[Jake Robinson]

Enjoyed a nice trip to climb some peaks in the "Snoqualmie Pickets" and the surrounding area over the last few days. Day 1: Mount Thomson, camp at Glacier Lake Selena, Gary, Brian, and I left Snoqualmie Pass at 8 AM and climbed the East Ridge route on Mount Thomson (snow free at this point). The last time I climbed this route I had some difficulty locating the correct class 4 chimney that grants access to the summit. This time the routefinding went smoothly and we all had a great time scrambling this impressive peak. We spent over an hour on the summit enjoying the clear views and ogling the waterfall that drains Icebe...er...Grebeci Lake.

Team hiking across Bumblebee Basin

Mount Thomson

Selena and Gary scrambling on the East Ridge

Topping out

The Crest and Grebeci waterfall

We rappelled the class 4 step (30m rope works) and hiked back to the PCT. Gary and Brian headed back to the car while Selena and I continued east with the goal of camping at Glacier Lake for the night. We considered climbing the west route on Chikamin, but didn't feel like carrying over the mountain with our overnight packs.

Joe Lake, Four Brothers, Three Queens

Huckleberry

Alta

Burnt Boot

Chikamin

Overcoat

As soon as we began the descent to Glacier Lake, the mosquitoes became horrendous. We hiked in hardshell jackets and bug nets and they were still a nuisance. The mosquitoes were consistently bad for the rest of the trip and were especially intense at our camp at Glacier Lake. Camp was so beautiful, though, that I almost forgot about the bugs.

Three Queens

Nearing Glacier Lake

Chimney Rock

Day 2: Lemah and Chikamin The next morning we hiked up to Chikamin Lake en route to Lemah. I was overheating in my hardshell jacket but it was the only way to retain my sanity amidst the mosquitoes. Wonderful, dramatic scenery every step of the way.

Beginning of the route to Chikamin Lake passes by this rock formation

Three Queens above Glacier Lake

Chikamin Peak

Chikamin Lake

We hiked across talus and heather up to the SW ridge of Lemah One, crossed under Lemah One, then descended the SE ridge for a few hundred feet. We descended N on bad choss and steep snow, then contoured around the E side of Lemah One and Two to get over to main Lemah. Ice axes and crampons were useful on the firm snow.

Hiking above Chikamin Lake

Chimney Rock through some spires

Descending SE Ridge of Lemah One

Lemah Two, Chimney Rock (route traverses upper snow ramp underneath Lemah Two)

Cannon Hole

We had no problem with the snow-rock transition getting up to Lemah. After that, a few hundred feet of very enjoyable and solid class 3 scrambling. Then some more snow, choss up to the notch S of the summit, and some exposed choss on the west side up to the true summit. I think Lemah is probably one of the best viewpoints I have seen in Washington outside of the North Cascades.

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The snow leading to Lemah

Snow-rock transition

Fun class 3

Scrambling with Grebeci below

Topping out

Overcoat and Chimney Rock

Weather over Daniel

Chimney Rock

Thriller on Lemah Summit

YEAH!!!

We reversed the route back to Chikamin Lake, then descended towards Glacier Lake until we met the junction with the Chikamin bootpath (5200').

Descending Lemah

Re-ascending difficult choss to Lemah One SE Ridge

X marks the spot on Chikamin Peak

Descending back towards Glacier Lake

We followed the bootpath to the beautiful unnamed lake at 5400', crossed its outlet, and wrapped around the S side heading west. We lost some time here trying to find a bootpath, before finally deciding to just go up. I don't think there really is any sort of a consistent bootpath or cairned route up Chikamin, at least not that we could find. There is some tread/cairns here and there, but nothing continuous. Just follow your nose uphill to Chikamin's S ridge, it's all easy and it all goes. From there follow the ridge to the summit (class 2 with one steep scramble move right below the top). No register.

Lake 5400'

Ascending slabs and heather on Chikamin

Chikamin summit block

The scramble move

The Lemahs

Northwest Chikamin

Three Queens

Daniel

Gold Creek Valley. The first time I saw Chikamin was many years ago from I-90, looking up this valley. Cool to finally see the valley from the reverse perspective.

We descended to camp and went to bed early in preparation for an early wakeup.

Descending Chikamin, Hibox above

Chikamin from Camp

Glacier Lake

Day 3: Huckleberry and Alaska The next morning we hiked back to the PCT and around to Huckleberry in intermittent sprinkles. Luckily, the weather improved and we decided to go for Huckleberry.

Three Queens above a mosquito cesspool

The Lemahs and Chimney Rock

Stuart

Some weather moving through

We left the PCT at a pond and hiked up to the base of the E Ridge of Huckleberry. The E ridge is mostly steep class 3 scrambling with occasional loose rock. A good place to be careful, but nothing too difficult. We ascended the ridge then downclimbed steep class 3/4 to a notch below the summit. More scrambling up from the notch, finishing with a few crack moves of what I would call 5.5 or 5.6. If we had brought rock pro, I would have protected these few moves. It's possible there is a class 4 route climbers left of the crack, but it looked very exposed and loose. Anyways, I threw a rope down to Selena for this final bit and belayed her up. No register.

Huckleberry, E Ridge on left skyline

Scrambling the ridge

Traversing over to the notch

Downclimbing into the notch

Huckleberry summit shot

The rap anchor on the summit is a giant cairn. A little unnerving to rap off this, but it seemed solid and I've heard this is a common technique in canyoneering. We double-rope rapped on two 30m ropes, it is nearly a full 30m rappel. One more rap on the lower ridge then we hiked back to the PCT.

Huckleberry rap anchor

Rappelling

We hiked the 10 or so miles back to the car on the rocky PCT, making a short diversion to Alaska Mountain on the way. This was an awesome trip, thank you very much to my partners for being great people and making it possible.

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Every peak climbed on the trip in one shot

[neek]

And who says there's nothing interesting along I-90. Nice job linking it all up. Now we know where all the bugs are hanging out.

[olderthanIusedtobe]

Looks like a great trip. I got all thrown off, I was looking at Daniel in the distance from Boulder Pass a couple days ago and it looked to be mostly snow covered. Then of course I realized I was looking at the north face of it and your pic is the south side. Holy cow that is pretty much bare.

[b00]

[Gimpilator]

That's a pretty sweet trip Jake. The route you did on Lemah is one of the finest I've done in WA. Didn't want to do it before hand, but Fletcher kept pushing for it. Sketchy Looking anchor on Huckleberry.

[Bluebird]

Me: I'm bringing 3 friends to Thomson on Sunday. You should come along. We could camp at Ridge Lake and climb Huckleberry too. Jake: I'll repeat Thomson if we can climb Huckleberry, Lemah and Chikamin too. Me: Uh, okay? I mean, I want to go to all those peaks...

[iron]

lake 5400 is a surprisingly cold swim for its size

[Fletcher]

Nice link up! All quality peaks, nice to get them all in one go. Did you not do Lemah 1?

[Bluebird]

no, i took a tumble en route to the lemah glacier so i wasn’t feeling it and refused lemah 1. in my defense i did get it back together and made it to chikamin and huckleberry afterwards.

[b00]

[raising3hikers]

it definitely looks pretty nice up there. nice work connecting all of those summits in one trip. one of these days I need to do an overnighter in the alpine lakes wilderness