[TR] Upper Lena to Mt. Stone Traverse- 9/4/2004

[bremerton_john]

Climb: Upper Lena to Mt. Stone Traverse-

 

Date of Climb: 9/4/2004

 

Trip Report:

BlakeJ and I did the loop trip described in earlier posts by Fairweather and Olyclimber. We dumped bikes at Putvin Way trailhead, drove to the Lena Lake trailhead and hiked up to Upper Lena, arriving by 10:00am. We then ran the ridge past Scout Lake over to Stone Ponds beneath Mt. Stone. As Olyclimber posted the other day, we found there is a trail nearly the entire way to Stone Ponds from Upper Lena. It's overgrown in a few spots, but easily followed. The only difficulty for us was that when we reached Stone Ponds we were in the clouds, and couldn't figure out exactly where St. Peter's gate was. So we just found a snow gully and blindly walked up, topping out through a notch that wasn't St. Peter's Gate (we ended up being south on the ridge), but it worked nonetheless. We then traversed over to the west ridge through the scree and scrambled up Mt. Stone, through breaking clouds. On the descent we went via Lake of Angels and on down the Putvin Way Trail, passing the memorial marker for Carl Putvin, whose birthday it just happened to be yesterday (Sept. 4 1892). Incidentally, does anyone know anything about this guy? He died at 20 years of age, and is noted in the guidebooks as being a hunter, trapper & explorer.

 

We reached the bikes after being on the move for 12 hours. Fried chicken, cold brew and Jo-Jos in Hoodsport afterwards. Yum!

 

Here's a couple shots from the day.

 

Hiking up Upper Lena trail - South Brother through the clouds.

 

The upper Stone Pond.

 

Traversing the scree below Mt. Stone.

 

Mt. Stone's main summit (right) and double-peaked north summit.

 

Lake of the Angels

 

Gear Notes:

Just an ice axe for getting over the ridge of what we thought was St. Peter's gate, but wasn't. The snow this time of year is mostly real hard, fairly icy.

[AJScott]

nice work! How much do you travel on the bikes? My dad did this traverse back in the 70's and I have always wanted to get up there and check it out. congrats

[bremerton_john]

The bike ride is only a couple miles, maybe 4 at the most, all down hill. I don't think I really even pedalled, just coasted. That ridge between Upper Lena and Stone has some real nice meadows, and right now the huckleberries and blueberries are in abundance up there.

[Fairweather]

Nice trip! When we did it, the largest of the ponds (called Ullin's Bathtub?) were still covered with snow and we walked across easily. Lake of the Angels was just melting out, but Upper Lena which lies at about the same elevation, was snow-free. Nice pics too! Have you ever been up to "Milk Lake" below Mount Bretherton / above Upper Lena?

[bremerton_john]

Yeah, Milk Lake is another treasure. There is a great view of it from the summit of Mt. Bretherton. We passed on seeing it this time around, as speed was of the essence. Everything was snow free except for St. Peters gate and the gulley we took. I was somewhat concerned it would be down to ice, and while it was pretty hard packed snow, the low angle gave us no problem.

[Blakej]

I did the little usgs map deal on the computer and came up with 15.9 mi and 9000ft of elevation for the trip. John's altimiter came up just short of 8000 ft of elevation so either way a long day but well worth it. Stone also gave some tantalizing views of some other peaks like pershings and cruiser that really provide some stoke to get out and do more before we get pounded by this winter.