Enjoying a high snow year, Jim and I were excited to try a 6 day trip into Gunsight and Sinister. The area is most famous for it being on the Ptarmigan Traverse near Dome Peak. We had originally planned the trip for Memorial Day weekend but we feared the snow pack would be too much. We looked at schedules with our friends George and Kevin and settled on 4th of July weekend. This would be tight for me since I was leaving for Europe on the 5th.
We all met at the trailhead on the night of June 28th. The morning of the 29th, we headed up the Downey Creek with heavy packs. No one likes day 1 of a climbing trip. We ended up camping at a forest camp after 10 hours of hiking, climbing over logs, and fighting with the brush. We had hoped to get to Bachelor Meadows but found our camp to be quit comfortable.
Day 2 was going to be a tough one. I really wanted to camp at the Dome saddle. The weather was perfect and the views from the saddle would be amazing. This meant would have to gain 5100 of elevation. At least the majority of the travel was in open meadows and snow slopes providing views of Dome, Spire Point, and Glacier Peak.
As I neared our camping spot for the night, I found the guys excavating a tent platform in the dirt. They made it big enough for Kevin’s Mega Mid which slept all 4 of us for the night. This site was sure to be used by many climbers in the coming years.
One side of camp looked down on Spire Point and the Dome Glacier while the other looked across at Agnes and Gunsight. Spectacular high camp.
The next morning, we descended the Chikamin Glacier. The glacier is one of the largest in the North Cascades. It was pure joy to descend under so much snow cover. Kevin headed us to a snow bench on the glacier which had a rock out cropping. This would be camp for the night. Kevin went right to digging a snow platform for the tents. I have never met someone who likes to shovel snow as much as Kevin.
After a nice break on the rocks in camp, we packed up and headed for Gunsight. We were happy to find the snow in the gully was ample. Two years ago, George, Fay, Jim, and I were turned away by an impassable moat. Kevin quickly created a ramp in the snow enabling us to change into rock shoes and transition safely into rock climbing.
George lead up the first pitch which the rest of us found a bit spunky. Jim was glad to have George attack the black head wall.
After this, we climbed into the dirt gully and traversed out onto the face.
Jim lead the final pitch which took us out on a very narrow, exposed ridge. The rock was solid. The climbing was a hoot. And the views were amazing.
We spent very little time on the summit. It was a rock horn and we still had to down climb the ridge. We rapped down all the major climbing sections to find us back in camp just before dark.
The morning brought another blue bird day. Sinister was our goal plus we all wanted to move camp back to Cub Lake meadows. The only dry ground and running water near by.
We still weren’t sure if Sinister would go. There was a steep snow ridge we had to get around. We all decide if the climb got difficult, we would bag it and head for our desired Cub Lake camp. To our delight, everything went nicely.
We took the snow around to the south side and headed up a gully. At the top of the gully, we found ourselves on the back side of the snow ridge which gave access to a nice rock scramble to the summit.
Jim and I were giddy. There were times on this trip where we didn’t think we would summit either peak and here we had summited both.
There was another party on the summit who had avoided the gully by taking the rock ridge all the way. We decided to follow them down. The lower half of this route got pretty narrow and exposed. We all took it really slow since we hadn’t come up this way.
The climb back up the Chikamin Glacier went steady. Jim always sets a nice climbing pace. We soon found ourselves back at our high camp on the Dome saddle. There we found climbers enjoying our recently enhanced tent site and a cloud bank of marine fog. We descended in the fog faster than we normally would a glacier. There were tons of tracks from other climbers taking advantage of the fabulous weather on a holiday weekend.
We arrived Cub Lake basin with enough day light to wash up in the creek. Funny how after several days of sweat and sunscreen, you don’t mind bathing in a creek coming right out of a snow bank. We estimated the water temps at just over 32 degrees.
We enjoyed the evening and were amazed by all the climbers camped in the basin. There were head lamps everywhere.
We slept in until 8 the next morning and enjoyed breakfast in the heather.
Our goal today was to just to hike until we were done and then camp for the night. We headed up and out of Cub Lake enjoying the views of Glacier Peak over the still frozen lake.
Once we had reached the ridge, it was all down hill.
We ended up camped only 2 hours from the car. This would make for a nice easy hike out in the morning. We all enjoyed long baths in the river. Amazing how warm a river feels after you have been bathing in snow melt.
We enjoyed the evening. We drank hooch, ate chocolate and cookies, and discussed the trip which would not have been a success without each parties efforts. Everyone made key contributions. Thanks to Kevin and George for joining our team for this one. It was quit the adventure.