[TR] Muncaster Basin August 2006 - Fire Creek - Pyrites Creek 1/1/2008

seaportguy · January 16, 2008

Trip: Muncaster Basin August 2006 - Fire Creek - Pyrites Creek

Date: 1/1/2008

Trip Report:

August 5: Our original plan was to go into Muncaster, traverse by Mt. Taylor and come out Skyline to North Fork Quinault so we left a car on the North Fork and started out on Enchanted Valley Trail. Left car about eleven. Hiked in about three miles, crossed river at the big bridge, and at Fire Creek left the trail and started uphill. Worked uphill in rough brash for several hours and made camp on a sort of level bench. Jeff and Neil wandered off for water.

August 6 we kept working up in thick brush, hard going, steeper and steeper, coming out on a steep ridge that was sketchy and steep. Took hours to work up and up and over a knob, very sharp, to an upper basin where we found a great tarn and high campsite overlooking Fire Creek and Quinault Valley below.

August 7: Rose early and worked around to the west below peaks toward headwaters of Fire Creek, had to drop into a steep gulley and then climb out a steeper slope over a canyon and ice. Worked up along this slope to a pass just north of Muncaster Mountain, and from this pass looked into Muncaster Basin. All snow and rock and below lovely basins. Worked down the snow and took water from a stream and then worked across the basin on gametrails and worked our way up onto a high bench just below the ride overlooking the Enchanted Valley Trail. At this point we were probably a half mile as a crow flies from the camp the night before but with mountains in between. Camped here up high overlooking Mt. Taylor and the basins and the Skyline Ridge Trail, Olynmpus far off to the west, with clouds coming in and a bright red sunset.

August 8: This morning we had rain by nine am and it grew dark and gray. Bears all over the place. Packed up and worked along rough country toward June 10 peak and the Godkin-Rustler Pass below Mt. Taylor. The route across Taylor looked hard and rough and we started having doubts. The weather deteriorated and we foudn ourselves trapped in high rock and cliffs and we had to backtrack and drop lower to find a way forward. Raining hard by now and we made camp. Jeff and Neil explored ahead and I guarded the camp from bears. That night it rained all night.

August 9th: Worked our way in better weather down a gulley and then back up into the basins along the ridge and worked all day toward June 10 peak. Came to a lovely basin just south of the peak and climbed up one side to come out at a high high tarn amidst rocks and lovely grasses where we made camp at 5200 feet overlooking basins, Mt. Taylor, Mt. Christie, but clouds coming in and by nightfall it rained again. Jeff and Neil climbed June 10 that evening.

August 10: This day we explored all through the area and tried to pick our wat around to the headwaters of Pyrites Creek. We knew we could not make the Taylor crossing and have time to get back out via Skyline and so we tried to find a route through steep slopes and rocky gullies to the headwaters of Pyrites by Chimney Peak. Looked pretty damn bad.

August 11: This day we were hiking about eight hours and we travelled as the crow flies less than two miles, the first mile an easy stroll down into the basins and some lakes, and the Godkin Rustler pass, and we could see Godkin below us 2000 feet, but then we had to work along the steep sidehills, almost vertical, thick with brush and trees, and gullies and cliffs, and we took five hours to go a quarter mile and a couple of times thought we'd not make it and might have to backtrack. We'd fight through brush, blind and bloody, and come out at a cliff, have to backtrack and drop 300 or 500 or 800 feet and then cross a sketchy gully and climb the other side and be blocked again. If we went too high we'd be on ice and exposed, and if too low we were afraid we'd be trapped in cliffs, and so we went and we went and finally Neil got out ahead and found a route and we came to a lovely small basin behind the pass to Pyrites, overlooking Godkin and the Elqha Valley, Mt Taylor to the west, just lovely, and we camped here. I think we made a big mistake, we should have climbed oevr the high pass just north of June 10 and then worked along the long east-facing sidehill overlooking Pyrites and the valley - instead we tried the west side and nearly failed.

August 11: This day packed up, crossed over a small pass to the meadows above OPyrites, and worked around north and east as far as we could in open country until we came to cliffs and a stream valley and then we dropped through thicker and thicker brish to trees and then fought through trees. Crossed a steep, 200 foot gulley and came up on the other side and then got a little sideways and wandered too close to Pyrites and were caught again in gullies and climb-outs. A nightmare. Then when we got clear opf that we were lower, almost at the trail, we could hearv the creek and the river, and we fell into a huge blowdown area, huge trees lying across each other every whichway, and it took two hours to get by these, but then at dusk we made the river asnd a campsite at Pyrites Creek. I had eben here ten years earlier and then there were benches for two hundred yards forther east before the river and these were all washed away, it is amazing how dynamic these areas are and how much they change year to year. We camped here back ona trail for the first time in a week.

August 12: this day we walked out 10 miles on the Enchanted Valley trail, effortless wandering and strolling on trails, it felt like we were on highways and roads after the days in the brush bushwhacking, and the trip out was fast and easy. Got to the car, picked up the other car, and on the way home stopped at KFC in Aberdeen for a big greasy feed....to see pictures see http://cascadeclimbers.com/forum/ubbthreads.php?ubb=photopost

help! how do I add pictures to this???

Edited January 16, 2008 by seaportguy

rob · January 16, 2008

haha, sounds like a fun trip. I've had similar bushwhacking experiences in the olympics -- they're not steep hills as much as they are cliffs made out of dirt and slide alder :crazy: