Pasayten Peakbagging

Lake Mountain (8,371ft) , Monument Peak (8,592ft), Blackcap Mountain (8,397ft), Osceola Peak (8,587ft), Mount Carru (8,595ft), Mount Lago (8,745ft), Ptarmigan Peak (8,614ft), and Lost Peak (8,464ft)

Eric Gilbertson (solo)

June 30 – July 2, 2018

3 days
83 miles hiking
4 miles mountain biking
0.25 miles packrafting
8 Washington Hundred Highest mountain climbed

Saturday – climb Lake Mountain, Monument Peak, camp at Shellrock Pass (30 miles, 10kft gain)
Sunday – climb Blackcap, Osceola, Carru, Lago, Ptarmigan, Lost, camp at Shellrock Pass (33 miles, 15kft gain)
Monday – hike/paddle/bike out (18 miles, 2kft gain)

Snow? In July?! I thought I must be dreaming, but when I stuck my head out the tent door at 3:30am it was snowing hard. It would continue snowing for most of the next 8 hours, even though I was down below treeline. Luckily I was just hiking out that day and not climbing any mountains. I was in one of the most remote areas of Washington State, an 18-mile hike from the nearest road in the Pasayten Wilderness.

My trip started at 5:30am Saturday morning at the Monument Creek trailhead. My goal was to climb all my remaining Bulger mountains in the Pasayten in one trip, and of the two normal access points for these peaks (Slate Pass trailhead and Monument Creek trailhead), this one seemed like the funnest. I’d seen some pictures from a recent trip up this trail by Matt Lemke and the ford on Eureka Creek looked tough. It would probably go up to my waist!

This ford may be a showstopper for many hikers, but I immediately thought – packraft! A packraft is an excellent tool in a mountaineer’s arsenal. I’d used my packraft a few years earlier on the first unsupported ascent of Mt Nirvana, the Northwest Territories highpoint. On that trip I’d paddled three days on the approach, carrying three weeks of food, glacier gear, and rock climbing gear all in the boat.

I’d been struggling for a while to contrive a way to involve my packraft in climbing Bulger mountains, and a stream ford was the perfect opportunity. Moreover, the first 2 miles of the approach were not in wilderness, and thus may be mountain bikeable. The Slate Pass approach was slightly shorter, but sounded less fun, so I chose Monument Creek.

On Saturday morning I loaded my packraft onto my pack and started biking up Monument Creek. The first 1.5 miles

 

were perfect for biking, but then the trail got very overgrown. From that point to the wilderness boundary I was mostly pushing my bike through dense growth, with the occasional teasing section of clear trail to bike on to convince me it might open up around the corner. It never did, so I stashed my bike at the wilderness boundary and continued on foot.

I reached the Eureka Creek crossing, where the bridge had washed out years ago, and it indeed looked tricky. Back in late October 2016 I’d hiked here and crossed the creek no problem, but with the snow melt this time of year i would probably have reached my thigh or waist. The level was irrelevant now, though, since I had my boat. The packraft doesn’t care how deep the water is, just so it’s deep enough to not scrape on the rocks.

I quickly inflated the boat and paddled across, then packed it back up. I hung it in a tree so no varmints might be tempted to nibble on it. With my pack much lighter, I started up the trail to Pistol Pass. This trail has been completely abandoned for many years (maybe decades), and it definitely shows. At times the trail is in good shape, but then it disappears in undergrowth and blowdowns, with only the occasional cairn to mark the way.

 

By around 6,600ft, though, the trail cuts left and is then somehow in excellent shape all the way to Pistol Pass. I reached the pass, then dropped down the other side to Lake of the Woods and took my first break at 10:30am. My plan was to hike Monument Peak and Lake Mountain and continue on the Shellrock Pass to camp. I’d actually already climbed Lake Mountain before around Halloween 2016, and that had taken two full days just for that one mountain! We’d forgotten snowshoes and had to posthole in deep snow for most of the hike in, then the mountain was a steep snowclimb in a whiteout. Hopefully it would be easier in June!

I took out all the extra gear from my pack, tied up my food in my Ursack, and started off. I hiked up to a pass just south of Lake Mountain, then dropped down the other side. I did a descending traverse to the basin between Monument and Lake, then scrambled up the southeast ridge of Monument. The peak was moving in and out of the clouds as a drizzle set in. I reached a snowfield just below the summit and started traversing, but it got steep enough to need crampons so I descended. I moved around to the left side of the snowfield and scrambled up some class 3/4 rock to the summit as it started to snow lightly.

There was no view from the inside of the cloud. For the descent, I walked across the top of the snowfield to the east peak and then descended on rock the way I’d come. No need for the class 3/4 ascent route I’d done.

I dropped all the way down to the basin below the ridge, and then scrambled up the west slope of Lake Mountain. My route basically followed the gradient directly to the summit, and was a fun scramble. This was so much easier than it had been at Halloween! I remember that time we couldn’t find the summit register buried in all the snow, so this time I belatedly added a sign-in from that trip.

I descended down a class 3 route on the east face and returned to my pack around 5pm. There was plenty of time to reach my destination of Shellrock Pass for the night, but the trail did

not sound appealing. It dropped 2,000ft down to 4,600ft at Monument Creek before reascending to around 6,800ft at a camping area near Shellrock Pass. Moreover, it looked like the area had all burned last year, and I suspected the trail would be very difficult to follow. So I instead bushwhacked to a pass in the east ridge of Lake Mountain and descended cross country, eventually linking up with the Monument Creek trail at 5,600ft. This route may have saved some elevation, but it also incurred some misery. The bushwhacking was easy in the old growth and easy in the fresh burn, but very slow going in the transition areas, which were numerous.

I met the trail in the burn zone, and it was faint but still possible to follow. It basically just followed the drainage up, so every so often if I lost it I would just keep going cross country and eventually find it again. By 8pm I reached a flat area around 6,800ft below Shellrock Pass at a small tarn, and pitched my tent in the woods. I was asleep by 9pm and ready for a big day on Sunday

Sunday

My goal for Sunday was to hit six Bulger mountains in one day. I’d tried this before in October 2017 in the Enchantments, but only managed to climb five Bulgers that day. While descending from Dragontail I’d gotten caught in a snowstorm at sunset, which turned into torrential rain, and I was just happy to get back to the car. This time the weather looked good, even though these six mountains I’d targeted would be even more difficult to link up than the ones in the Enchantments.

I left my tent at 4:30am and hiked up to Shellrock pass, bypassing a steep snowfield on the left. From there I

followed the ridge southwest to the col just below Blackcap Mountain. This ridge walk was one of my favorite parts of the day. It was a true knife edge with class 2/3 scrambling on top that was very fun.

From the col I scrambled up loose scree and talus on the east face of Blackcap, then gained the northeast ridge where the rock turned to black shale, and scrambled easily to the top. I had at one point thought it might be easy to follow the ridge between Monument and Blackcap, but from this vantage point I understood why people don’t do that. The ridge is very sharp and technical, and the rock crumbly, so it’s not a great idea.

I put on sunscreen as the sun came out, then descended to the saddle northeast of the peak. From here I dropped down onto a snowfield and glissaded to the bottom, then traversed through the trees to the north to gain the trail. The next mountain on my agenda was Osceola, and I followed the trail west down Eureka Creek almost all the way to Lake Doris. The standard route up Osceola is the southwest slopes,

and most other sides of the peak look quite steep.

At the stream crossing just before the lake I left the trail and started up into the woods. I gradually broke out of the trees, and soon reached the endless talus field of the southwest slope. There was no elegant route here other than just putting my head down and climbing straight up. I find it best on these talus fields to just focus very intently on my feet and move up fast, going long stretches between looking up at the summit. This way, I’ve made more progress between checking my location, and it’s more motivating.

Before long I was at the summit, surrounded by cliffs on most sides except my route. Two mountains down by 10am. Osceola, Carru, and Lago all lie along a line north of Eureka Creek and are all quite prominent, with big drops to the cols between them. Ideally, I would have liked to just drop to the Osceola-Carru col and scramble up the west ridge of Carru. However, my topo map showed big cliffs on the east side of Osceola, and the standard route on Carru was from the east, not the west ridge.

Pioneering a new route might have a 10% chance of saving an hour of time, but had about a 90% chance of leading to a dead end and costing me a few hours. So in the interest of saving time and not exploring, I descended Osceola back to the trail, and hiked all the way back up the trail until I reached a gully dropping down from the Carru-Lago col.

This was the standard way up Carru. The gully was full of avy debris, so I ascended the open forest to the right, then entered the gully around 6,600ft. I scrambled up the gully through some cliffs until the terrain opened up and flattened out. Here I turned left, and scrambled up the southeast ridge of Carru all the way to the summit.

To get to Lago next, I luckily would not have to descend all the way down to the trail. I scouted a route from my vantage point on Carru that I could drop down to where I’d left the gully, and get up Lago directly from there.

I descended my route down Carru, taking advantage of some excellent scree-surfing slopes, and was in the col by 1pm. From there I scrambled up the southwest face of Lago. The terrain was a standard mix of scree, talus, and the occasional solid rock face. I reached the summit ridge, and followed a semi-climber’s-trail east to the summit by 2:30pm.

Just like Carru, Lago has an enormous cliff on the north that you don’t want to get too close to. From here I could see my next objective way in the distance – Ptarmigan Peak to the north. Ptarmigan is connected by a long ridge to Lago, so it’s possible to do a fun ridgewalk all above treeline to get there. Luckily the north side of Lago has a gentle face that can be descended on the way to Ptarmigan.

I scrambled down the face, and it looked like my way was blocked by a huge snowfield. However, I could barely skirt it on the left so did not need to bring out my crampons. A lower snowfield had no continuous rock route around it, so I had to briefly kick steps and take out my whippet to cross it.

I soon gained the ridge and headed north to Ptarmigan. I think this ridge was my favorite part of the day. It’s a pleasant walk above treeline, with no route-finding issues on the ridge, and easy dirt to walk on (not much talus). There’s one tricky section just below Point 8165 where I found an improbable third class ledge to traverse through the cliffs. I then scrambled over Dot Mountain and up to Ptarmigan Peak by 4:30pm for peak number five.

Ptarmigan Peak felt like the most remote mountain I’ve been on in Washington State. I was definitely closer to civilization via Canada then via Washington. This area was at the heart of a massive wildfire the previous summer, 2017, and as a result I was the first one on this summit in the past year. I looked over to the southeast towards Lost Peak, and wondered how I’d ever make it that far away in the remaining daylight.

I had a secret plan, though, and that was to traverse below and to the east of the ridge walk, following Dan Lauren’s advice, and thus avoid going back up and over Lago again. After ten minutes on top of Ptarmigan I dropped back down and descended to Dot Lake. From here I traversed at treeline to another pass, then dropped down into a burn area and climbed up to Butte Pass.

By then it was 7pm and I stopped to eat some cheese and crackers. I estimated Lost Peak would be another 2 hours away, which sounded like a lot given that I’d already been moving for over 14 hours on pretty rough terrain. But the cheese kicked in fast and I felt like I had a lot of energy. I quickly climbed up the ridge over point 7275, dropped down, then scrambled up to Pass Butte. I knew from the map there would be many false summits on the way to Lost Peak, but they were still kind of frustrating. I managed to skirt around a few bumps on the ridge, not wanting to stop and rest lest I lose momentum.

Finally at 8:45pm I crested the summit of Lost Peak, my sixth Bulger for the day. The sun was getting pretty low, which made for excellent lighting on the surrounding peaks. I quickly downed some water, liter number seven for the day, and ate the last of my cheese. Someone had constructed a small bivy wall near the top, and I was tempted to just sleep there. But it was awfully cold – probably below freezing, and it would be a miserable bivy.

I started down around 9pm, and had to whip out the headlamp below Pass Butte. I eventually reached the trail at

Butte Pass, and staggered back to camp at 11pm for a tough 18.5-hour day. I later checked my GPS stats and saw I’d done about 33 miles and 15,000ft of climbing over the day, mostly off-trail. It was not hard

to fall asleep quickly that night after dinner around midnight.

Monday

 

I was woken up by pattering on the tent around 3:30am and saw that it was snowing! I went back to sleep, but the light came way too early and I was up again around 6am. It was still snowing, and my tent was covered in a dusting, as was the surrounding ground. I felt very lucky not to be caught in this snowstorm in the mountains. Somehow it had been dry all day for me on my big summit day.

I packed up and started hiking around 7am, this time intent to try my best to follow the trail the whole way. I’d had enough bushwhacking for one trip. It was still snowing as I descended down Monument Creek, then back up to Pistol Pass. All the surrounding mountains were socked in with clouds and snow. Even though the snow hadn’t really let up, it wasn’t sticking to the ground. I suspect the ground was too warm and dry, given that it was July. That was some unusual weather. It continued

snowing as I crossed Pistol Pass and descended down Monument Creek, only letting up when I dropped below 4,000ft. That is the only time I can remember when, taking a break, I was pestered by a mosquito, but the mosquito was pestered by falling snowflakes.

I reached my packraft around 2pm, and Eureka Creek was even higher now than it had been in the morning. I

unfolded the packraft and blew it up, then put in at the confluence of the Lost River and Eureka Creek. I could have just paddled straight across, but wanted to get in a little bit more of a run. Unfortunately I hadn’t really scouted the river, and had only read that it was full of logjams. However, I could see a tame-looking stretch with a good takeout, so got in the boat and paddled down the Lost River a little ways, then took out.

It would have been really fun to paddle the whole way back to the road, and if I go back I would definitely do this. However, it’s a bit risky to paddle solo on a river I haven’t scouted, so I was ok with playing it safe and keeping the paddle short.

I packed up the boat, then hiked back to my bike. I found my bike, but my helmet had no straps! The seat was all chewed up, and I guess some critter had nibbled off the helmet straps to get at the salt. I fashioned some straps with parachord, then pushed and biked back to the car by 3pm. After an ice cream stop in Mazama I made it back to Seattle that night.

 

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