Home > Trip Reports > July 4-6, 2008, Glacier Pk

July 4-6, 2008, Glacier Pk

7/4/08
5821
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Posted by Monika on 7/10/08 2:09am
July 4 Ryan L and I left the White River TH at 6:30a.m.  This is an east side approach north of Lake Wenatchee.  10 miles on trail, some of which is overgrown up to your chest and wading through streams running down the trail up to your mid shin.  All bridges for the 3 river crossings are out (Boulder, Thunder and Lightning).  Some interesting crossings  ;) but was easier 2nd time on the way out.  Bushwhack up the Lightning creek drainage 3200' - 6400' before putting skis on at consistent snow coverage ~ 3pm.  (snow began at 5000').  Lucky Ryan found a faint animal/old hiking trail.  (Unlucky we couldn't for the life of us find it on the way out.)  With skis on traversed to gain the Dakobed ridge top and camped at a col just west of TenPeak at 7140'.

Saturday we had hoped to summit, but Saturday was rain allllll day.   But was good to rest after the approach.

Had concerns about snow stability with all that rain but lucky for us Saturday night the rains stopped, the temps. cooled and the winds blew.  Turned out this made for super stable ski conditions Sunday with the perfect amount of softness.  Left Sunday to lose what little vis we had to traverse and climb up to ~ 7800 on the Honeycomb gl. and then descend on the Suiattle gl. down to ~ 7100, traverse down low and find ourselves climbing up again.  I wished my navigation skills were better in all that marine layer, used a LOT more time because of this.  And it didn't burn off.  Arriving Friday there were already clouds rolling in, so we never had a chance to see the approach over to Glacier pk.  Well we did break out of it and got onto the Cool glacier and reached the col between Disappointment pk and the summit making the top from the SW side at 10am.

Skied a fun very stable steepish coulior off the top back onto the Cool gl.  And then dreamy turns all the way down.  Not runneled or suncupped.  Back into the marine layer.  Back to camp and then the long ski/bushwhack/hike back to the car.   

Super fun trip to finally get in there and ski Glacier for my first time.  I really enjoy that area north of Lake Wenatchee/Gl. pk. wilderness.   :D


1st pic is Ryan nearly at the summit.
2nd pic is on the Cool Gl. looking up at our line (the most obvious one descends leftward)
3rd pic is back up on the Honeycomb Gl. looking back at Glacier.
Bravo, ewe two!

Awesome. I so want to ski that mountain again, especially after looking at it for several days on the ptarmigan traverse. I wish I had more gear and just could've continued going and going. Ha.

Way to get up in there guys. The schwack and rivers sound fun. Such loves this mountains spill on us, eh?

Cool!  Sounds like a fun area to explore - good job you guys.

author=Monika link=topic=10621.msg43129#msg43129 date=1215709781]
  Some interesting crossings  ;)


Full nude?

Awesome trip! Thanks for the report.

Nice job remembering the stats Monika.

Here's a shot looking back towards our camp, which is out of sight to the left. On the ascent we dropped into the clouds and climbed back out, but on the descent we stayed high and tried to keep the ridge in sight:



This is Monika descending a ridge separating the Chocolate and Cool Glaciers. We thought we might be able to gain the summit via this ridge, but it turned out to be a little too complicated.So we dropped back onto the Cool and traversed around to the standard route on the Sitkum:



What we came to do:





And here's a shot of our line off the summit (the obvious one on the right):





right on you guys!  chock o'cool trip.

Very nice, thanks for the TR.  Mui Bien!!

Thanks y'all.

Put some more pics on picasa:
http://picasaweb.google.com/yukigirl/GlacierPeak
Ryan's pole broke the first hour of the trip, i can't imagine doing that much without !

Just saw that area again from Fortress and Chiwawa. 
still hope to do that Dakobed traverse sometime...


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july-4-6-2008-glacier-pk
Monika
2008-07-10 09:09:41