Month: June 2013

June 21 is my birthday and every year I plan something fun, somewhere, away from typical before-summer weather (i.e. rain) that occurs around here.  This year was no exception and the original plan was to backpack for 4 days in the Horseshoe Meadows area of the eastern Pasayten.  This area typically melts out by mid-June (so I've heard but have yet to experience) and the wildlfowers can be spectacular.

Unfortunatley the typical June forecast reached beyond western Washington and extended well into eastern Washington, except for a tiny weather window for Saturday and Sunday, June 22 and 23.  Unfortunately the TH to Horseshoe Meadows is at least 5 hours away, which makes a short weekend getaway impractical.

The other place that melts out early is the Teanaway River region, which sits south of the Stuart Range, west of Blewett Pass, and east of Snoqualmie Pass.  The drive is a reasonably quick 3 hours via I-90 from our location.

Our friend Mark was game to join us and he's a bit of an expert on wildlfowers.  We picked him up at his home in Issaquah at the leisurely/lazy time of 0900.  There were lots of cars in the lot when we arrived and got going at 1130.  We figured most of them were dayhikers and for some reason the Bean Creek trail is more popular than the Beverly Creek trail, although we saw plenty of people on Beverly Creek trail.  Mark and I had skied Iron Peak last year, a month earlier, so it was neat to see the same trail and environs without its spring blanket of snow.

The early wildflowers were spectacular: arnica, arrowhead root, shooting stars, grand lilies, and a few orchids.  Once we took the fork from Beverly Creek to Fourth Creek we entered the Alpine Lakes Wilderness and were treated to grand views of the Stuart Range.  Some day, my pretties I will be on your summits was the phrase that kept running through my head as I ogled Mt. Stuart, Argonaut, Dragontail, Little Annapurna.  Was that my voice?

The first campsites were still soggy from recent snow melt so we hiked up up Hardscrabble trail, which winds around the north side of Bean Peak.  We found a dry campsite with good drainage in spite of patches of snow.  It was still early afternoon so we had plenty of time to set up, find a water source, explore a bit, take pictures, relax.  We watched the clouds roll in and wondered whether the predicted storm would arrive early.  The clouds rolled and broke, rolled and broke.  An older couple hiked through our camp to gain the ridge and check out the views.  We heard several scrambling parties hooting and hollering on the top of Bean Peak.  And then there was peace.

After dinner I decided to scout out our planned exit route and hiked up to the ridge.  Our exit route was still mostly covered in snow and a bit exposed as far as run out, if any of us slipped and fell.  With that information I went back to camp and said that I was in favor of backtracking out rather than completing the loop.  I got instant agreement (how nice!).

The moon was mostly full so it never really got dark all night.  It never rained either so it was nice to wake up around 0500 in full daylight in a dry tent.  Breakfast was leisurely.  Our pancake experience failed.  The gluten-free mix is more glue than pancake so Randy and I ate our snacks for breakfast.  We packed and started hiking around 0730.

On the way out we saw no one until we were nearly down at the TH again.  Then we saw some fast-moving day hikers who were trying to get in a hike before the rain.  We arrived at the car at 1030, only 23 hours later from when we had left the car.  We congratulated ourselves on a successful, dry backpack and headed toward home.  About 30 minutes later the rain arrived, right on schedule at 1100, just as the forecaster had predicted.  Here are the photos.

Stats:  RT ~9-10 miles

Elevation gain: ~3000'

The plan became a plan while Steve Luther was still on vacation in Turkey.  I wanted to ski the south side of Mt. Baker and invited Steve to come along.  He emailed to say that he was still on vacation but we'd figure out a plan when he returned.

The weather forecast for Saturday, June 15 was good and we had a little beta from a group that had skied a similar route the previous weekend.  Paul and Laurie Sherman jumped in the plan and we agreed to meet at 0600 in Sedro Woolley, and then 0530 since Steve was still on Turkey time and not sleeping all night anyway.

We arrived at the TH to find a line of cars on both sides of the road.  The road hadn't quite melted out all the way at the Schreiber's Meadow parking lot.  We did see signs posted that snowmobiles were no longer allowed.

At approximatley 0730 and at 3200' in elevation we began our route up the Scott Paul trail toward the Squak Glacier.  The snow was hard and topped with red fir needles so we opted to carry our skis through the woods to about 4500' when the trees open and the snow is much cleaner.  No one likes to pick needles out of the glue on your skins.

The snow was soft, the sun was out, the day was very promising.  Steve lead us on a fairly straighforward route that avoided losing even a little bit of elevation as much as possible. The terrain rolls so an occasional loss is unavoidable.

Once on the glacier, the route is clear, especially on a sunny day with excellent visibility.  The crevasse cracks are obvious as is the route over or around them.  We could see Mt. Rainier, the Olympics, the Puget Sound, and the surrounding North Cascades, plus a giant ring around the sun that indicates moisture in the atmosphere (I think).  Gorgeous day.

From the moment we skied onto the glacier the route goes up and up and up.  We had agreed on a turnaround time of 1400, which offered a little leeway if we weren't quite ready to turn around.  The last 1000' were tough, even though we passed a party of struggling skiers.  I had a hard time getting into a rhythm but did my best to put one ski in front of the other until finally I made it to the crater rim (9700'), took off my skis and put my ski boots in that special sticky muck on the edge.  It was cool!

We ate lunch and watched some friends ski down the Roman Wall from the summit to our location.  The summit was tempting because it was only 1000' more at that point but we were beyond our turnaround time and I wasn't sure I had another 1000' in me at that moment.

The ski down the Easton Glacier was really fun.  There's nothing like spring corn in the North Cascades.  We skied at least a couple thousand feet of it until the snow got mushy and grabby.  Still, it was my best ski day the whole season (however, I do have a short memory…).  The entire 6500' down only took 2 hours.  Best of all, we skied all the way down to the TH.  What a great day.  Here are the pictures (I hope).