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Good luck with that. That FA was put up by a badass.

They really should deploy the military to do this selective enforcement of the law. I believe that is what the American people wanted when they elected a convicted felon and gave him a mandate to prohibit self expression on free time.

Different people! Not to say anything of Mr Ng’s ability or potential. Maybe we all want to spot the next jeans wearing Cheamclimber, but I think it best just to encourage and help out the youth who clamor for the hills in our little community here. No sense in saddling expectations or projecting where someone is going. He will find his own way, and I hope his motivations are always his own. I do enjoy the TRs! Thanks Lucas!

Does Lucas remind any of the Cascade Climbers elders of Colin when he was young?

That looks great. Always wanted to get back up there for something like this. Way to make it happen and thanks for the notes on logistics!

You can arrive the night before and pull a number.... but everyone knows this and more and more people do it. More and more people are now camping outside the ranger station in the parking lot, or in a turnout nearby. The NCNP should join the 21st century and allow more permits to be made on line and not need to stop in to the ranger station. The Olympic NP has their shit together - you can call in a permit request - something I recently did for camping at Lake of the Angels for an over night trip to climb Skokomish and Stone.

You Gorge climbers are just a different breed!!

Has the great Wayne Wallace never climbed Backbone Ridge? !🤔

"Sahale Arm please. Well if not there, can we go to a nice alpine lake, that's not to far from the car, and has lots of solitude with some amazing views?"

Sometimes it’s hard to make it to marblemount before they close. So we will drive in the evening before. You can go to the station and get your number for the next morning, even if they’re already closed. That can help expedite the morning after….because yes it can take a while even on random week days

Selling a Western Mountaineering -25 Puma gore 6' sleeping bag. Has 2 nights of use. Great bag for Denali, Everest, all kinds of other cold (broken) dreams etc. Right zip. $1300 new. Warmest, lightest bags available, made in the USA. Comes with with a nice compression stuff sack and storage bag. $750.

There’s a mandatory 50 yard band right along the top of the ridge but that’s it, steep enough that you’d like crampons though. Towards the base of spire point it becomes snow-free, was able to go from summit to white rocks without touching snow. Glaciers are going quick, lots n lots of dry glacier. Dome was the only one I crossed that wasn’t just a melting sheet of ice.

Nice work, really great effort solo. So is there no glacier anymore just NE of Spire Point? Like on the main Traverse route? I've only been there in spring when it was all snow.

@danLeskosky We used our 70. If I remember correctly, Kurt tied in midway and tied the bag to the end of the rope. The pitch was less than 35 m so hauling was no big deal with our single rope.

Trip: Porcupine Peak - Salad Days 5.11a Trip Date: 08/23/2025 Trip Report: Climbing and Crowds on a Newish Classic Liza, Kurt, Marc, and I headed out over the weekend to climb the newish @dberdinka and @lunger route, hoping for some fun, remote climbing in one of our favorite zones. After a solid week in the Sawtooths earlier this month, Marc and Liza were feeling strong and psyched to push their grade. A climb with bolted anchors, mostly in the 5.8–5.9 range with a single splitter 5.11- pitch sounded like just the ticket. We left Easy Pass trailhead around 8:30 a.m. and made quick time along the PCT before turning off on the climber’s trail toward the base. Following the approach line on Mountain Project’s map turned out to be super helpful. The first 400 feet of trail were a bit schwacky, but we soon hit a more established path. Liza and Kurt had climbed Arrested Development (5.10-) the year before and found the climber’s trail felt way more "developed" than last season. The approach took us about 1.5 hours. When we arrived at the base, two parties were already on route with one finishing P2, the other starting P1. As we snacked and racked up, three more teams arrived behind us. We were expecting maybe one other group… not SEVEN! But everyone was friendly and in good spirits. Liza and Kurt headed up first, with Marc and me climbing behind. Some highlights from the day: P1 (5.8) starts with a fun, heady mantle protected by a bomber cam just below—great start. P2 (5.9) was a blast: good jams, a wide layback crack, a delicate face move, and then a bolted jug haul to the anchor. Super varied and enjoyable. P3 (5.11-/10+?) was the crux: Liza and Marc led it and totally crushed it, especially considering it was their first 5.11- trad pitch. Liza took a quick rest for finger pain and Marc got the onsight. Tape on the left pinky was nice beta. This pitch gobbles up nuts and will take all the 0.2s and 0.3s you’ve got. P4-6 (5.8/5.9) The next three pitches served up moderate jamming, laybacking, stemming, and some delicate bolt-protected face moves between crack systems. By then, four of the teams (including us) were stacked on top of each other, climbing around and over each other. Fortunately, everyone was having a great time and the vibe stayed positive and chatty. After a quick scramble pitch, four teams topped out at the false summit together, took one look at the awkward mantle to the true summit, and collectively said “nah.” Instead, took some photos and all combined our 70m ropes for a mega party rappel down the route using all the techniques (carabiner block, simul rappel, gri-gris, ATCs, single-strand, double-strand)! The rappels were straightforward. Though it’s unclear whether the party-rappel saved us time or cost us some, but it sure was fun. Unfortunately, one of the ropes got a coreshot on the final rappel…. We packed up and made it back to the cars by 7 p.m., tired and happy. Final thoughts: The climbing was well protected throughout. The rock was a bit slipperier than expected. A great route for pushing into the low 5.11 range in an alpine setting. Thanks to Darin and Eric for putting up this route and all the work to clean and bolt it! Party climbing! Summit selfie! Gear Notes: We brought triples 0.3-0.5, doubles 0.2 and 0.75-1, singles 2-4, and a set of nuts (many sm-med). An ideal rack would be doubles 0.4-1, single 2-3, set of nuts (many sm-med), and as many 0.2-0.3 cams as you want to carry (triples or quad). Approach Notes: Follow PCT until

Trip: Dragtooth - North Buttress / The Dragway Trip Date: 08/19/2025 Trip Report: Got to sneak in a quick 24hr mission with my friend Miles while visiting family in Reno. We climbed the Dragway on the Dragtooth of Sawtooth Ridge because it was a short drive for High Sierra climbing, a "short" approach, and a short route. We failed to factor in the ridge traverse and descent as significant factors and it took a little longer than anticipated. Sawtooth Ridge is the NE boundary of Yosemite NP but this route is approached from Twin Lakes on the E side of the range, so you are in FS and Hoover Wilderness the entire day unless you drop off the ridge line to the W. The rock quality is good by N Cascades standards but poor by Sierra standards, as is apparently the case on much of Sawtooth Ridge. This route felt quite a bit harder than other 5.10s I've done down there, but if you like 5.10 OW and fists with the occasional thin stemming move you will have a good time. The descent has several options, none of which are great. We traversed the summit ridge for quite a while but didn't like how it looked so dropped down a gully to the W to some sandy slopes and reascended to the Matterhorn/Dragtooth Col. In retrospect continuing the ridge traverse just below the crest on the W side appears to go easily. The couloir from the col back to the E was pretty atrocious scree/dirt/ice. We opted for the skiers R couloir after the initial rappel, which appeared better than the L, but was quite awful by any standard, even Canadian Rockies! Maybe bring crampons? Or climb Matterhorn on the 400' of shattered 4th class ledges and descend the 3rd class dog route on that peak, which would add some mileage but would be way faster than waiting for a helicopter rescue after getting pounded in the couloir. Here are the pictures... Approach, Dragtooth with the route and the Matterhorn visible. Head up and R to the Tarn after the scree at the head of the valley. Creek next to the tarn. Horse Creek Tower on the R. Saddle to it's L is way to route. View of the route following obvious dihedral, note ice on the water. Sawtooth Ridge N of the Dragtooth. Route up close. 3rd pitch, 1st dihedral pitch Fun anchor shenanigans. Rest above Crux on Pitch 4. Sawtooth Ridge to N Last hard pitch, amazing splitter crack from fingers to wide hands. Looking over to Tuolumne. Miles on the summit. Ridge traverse shenanigans. Matterhorn is the prominent peak. Miles in the col, starting down the gully of choss. Yummy choss gully. Negotiating firm snow once out of the couloir. Matterhorn in the sun. Back in the meadow by the tarn. Route not visible from here. Just 3k' hike down to the car and a 2.5 hr drive home! Gear Notes: Doubles to 4 Approach Notes: Free day parking at Annett's Mono Village, Horse Creek Trail to the top of the scree field then climbers trail to the tarn and cross country to the route.

Just saw this. You arrive and draw a number and wait your turn. Depending on how much the gods hate you that day you may be subjected to people ahead of you who have done no research about what they want to do and take up 15 min or more time chatting with the ranger on duty. My last visit was a few weeks ago to get a cross country zone permit for Arriva. We waited quite a bit, even though we got there around 9 when the 7 am crowd should have been and gone. The people in front of us wanted to "backpack somewhere" but didn't know where. The ranger walked them through options, asked questions. It was swell.

That is so sad about the snow. I can't even imagine doing this peak without snow...I also think I was last in this area about 20 years ago....

Sha na na na. Sha na na na. Hey hey....

Lucas...you are starting to make yourself known around these parts....

Now that is a traverse!!!

Trip: Seefar Peak, Brooks Range, The Long Way - East Gullies From Marsh Fork To Dalton Highway Trip Date: 07/28/2025 Trip Report: TLDR Version/Intro: Me and 4 buddies went to the Brooks Range in Alaska for 12 days of hiking through one of the largest wilderness areas in North America. July 28 to Aug 10. We had a blast and it went great. We got flown in by a bush flight, walked along many river valleys, hiked up a talus pile peak and then through the wilderness, across rivers and over hills to the Dalton Highway where we got picked up by a commercial shuttle service that drove us back to Fairbanks and the World. Long version: Day 0: Drive from Bellingham to Seattle, Fly from Seattle to Fairbanks on Alaska Air (duh), van ride, Uber ride. Walk around town, hit a bar, Thai food. Beers in the hotel room. Day 1: Fly to Coldfoot on Wright Air, slight delay due to missed flight (don’t believe the hotel that you don’t need to be early to Wright Air, they take their business very seriously). Immediately upon landing in Coldfoot we jumped into prop plane the same age as my parents and fly with Dirk of Coyote Air into Upper Marsh Fork landing strip on the Marsh Fork of the Canning River. The flight was incredible, frequently with wheels just clearing ridgetops and flying the terrain up and down valleys. Extremely scenic, caribou and sheep. Upon landing there was much exclaiming and pointing and backslapping. Once we got settled down and the final packing completed we hiked up valley. Warm, patchy sun, overnight hard rain. Glorious, glorious, glorious! I got a good chuckle out of everyone later admitting that they were forcing down the nausea the whole bush flight and hiding it from the others. 5.5 miles, 2.5 hours. “Rainy Camp” Day 2: Hike up Marsh Fork, cross into unnamed very upper East Fork tributary of the Ivishak River drainage. Camp at headwaters. Hard day, with technical talus and side-hilling above cliffs and raging water. The river was running pretty high from the previous night's rain so walking in the canyon bottom was not an option for us, otherwise this would have been easier. Cool and misty with rain. Amazing, just like home but nothing like it at all at the same time, so great all around; we expected weather, didn’t rain enough to get wet. Much exclaiming about the scenery. 12 miles, 9 hours “Frosty camp” Day 3: Awoke to frost on the tents and plants. Hiked down canyon to junction with upper east fork of the Ivishak, down river past multiple small confluences, easy walking. Over interminable ridge with tussocks (our first!) to Ivishak River main stem. Camp in a “hay field”. Bluebird sun and warm, 2 long great breaks for lunch. Much exclaiming about the scenery. We pushed hard on this day to set ourselves up for a potential summit tomorrow assuming the weather held out. We didn't want to get stranded up high looking for a campsite with no water. 16 miles, 11 hours “Hayfield camp” Day 4: Ascended Ivishak valley toward Continental Divide, turn south to climb Seefar Peak via dogleg east gully, awesome snow in first gully, then major talus slog to the summit. Amazing time spent on the summit, warm but breezy. Lots of cool fossils in the limestone. Descent to the south and west terrible talus, so we bailed off the ridge early to Wind River valley. Made camp. Amazing dry tundra camp next to river. Shoes and socks dry at camp! First time since 5 minutes into the trip. Bathed in river and washed clothes. Bluebird, sun, warm. Much exclaiming about the scenery. A good time was had by all. 10 miles 4000', 10 hours “Swimming Hole Camp” Day 5: Hiked down Wind River, saw wolves with puppies, then later moose which led us into a lousy tussock field, camped in side creek. Very mediocre spot, but extremely close to water and some dry wood, so we had a fire and drank margaritas to enliven the spirits a little. It worked. Much exclaiming about the scenery. 14.3 miles, 7.5 hours “Margaritaville Camp” Day 6: Up wind River tributary, saw a grizzly with two cubs, a heard of sheep way up high, and a lone wolf across the valley making quick work of the talus. Up a unique talus-ey canyon, over two passes, one being the Continental Divide, down a tributary of a southern fork of the Ribbon River. Great walking most of the time. We got showered on twice, but mostly sunny. The area where we looked to camp was somewhat brushy with knee-high vegetation and it took a bit of looking to find a good campsite, eventually made a spot work quite well with great moss and blueberries. 13 miles, 8 hours “Barefoot camp” Day 7: Nice enough weather early, quickly turned to rain, then hard rain, despite the Inreach weather saying it would improve throughout the day. Misery. Trudged up to beautiful lake, too windy and cold to enjoy it. Saw wolf puppies briefly. Over pass separating the Ribbon and Accomplishment Creek and down to tundra on other side, just past dangerously slick boulder field. Dove into tents soaked through. Very cold and wet. Lunch in tent, nap. Whiskey helped spirits a lot... at least in my tent. Less exclaiming about the scenery today, though everyone admitted it would have been great if we could have enjoyed it. 8 miles, 4 hours, no breaks. “Sunny dry happy fun camp” Day 8: Woke to fog but no rain, weather improved dramatically throughout the morning. This was clutch since our base layers were completely soaked. First thing in the morning everybody got ready to hike then leapt into our wet clothes and immediately started walking quickly to warm up in an attempt to dry out some clothes. Down Accomplishment Creek, up side creek over a pass with lots of caribou antlers, half way down canyon on other side to camp. Beautiful country, lots of exclaiming over the scenery, sunny and warm, dried out everything. Decent walking. Saw moose, wolverine. Drizzle just before camp. “Sewing camp” due to a near catastrophic pack blowout. 9.5 hours. 16 miles Day 9: Drizzle, fog, cool. Down interesting puzzle canyon, that was tons of fun to figure out, left side, right side, in the creek, does it go? It goes! Saw a griz at a distance, then across a big river, nameless east tributary of the Sagavanirktok, (tough, fast crossing), hardest of the trip. Slogged up a tussock hill, to canyon, over pass and down to Sag valley, mediocre camp, not many options. We were told that the Sag was a tough crossing that kills people from time to time, so we were excited to get a look at it from up high. I had done a lot of satellite and map reconnaissance of the entire route and had picked out an area of the Sag that is quite braided, hopefully making for the easiest crossing. I had read a few scattered reports of people who crossed just a couple miles further north and had to use rafts. “Lumpy camp” 12 miles, 7.5 hours Day 10: Foggy AM, then sunny and warm. Across the Sag! It ended up being not that big a deal, but it helped that we were on day 10 and river crossing 1 million +/- a couple hundred thousand. Up the valley wall to an amazing broad sunny saddle with rolling fog, for a tea break. We were on a plateau above the confluence of the Atigun and Sagavanirktok Rivers. The fog started to break up after break, we walked slowly; some bad weather was predicted today and the next couple so over the previous few days we had hustled to make sure we could get across the Sag before the rain set in. Unlike the previous days, the weather report ended up being pessimistic and we had great afternoon sunshine. We strolled through tussocks to camp on a sunny alpine tundra slope. Amazing day. Surprise sun! Everyone tard sailed all their gear out on the tundra to dry out everything. Dry socks even!! The low tundra around camp made for great lounging and camping, and beautiful. The sun and sense of accomplishment really made the light on the hills glow that long afternoon. “Kick Ass Camp” 5 miles, 5 hours Day 11: Hiked off the plateau to the Atigun River, up the river valley to the road, road!? Long road walk to Galbraith Lake camp. My knees hurt after the 8 miles of road for the first time in the entire trip. Mostly cloudy with sun patches and a short drizzle. Surprising amount of traffic on the road, saw a civic! Fire and celebratory attitude at camp. “Galbraith Lake Campground” 6 hours 15 miles Day 12: Woke up leisurely, lounged around, day hike to West Galbraith Peak, tea and coffee on the summit. Camp time, eating everything that was left. Mostly cloudy, mild. “Galbraith Lake Campground” 5 mi, 4.5 hours Day 13: Lounged in the tent, rain and drizzle, picked up by van at 11. Wes from Dalton Highway Express picked us up in a beater 15 passenger van. Two entrees and a beer at the truck stop in Coldfoot. Food at the farthest north truck stop and bar in America was cheaper than in Bellingham. “Hotel Camp” 10 hours in the van, zero walking. Photo credits to Mike Graw. Gear Notes: backpacking gear, bear spray, rain gear Approach Notes: Airplane, deproach by van.

This is an awesome TR, thanks for sharing your adventures and for fanning the flame of Cascadian stoke!

@JasonG when you printing up “I’m tired” tshirts? I think the motto has legs!

I'm new to mountaineering! I just climbed Baker two weeks ago as part of a class. So very little experience and no experience on Rainier.