Ptarmigan Traverse

Ptarmigan Traverse
September 2009

If you live around here and roam the mountains long enough this is just one of those “have to dos”. For me this is the kind of trip that I have come to love. No summits just trippin thru remote, rugged alpine wilderness. I started climbing back in 1973 or so and this trip has always been on my list.

When my long time climbing partner Brian called on a Wednesday and said him and his brother Steve were not going to the Pickets but rather the Ptarmigan Traverse on the next weekend I was in.

The plan was for three nights/four days. With no summits planned this 35 mile trip seemed pretty reasonable. The plan was for a short first day to Kool-Aid Lake, a couple longer days and a forth very long day out. The Suiattle river road was closed by washouts nine miles down from the trail end.

Day One
Car parked at the washout on the Suiattle and a drive back to the end of the Cascade River road. Four or so trail mile to Cascade Pass where the trip really begins. Lunch done we headed south toward the Cache Glacier and Cache Col. Cache Col I guess is really the start of the true alpine. This was September and the head of the Cache Glacier at the Col was very steep and mostly blocked by a large moat. Really good snow climbing conditions and in normal circumstances I would have smoked the last steep section. But not being so young and bold I panicked and bit on very steep hard snow with the lip of the moat only some 20’ below me. Call me chicken but a bit of risk analyses (low probability with high impact) I backed down below the moat and ascended a near vertical dirt gully. Crappy work but at least for me a bit safer. Once at the Col weather started coming in and we got o bit of snow and light rain. Nice decent over heather and scree from the Col to Kool-Aid Lake. Tents up, dinner cooked and really a pretty nice evening even with the scattered showers.

Day Two
Woke up to blue skies above and clouds in the valley. What looked like a very steep ledge system (the Red Ledges) turned out to be pretty easy. Maybe 3rd class at the hardest. Beyond the Red Ledges the route contours south above the Middle Cascade Glacier on open heather and broad benches. The route drops thru boulders and open scree and onto the Middle Cascade. The upped Middle Cascade was somewhat broken up and required some route finding and traversing thru open crevasses. Not too big a deal. It’s a bit critical to pick the correct gully south off Middle Cascade into the next valley. Apparently we chose correctly. Still, the gully was steep and it was either struggle in the moat between the gully snow and rock face or decent very steep hard snow. The moat seemed to be the better but eventually I donned crampons jumped onto the snow. A bit hairy but better that the moat. The route contoured south and west above high above the headwater circ of Flat Creek across easy heather and rock slabs. Picked up the trail and descended into the Yang Yang lakes basin. The lake being very buggy and with time left in the day we acceded to the saddle north of Le Conte. There we found a well-used camp spot and called it a day. Perfectly nice evening for dinner but clouds were building and by night fall it was raining again. By late night the weather was howling, raining hard and windy.

Day Three
Morning brought no relief. Steady rain, wind and visibility less than ¼ mile. Ok so now what. We could retreat and make Cascade Pass and the car in one haul. But we were there and things as they are we may not find ourselves here again for some time. We had food to spare and so we would give it a day with the agreement that if the weather broke we would make for Cub Lake or retreat.

Day Four
Spectacular morning. We knew we would have to make Cub Lake today to get out of the mountains in case of more bad weather and to get out only one day late. Packed up early and headed for the very imposing Le Conte Glacier. What looked to be a difficult steep and crevassed entrance ramp onto the glacier was steep but the crevasse were easily avoided. The rest of the glacier was pretty straight forward with a large bergschrund blocking the route to the saddle north of Sentinel which required a bit of a traverse out and back. Beyond the saddle the snowfield on the NW side of Sentinel was hard water ice. The ice was a mix of glass water ice, slush coved ice, rock debris over ice, and running water over ice, nice. Once off the ice we continued the descending SW traverse to the South Cascade Glacier. We noted a large stone hut down on the moraine that is apparently a survey/study station for the South Cascade. Easy crossing of the South Cascade, flat and no crevasses. The view of the Dana Glacier and Dome Pk from the Col above White Rock Lake was spectacular. I’ve been around and I’m telling ya, spectacular. Steep rocky decent to White Rock lakes for lunch. From here we could see what we were in for. The polished rock slabs below the receding Dana Glacier appeared from our vantage to be a ridiculous accent above vertical cliff bands. The traverse to the rock may in fact been more ridiculous than the rock itself. The traverse route was well defined, mostly, thru scrub alpine fir but in looking back we crossed thru a very narrow band above… yep vertical cliffs. The polished rock proved to be not so technically difficult as it was physically strenuous. Steep flat slab bouldering, loose rocky gullies, running water, and steep sections of snow. Eventually we hit the Dana. The lower part was broken ice but gave way to consistent snow. We moved to the natural hogs back formed from wind deposited snow blowing thru the gap SE of Spire point. This gap is the other end of true alpine who’s other end is Cache Col. From here we could see Cub lake 2,600’ below. We could also see storm clouds coming in from the south. Tired legs made for a long hard decent thru steep heather and scree. By dinner it was raining again and continued to rain all night

Day Five
Up with the rain and it’s 18 miles out. Four mile of bushwhacking down Bachelor Creek, five miles of Downey Creek Trail and nine miles of road. The trail out of Cub Lake was short but steep. The trail down into Bachelor Creek started out pretty good but soon got into heavy avalanche debris and then gave way to just slide alder. The trail was there but was though to keep track of. There was some flagging but it was slow going. The last mile was better trail with windfalls only. The Downey Creek trail was in great shape, in fact there was a crew working on building board walk over the marshy sections. Five miles of good trail, slight downhill and we were at the Suiattle River road. The bridge over Downey Creek was there but the approaches were washed out. Nine miles of road went by one mile at a time. Each mile, one down eight, rest… At the car, still not able call home (a day late remember). Now drive back up the Cascade River to retrieve the car and home.

When I did get a call home Patty said she had already spent the insurance money.

Amazing trip. I give it a ten.

For the four days we spent, a couple guys did this in 14 hours and 36 minutes earlier this same year. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=se3W7yF3kvU&feature=related