in visiting the Pasayten. I had a remaining top 200 peak, Devils Peak, near Slate Pass that I still needed to get, so that was a good excuse to visit the area. Back in April I’d snowmobiled up to Harts Pass and skied down the Middle Fork Pasayten river sort of near Devils Peak, but didn’t have time for a side trip to tag it.

My friends had climbed Devils Peak a few weeks earlier by hiking up Robinson Creek, but I was interested in approaching from Harts Pass road, since it would mean more skiing. Based on satellite images there was still plenty of snow above 5,000ft on the road, but it didn’t make sense to snowmobile up this time. I’d be too nervous towing my trailer up around Deadhorse point.

So I decided to drive up to the edge of intermittent snow line, then bike up to continuous snowline, then ski from there. Friday night I drove up to about 4600ft until I started passing through patchy snow drifts. Jeep tracks continued, but I’m pretty conservative about pushing up snowy roads like that with limited turnaround areas, so I parked at a good pullout there for the night.

I was up and moving by 3:45am with skis strapped to my backpack and biking up in ski boots. Of course the drifts ended soon and I biked through a long bare stretch, but within a mile or so I saw a jeep parked on the side of the road. After a few more snow patches the jeep tracks stopped and an outback was parked on the side of the road before a bigger snow patch that was untracked. I figured I could have certainly made it as far as the outback in my forester, but it would have hardly saved any time over biking.

At that hour the snow was icy and firm, and I easily biked over it. I knew I’d have to push through slush on the way out, but wanted to get to continuous snow before I started skiing. The snow got continuous around 5,600ft, so I locked up my bike and started skiing. The sunrise was very colorful looking back toward Mazama.

I skied up to Harts Pass and noticed part of a jeep sticking up from a snow bank. I remembered seeing this mentioned on the methow valley snowmobile association facebook page nov 20, so it’s been up there a while. It’ll probably be a few weeks more til it melts out enough to recover. I skinned up to Slate Pass, but it was unfortunately still too icy on the north side to ski down safely. So I switched to crampons and hiked down the north side.

I cut through Robinson Pass then put the skis on and skied down to Robinson Creek. By that elevation the snow was melted out on south facing slopes. It looked not worth it to ski anything on the south face of devils peak since it was very patchy snow and likely still icy. But I couldn’t just ditch my skis in a random spot in the woods since I might lose them.

So I carried them up to a big open area around 5,900ft on Devils Peak and ditched them in the open where I could see them from a distance. I continued cramponing up patchy icy snow and dirt. I was aiming for the brown ledge route Eric E took on nwhikers a few years ago. After emerging above treeline I found the lower-angle open slope and cramponed up steepening snow, then traversed to the ledge.

I crossed the ledge on frozen scree, then front pointed up two more icy snow gullies and made a final short scramble to the summit by 9am. The registered showed it is indeed not a popular peak. My friends Fletcher, Fred, and Josh had signed in a few weeks earlier in April, but there were only a few other sign ins over the past 10 years. The register was pretty wet so I dried it out as I took in the view.

I soon headed back down, downclimbing facing in down the icy gullies. I think if I’d waited til late afternoon they would have been skiable, but I didn’t want to wait that long. Eventually I made it back to my skis, and carried them back down to Robinson Creek. I found a spot to jump across, then reached continuous snow.

I skinned back up to Robinson Pass in snow that was now nice and soft. Interestingly, I noticed fresh ski tracks coming down from Middle Pasayten Peak. They continued up toward Slate Pass, so I started following them, since that was my intended route anyways. I soon caught up to two skiers. They were just finishing a big loop up and over Robinson peak to Lago and back to Slate Pass. They’d stashed bikes at Cache Creek to ride down. It sounded like an awesome loop! I recall Lowell Skoog doing this loop in May 2018 and posting it on Turns All Year.

I soon reached Slate Pass, then transitioned to downhill mode. I made fun turns all the way down to Harts Pass, then glided back down to my bike. The snow was slushy now. I biked down on the edge of the snow banks, for the most part staying on thin stretches of gravel but occasionally barreling through the slush. At one point I got overconfident blasting through the slush and uninentionally did a superman dive over than handelbars. But the snow softened my landing and I was ok.

I took it easy then, walking the bike occasionally. Soon a family of four passed by on their way to Slate Peak. They didn’t have snowshoes, so I suspect it was tough going. I expected there would be some hardcore vehicle that had pushed farther up the road (this is usually the case on spring trips like this), but there were just two more trucks parked next to the outback.

I soon cruised back to my forester by 1:15pm, loaded up, and started down.

On the way just as I got past deadhorse point I pulled over to let a convoy of four hardcore trucks pass by. It looked to me like they were waiting for the snow to get slushy to try to push higher up the road. I kind of regretted heading out early, since I was interested to see how far they could get. Then lower down I saw another truck head up with a snowmobile on the back. I also kind of wanted to see how far he could get, but was content driving out. (I later learned that the snowmobile truck had slid off the road up in the snow and got left there for at least the next few days).

I had plenty of daylight left, so decided to tag on another top 200 peak. Wallaby Peak sounded fun and short, and was near Washington Pass so I could get some more skiing in. I made it to the hairpin turn around 2:30pm, luckily late enough that many skiers had already left. I quickly suited back up and started skinning. I skinned up Early Winters Creek as dozens of skiers finishing the Birthday Tour skied down. At the pass I put skis on my pack and booted up the southwest ridge of Wallaby following fresh boot tracks.

As I got higher I realized the route didn’t make sense to ski since there was too much rock scrambling, so I ditched my skis. I continued following the boot tracks, but at on point they went high up the ridge while I remembered from the summitpost page description the route should traverse right onto the south face. So I left the tracks and kicked steps in the steep face. I then booted steeply up to the summit. There were no fresh tracks, so I’m guessing the other party turned around. But there was faint evidence of older tracks, which I’m guessing were from Fletcher and Riley on May 19.

I took a few pictures then quickly headed down. I soon made it to my skis, and luckily the snow was still soft (though shadows were approaching). I made fun turns back down, and too soon was back at the car. I loaded up, gave a ride to a skier doing the Birthday Tour who needed to get back to his car at the start, then drove home that night.

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