[TR] Mt Pershing - Route #7 7/16/2016

[olyclimber]

Trip: Mt Pershing - Route #7

 

Date: 7/16/2016

 

Trip Report:

In a union of Olympic mountain aficionados, Saturday OlympicMtnBoy (Stewart) and I climbed Pershing.

 

We saw a bear crossing the rode in the morning when we were driving up the NF 2401 above Jefferson Lake...very cool to see, it was a pretty big one. It has be a long time since I've seen a bear in the Olys.

Got to the way trail some time around 8ish after leaving West Seattle and driving down around via Olympia, etc. Stashed some beer in the creek and headed up, following a way trail and some flagging. As noted by others, the flagging is a bit confusing. I tried to get us off route by following some yellow possibly pink flagging up to out into the slide area, but we soon resolved it just by looking around and realizing quickly that we needed to head to the northwest, so we back tracked a bit and headed up the hill. I think I'm in pretty good shape, but Stewart had me trying to keep up. It was an awesome challenge, and I almost did.

 

We passed a really cool old tree on the way up, it looked way, way older than anything else we saw up there other than rocks, and it had seen some shit.

 

We followed some orange flagging up and when it ran out we looked across and saw the infamous "vegetated slabs" that lead up to the upper basin below the peak at about 4300 ft.

 

After this you get to tromp up a beautiful meadow till you reach the basin where we found a goat checking us out and warming himself on a rock.

 

The whole way up the view of Washington to the southeast are awesome, there a couple really cool waterfalls that come off it. Once you hit the upper basin then Jefferson really pops to the northeast.

 

We headed up to the gully/knotch just to the north of the easy looking one, and this proved to be a great spot to enter on a short rock climbing section (probably not more than 15 or 20 feet) and we were on the ridge line. We followed the ridge line to the summit, and I have to say it was one of the more enjoyable scrambles I've had to the summit of an Olympic peak. At one point there is an awesome short hands traverse.

 

 

Some cool little ledge walks and we were on the summit.

 

 

Given the forecast we felt like we really lucked out. You could see Washington and Ellinor and the traverse between them right across the valley. To the west the Lincoln and the Sawteeth and Cruiser popped in and out of the clouds. Skokomish and Stone never really came out to play, but you could clearly see where they were. We could see Lena Peak to the north, but the other peaks like Bretherton, the Brothers, etc were all pretty much obscured. To the east, the Sound and the city were all under the sea of clouds. It is yet another amazing and special position in the mountains that I've been lucky enough to visit this year.

 

 

 

 

The summit log here is broken up into dates, and we enjoyed perusing the oldest one.

Here are the first few pages:

Page 1

Page 2

Page 3

Page 4

Page 5

Page 6

 

Page 6 was a favorite.

 

 

We headed back down to the car and the beer, and I got to ride the Southworth ferry home for I think the 7 or 8th weekend in a row. My Oly brother Stewart was awesome to hang with in the hills (as many of you already know) and Pershing is definitely an enjoyable and worthy day out.

 

 

 

Gear Notes:

Ice axe was nice for the short but soon to be melted out section of snow just below the ridgeline.

 

Approach Notes:

flagging. i think the orange was the best, but really just read the guide book text and follow that, because some of the flagging will lead you up to the lake instead. and there is a way trail that comes and goes, but is there for much of approach.

[OlympicMtnBoy]

Woot woot! Thanks for putting up the TR Oly, it was a right fun climb up there! I should have a couple more pics to add if I ever figure out an efficient way to get them from my smartphone to here. ;-)