When Brooke arrived in Seattle last September, she had a list of the top 10 hikes in Washington State. One of the places she really wanted to overnight camp was Sahale Arm in North Cascades National Park. We told her so does everyone else visiting the North Cascades. Sahale Arm might be the most sot after backcountry campsite in Washington State.
As a token effort, I submitted a camping request in last March’s lottery. To our surprise, I won a night on Sahale Arm. Jim and I are the most unlucky people in lotteries so we are not sure what happened. After a trip to the ranger station, Brooke was able to turn our permit into two nights on Sahale Arm and one night in Boston Basin. Since Dan was not able to join us, our friend, Kellie, jumped on board.
With the Cascade River Road being closed at milepost 18, we decided to leave a day early and hike the remaining 5 miles into the Cascade Pass Trailhead parking lot.
When we arrived the Cascade Pass Trailhead parking lot, we found another party camped in the parking lot. Seems we were not the only people with this idea. Good thing the parking lot was plenty big enough for all of us.
The next morning, we headed up to Cascade Pass under cool skies. This was a welcomed change to all the heat lately.
I have been to Cascade Pass nearly 10 times but I have always hiked south from here towards the Ptarmigan mountains. This would be my first trip up Sahale Arm. I was easily as excited as Brooke. After 30 minutes of steep trail, we crested the bottom of Sahale Arm.
From here, we began a lovely afternoon stroll up through the heather.
The wildflowers and heather were still in bloom.
The views were amazing. You could see why so many backpackers come here.
We weren’t in a big hurry to arrive the high camps. The ranger had told us the wind was really blowing up there. When we arrived the high camps, I was very confused. The camps were on the top of the moraine humps.
The ranger was right. The wind was blowing like crazy. Soon after we arrived, our camp was completely engulfed in clouds. As we were trying to get organized in the cold, wet winds, a family of goats came by for a visit and to see if we had peed lately. Goats love the salt in our pee. They actually eat the dirt after we pee on it.
The wind blew all through the night putting a nice layer of dust on everything. We woke to clear sky to the east and low valley fog to the west. And cold winds. At least we were able to get behind a wind break during breakfast.
We headed out of camp before 8am with summit packs. Our goal for the day was to climb Mt Buckner. It was not only one of the tallest peaks around but it was in the sunsine.
Before long, we had crampons on and were descending snow fields. I hate descending directly from camp. It means that at the end of the day when we are super tired, we have to climb back up to camp.
As we descended, the clouds rolled in and consumed us. We got one final view before everything went white.
For the next hour or so, we followed the assumed climbing route with almost no visibility.
And then as quickly as the clouds came in, they lifted. The lifting clouds were actually quite picturesque.
In the end, we had blue skies and would have them until we got back to camp which was engulfed in clouds with brutally cold winds.
We spend the next several hours climbing steep, soft snow. Not the kind of conditions that allow you to stop and take pictures. I did get my camera back out just feet before the summit.
Brooke is definitely at home on a mountain summit.
We were all so happy to be sitting in the sunshine versus the clouds in the valley just west of us.
Our descent from the summit was slow and tedious. The snow had got increasingly softer making it very slidy. We roped up and put in snow pro as we descended back to our traverse route. We arrived back to camp 14 hours after we had left. It was so cold and windy that us girls would not get out of our tents for dinner. Jim proceeded to wait on us of the next hour. He is so good at taking care of us.
As Jim and I lay in the tent listening the the wind howl through camp, we talked about how unhospitable Sahale Arm Camp was. For a place you can never get a permit for, it certainly was miserable.
We woke to blue skies and no wind. So this why everyone wants to camp here.
After such a long day climbing Mt Buckner, we slept in and took our time packing up. Today, we would be doing a carry-over of Sahale Peak and camping in Boston Basin. We had hoped to climb Sharkfin Tower as well but we didn’t have time.
The climb of Sahale couldn’t be more direct. Straight up the Sahale Glacier from camp.
Considering Brooke put on crampons and started using an ice axe just over two weeks ago when we headed out on Rainier. She was already quite comfortable. She had had a few slips on Mt Buckner (she still needs more time on snow) but each time she was able to quickly arrest.
When we reached the top of the snow, discussions started to take place regarding what route to take next. Kellie had remembered climb over the summit from the west ridge. Jim remembered rapping around the summit. In the end, Kellie lead the west ridge with her full pack. We all followed on rope. The rock was very solid and quite enjoyable. We all agreed it would have been way more fun without a full pack.
We had a snack on the summit before starting the process of rappelling down the other side. Jim took this opportunity to work with Brooke on the techniques of rapping with a full pack. Let just say when you add a full pack, your weigh just went up by 30% and your pack flops around.
Once down the other side, we took in the views of Mt Buckner.
As we were discussing our descent into Boston Basin, the freakin fog, also know as marine layer, came rolling back in. Not good. We had to descend a glacier that we had not come up. We had no idea where the cravasses were. Crap!
After a bad start down the wrong snow field, we ascended back to the ridge crest, downclimbed into the correct notch, and roped up for the glacier. Our topo maps showed the glacier to have a fairly gentle decent route if we could stay on it in the fog and not fall in a hole. Needless to say, we took the descent very slow, examined everything, and took advantage of every time the cloud layer thinned at all.
After an hour or so, we could see that we were dropping below the cloud. Or was the cloud lifting. Either way, we could see again.
By the time we got off the glacier, it was 8pm. We needed to find a place to camp before it got dark. There were plenty of rock slabs in the snow fields but they weren’t quite flat. In the end, we settled on something almost flat and then put all our gear under our feet. Wasn’t the worse camp I had ever slept in.
By the time the sun was setting, the skies were completely clear once again.
Johannesburg Mountain is sure pretty from Boston Basin. It continued to talk to us all through the night.
We all slept pretty good considering we kept sliding down to the foot of our tents. We had a leisurely breakfast during which a ranger came by to chat and check our permit. This was the second time on this trip that our permit had been checked. Most trips, we never see a ranger. Goes to show how popular this area is.
After packing up, we finished our descent into Boston Basin.
After crossing the creek on the edge of Boston Basin, we looked back for one last view before diving into the bushes.
Took us over 2 hours to do the next 2 miles. The Boston Basin trail is not maintained. It never has been. It was originally put in by miners and then adopted by climbers. Miners were crazy people.
When we came to the Cascade River Road, we took a lunch break. We figured we had 4 miles of road walking to get back to our cars. After 30 minutes of walking, we came to a gate. This was a bit confusing. It turned out that while we were out, the road had been opened to milepost 21. Yeah! we were not going to have to walk any further.
Brooke started chatting with a young couple and before long they were giving her a ride back to our car. What a great surprise ending to trip that turned out to be harder than we had expected. I guess most of them do. A trip always looks easy from my couch.