The high route above Whatcom Pass has been on Jim and my list since we met. Neither of us had ever been in the area. The high route has the benefit of being directly across from Challenger, one of the prettiest mountains in the North Cascades.
We decided to combine the high route with the climb of Bear Mountain and make it a seven day trip. The schedule would allow us to have time to play in the lakes. The Whatcom Pass high route starts at Tapto Lakes then traverses past Middle Lakes, Tiny Lake, and East Lake. The actual high route continues to Pass Lake and on to Bear Lake ending in the Chilliwack mountain range.
With Bear Mountain as our climbing goal, we decided to camp in Indian Basin which required us to drop off the ridge before we reached Pass Lake. We now know why the high route goes through Pass Lake, Indian Basin is not the best camping. Unless you like hiking and camping on scree. Oh, and enjoy sharing the forest with wasps.
Kevin Koski, Fay, Lisa, and Kevin Loper joined us for the adventure. Day 1 was straight forward. We headed in from Hannagen Pass trailhead with US Cabin campground as our goal. Thankfully we had a slight break in the heat.
Our second day was mostly a climb to Whatcom Pass and then onto Middle Lakes. It did include the fun cable car crossing on the Chillawack river.
Special note, Lisa and Kevin were celebrating their 30th wedding anniversary. Most couples go to Hawaii, they go on a 7 day climbing trip. My kind of people.
As we neared Whatcom Pass, we discovered the ripe blueberries. This took the sting out of the last 500 feet of gain. The climb up to Middle Lake treated us with views of Whatcom Peak and Challenger as well as ripe blueberries everywhere. We had many breaks to graze and take everything in.
Middle Lakes was not our favorite swimming lake but the views were stellar. One of the best dining areas ever.
We all enjoyed the view of Challenger turning pink as the sunset…
and the moon rising.
We woke to blue skies even though there was a forest fires off to the East. We were very lucky that the winds were coming from the West. We headed off to do the long traverse to Indian Basin.
First, we past Tiny Lake. I made a mental note to swim here on the way back. Then we came into East Lake. It was so beautiful. We all enjoyed a break before heading up to the ridge line above East Lake.
After some tedious side hilling, we reach the last ridge and could finally see the gap to Indian Basin. This deserved another break in the shade. These were the last smiles on our faces for the day.
The traverse to the gap was long and hot.
When we finally reached the gap, we got our first look at Bear Mountain. Our route was to traverse the East ridge. The summit is the last horn on the left. Boy, that is a long way.
After some discussions on what our route was going to be, we headed down into Indian Basin. Beckey said there were ledges. We certainly couldn’t see any from here.
Soon we found ourselves in steep forest, then a wasps ground nest. Then Jim lost the bottom of his pole and we found another wasps nest. I lost a part of my pole but was not about to hunt around the forest to find it. We all just wanted out of there. At this point, we had 13 wasps stings between us.
We finally hit Indian Creek and then found a scree field. Now to find camp. We kept climbing. All the heather benches were lumpy with large rocks. Eventually we had to just pick a spot and make it work. Jim and I ended up with our head and feet high. Built up the sides so we didn’t roll out of the tent. This must be what it feels like to sleep in a hammock.
The next day we were treated to another cloudless, blue sky. We climbed out of Indian Basin and gained the East ridge of Bear. The views of Redoubt, Spickard, and the Mox Peaks were fabulous.
The route up the ridge of Bear was a combination of scree and heather. Nice climbing.
Soon things got harder but the ledges Beckey promised did appear. The entire route was ledges and gullies.
We did have an exposed ridge run.
Eventually, we traversed as far as we could go which was right under the summit. One problem. The summit block was sheer rock. No hand holds. No foot holds. No place to put gear. We really needed a few pitons and rock shoes.
Jim wanted to try an alternative route so we roped up.
He was able to reach the ridge line but from there he could only admire the summit. He was stuck less than 50 feet from the summit.
We pulled the plug and headed back to camp.
As usual, we were heading back later than we wanted and fighting daylight. But that didn’t stop me from getting some sunset pictures of the entire Northern Pickets. I love Challenger.
And Mount Baker…
We got off the technical stuff before the sunset but arrived camp under headlamp. Typical for us.
The next day, we had to start the journey out. Everyone was a bit jittery about the wasps but we had no option. We were able to obtain the saddle above Indian Basin with only one more wasp sting. We considered that a success.
As we traversed back towards Middle Lake, all we could think about was stopping for a swim in East Lake.
After a refreshing dip, we were all ready to traverse some more. By the time we reached Tiny Lake, we were ready for another swim. Who could pass this place up?
Once we reached Middle Lake, we became very aware of an additional forest fire breaking out to our East. We watch the fire grow as we ate dinner.
We awoke the next day to a smoke filed valley. Good thing we were headed out. We made good time getting down to Boundary Camp which is not a glamorous camping spot but it is functional. Camping here put us 5 miles from
the car. We were all back to the cars before 11 the next day.
We might not have summited Bear Mountain but we still considered the trip a success. Good friends. Amazing views. Swimming in Alpine Lakes. And of course, the cable car crossing.
