April 13, 2012 - Snowfield Peak

Sky opened up once we gained the ridge

Is this the right creek? Unfortunately none of us asked that question, out loud or internally while we convinced ourselves we must still be on track. The rocky trail had long ago succumbed to drifts of snow, allowing us to don our skis, a blessing to have them off our backs, but still being in the trees meant route-finding was challenging. And it was 1:30, Saturday morning. we stood upon a large snow pillow on top of a rock in the middle of the creek. Unfortunately we hadn't noticed there were several branching creeks close together that diverged below the lake we had our sights set on. Stars twinkled above brightly and I realized it may be clear enough to finally get a GPS signal. Confirmation that we were off route came quickly. Hit the locate button and zoomed down, agonizingly, onto the wrong drainage. Fortunately it was a short traverse across a treed, but mellow, slope to the correct creek. We were found for now, but wouldn't get to sleep until 2.

Friday afternoon had dragged slowly, punctuated with mental gear checklists and hurried last minute emails about footwear. The carpool lane was used to full effect and a one hour delay dissolved into a 15 minute bump in the road. After loading up on calories at the Sedro-Wooley subway, Levi and I met up with Matt and we combined gear in the back of his truck and sped up Route 20. We awkwardly crossed the road carrying heavy packs with skis slung on the sides and made our way up the first rocky switchbacks. As several cars climbed up the road below we wondered aloud where they were going at this time of night- the road was closed only a handful of miles ahead, after all. Before long we began our game of limbo with the trees.

Views across the Colonial creek basin

Every centimeter of my 183cm skis was used to effectively hook around tree branches
and all sorts of tangles of alder along the trail. Ski boots extending out from the skis forced us to slither between trees when forced off trail. Ice axe spikes wedged themselves between trees. After an hour of trail yoga we made it abruptly to continuous snow. A few minutes of postholing and convincing coverage under the trees along with the promise of less weight on our backs spurred us to stop and make the switch. Skinning was straightforward, the difficult part was deciding where to point them. At times the trail was obvious, at times not. We foolishly continued onward along the creek with no bearings to guide us and eventually made our way to our steep waterfall view where there was supposed to be a tame slope leading up to the lake. After our traverse brought us to the correct creek, a quick veggie belay assisted skin gained the lake. It smiled at us, a knowing smile that acknowledged our struggle to get there, but was unapologetic at the same time. Knowing that camping was not allowed around Pyramid Lake we set up camp on a snow mound with water on three sides. Certainly camping in the lake is not illegal? Sleep came easy and we woke in the morning with no rush to break camp, feeling satisfied with 2 miles and some elevation gain already ticked off the trip. Consultation with the topo reminded us of the long day we had ahead of us.

Sucker holes were abundant, lighting up small pieces of terrain

We loaded gear, aiming to bump camp up along the ridge, hopefully past the tricky traverse below Pyramid Peak. Travel was commiting from the beginning as we skinned up along a slope whose fall line fed directly into the icy waters below. Thankfully the spring snow that had allowed us to quickly melt water also easily formed platforms under our traversing skis and we made our way up efficiently. Up through heavily treed slopes on snow choked with pollen and pine needles, we yearned to see the sky poking out above indicating that we had gained the ridge. Eventually, just as the sun broke through the foggy April clouds, we came to the first flat knob along the crest of the ridge. Far below and behind us we could see Diablo Lake and ahead we could see other bumps along the ridge and Pyramid Peak itself.

I think we can fit through here...

After soaking in the views and planning our track along the ridge we set off to get to the base of Pyramid. The small bumps along the ridge that the topo indicated turned out to be more difficult than planned - need to get a better understanding of the scale of those closed circles along ridges. After a particularly interesting traverse along one of said knobs, we came to a large avy path down the north side of the ridge. The path seemed to go right up to the saddle on the crest of the ridge, so we wasted little time in climbing this tree free highway. We enjoyed a long late lunch at the top with views across the Colonial creek basin. Discussion ensued as to how far we could get that day and whether the increasing clouds we were seeing would preclude progress the following day. Eventually we agreed that heading down was the best decision. The descent was not something to be taken lightly, and we didn’t want to throughly tire ourselves out with more climbing only to meet a longer descent the next day with more fatigued legs.

spring in the North Cascades

rainbow skiing

The first few turns were surprisingly creamy and even a little fun. Photos of skiiers in front of a full on rainbow with Diablo Lake in the background made the climb up the ridge worthwhile. Before I had mastered the game of matching the visual texture of snow ahead with ability to make turns, I was reminded that the conditions were highly variable by getting caught up and plowing headlong into a large tree. I ended up upside down facing the tree with my skis and legs above... not a full on tree well, but a large tree divot that made it spicy getting back up. A scraped up knee, broken ski pole and bruised ego, and we were off again. I would not make a confident turn for the next 1500’ or more.

Matt blurring by

Our reward - a sappy crusty steep line into the trees.

The rest of the descent went fairly easily, however, despite the thick web of trees, crunchy snow and steep dropoffs in the woods. Luckily we were able to do a long traverse out for much of our descent and made it back above the lake where we made some interesting turns and set off slow heavy sloughs that plowed into the lake below. We grabbed our stashed boots and “skied” until rocks and trail came back into sight and we made one final switch to boots and hauled our gear out of the woods.

Pyramid Lake

Though we hadn’t gained the summit of our trip, or even seen it for that matter, we had gained impressive views of some rugged  North Cascades terrain. A glimpse at the sacrifice and perseverance that is required to climb the remote peaks in this region made this trip a success.