Last winter
I posted a number of ~100-mile routes in the North Cascades that might be good adventure runs. The Glacier Peak circumnavigation was the one I wanted to do most and luckily
Ben was just as keen to partake in some scenic suffering.
Usually done as a backpack, there are a few different trails to take around the east side of the mountain (
High Pass,
Buck Creek Pass or
Spider Gap), but only one route around the north, west and south sides. Both of us had previously covered all three options and chose Spider Gap-Lyman Lakes; it's just too awesome not to include and it means an additional climb up Little Giant Pass (great view of the Napeequa valley).
Our route went:
White River to Boulder Pass trail to the Napeequa, Little Giant Pass to the Chiwawa River, Chiwawa River road and Phelps Creek to Spider Gap and Lyman Lakes, Cloudy Pass to Suiattle Pass and the Pacific Crest Trail, PCT southbound to Indian Pass and return to White River via Indian Creek. Between our GPS devices we came up with 106-107 miles with 27,000'+ of elevation gain. We completed the loop unsupported in 35 hours flat (Ben's file and my files #1 - #2).
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| Our GPS track and elevation profile from The Glacier Peak 100+ |
By far this is the hardest thing I've ever done.
More than the distance and elevation, it was the "small" things that became the most difficult to deal with: wet brush meant 90 miles of wet feet and painful maceration, a very slow pace at night not being able to see our feet because of said brush and a large number of difficult blowdowns on sections of trail we were expecting to be reasonably clear (PCT man! Since he's a trail crew leader I trust Ben's blowdown count: 36+ on the PCT section from Vista Creek to Fire Creek Pass and 60+ over the entire route). Of course the trails that have reputations for brush were brushy (Boulder Pass, Napeequa, Indian Creek), but since we were expecting that it wasn't as painful (except for Indian Creek which is a miserable way to end 107 miles around Glacier Peak).
A big thank you to Ben for doing this with me; besides being incredibly difficult, it's also an insanely scenic tour of one of my favorite wilderness areas.
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| 5:09am start; "Big trees down!" |
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| White River trail blowdown |
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| Lower Boulder Basin |
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| Boulder Basin and Boulder Pass in the upper right |
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| Looking back down Boulder Basin |
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| SE ridge of Clark Mountain from Boulder Pass |
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| Descent from Boulder Pass down to the Napeequa |
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| Descending from Boulder Pass; Ben's photo |
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| Ben descending from Boulder Pass |
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| Flowery brush on the Boulder Pass descent |
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| Welcome to the Napeequa! |
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| Napeequa River ford; very shallow this year |
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| Some boggy sections in the Napeequa |
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| Napeequa valley, headed south toward the Little Giant Pass turnoff |
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| Emerging from one of the thickets in the Napeequa; Ben's photo |
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| The Napeequa river (little Alaska!), Boulder Pass visible in upper left |
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| That view is worth the effort; the Napeequa from just below Little Giant Pass |
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| Looking east to the Entiat range from Little Giant Pass |
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| Keeping one pair of socks dry; fording the Chiwawa River after descending from Little Giant Pass |
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| 99 of 107 miles are in the Glacier Peak Wilderness |
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| Spider Meadow |
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| Looking back down on Spider Meadow from just below the snowfield; Seven Fingered Jack and Mt. Maude on the left skyline |
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| Upper Spider Gap snowfield |
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| Lyman Lakes side of Spider Gap |
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| Ben's photo |
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| Spider Gap and the Lyman Glacier on Chiwawa Mountain |
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| Ben descending to Lower Lyman with Cloudy Pass, Cloudy Peak, North Star and Bonanza Peak |
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| We both ate a lot of food... |
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| From Cloudy Pass, looking back at Greenwood, Dumbbell and Chiwawa |
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| Goode Mountain, Stormking and Booker/Buckner |
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| Blankenship fire in the South Fork of Agnes Creek, closing the PCT |
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| Notice posted at Suiattle Pass |
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| Sample blowdown |
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| Suiattle River crossing |
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| 7:30pm dinner time and getting ready for the night, on the Suiattle River bridge |
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| Great old growth in the Suiattle valley |
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| Headlamps on around 9pm while climbing up Vista Creek |
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| 1:32am: 18-minute nap |
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| Sunrise around Glacier Creek (maybe?) |
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| Kennedy Peak, Kennedy Glacier and the Scimitar Glacier on Glacier Peak; from Kennedy Ridge |
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| Kennedy Creek bridge; Ben's photo |
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| Wet brush for breakfast on the PCT, somwhere in the White Chuck River valley |
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| Headed to Red Pass, the final climb |
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| Reaching Red Pass, "almost" done at mile 89; Ben's photo |
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| PCT southbound from just south of Red Pass, showing White Pass in the center and Indian Pass center right behind Indian Head Peak |
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| Descending into the massive brush-fest of Indian Creek |
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| About five miles of this in many different brush shapes and sizes |
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| A rare nice section of the Indian Creek valley, with quaking aspens |
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| Ben looks unreasonably fresh for what we just went did... |
