[Fletcher]

Riley and I got Gilbert, Ramble, and Wallaby yesterday via a short traverse from the end of Twisp River Road to the Washington Pass Hairpin. On Tuesday evening, we dropped Riley's truck off at the hairpin and cruised out to Road's End. The campground out there is closed due to hazard trees. We got up at 4am on Wednesday and got moving shortly before 5. We hiked the Twisp River Trail for a quarter mile or so before hooking right uphill directly towards Gilbert. Some very minor brush was encountered early on lead to some fun scrambling up steep terrain between 4400 and 5400 ft. It was a crystal clear morning and the ever improving views had us stoked on the route choice.

Twisp River in the morning

this caught my eye

Twisp Mountain and Lincoln Butte

rib we came up

a move

easier ground

The steeper scrambly terrain eventually gave way to more moderate chossy class 2 slopes for awhile. It was a cold morning and the breeze was frigid. Around 6200 ft, we jumped into a snow filled gully and cramponed up to within a few hundred feet of the summit. The final scramble was fun and steep. Summit views were wonderful with signs of changing weather in the distance.

fun stuff

nearing the summit

final summit scramble

summit

Reynolds

Bonanza and Glacier

Wallaby and Big Kangaroo with Golden Horn, Tower, and Methow Needle

summitshot

After Gilbert, we headed down the west ridge towards Ramble Peak (pk 7631). New snowfall from earlier this week made travel sometimes tedious but not too bad. An hour or so later, we sat atop Ramble surrounded by encroaching snow showers. It was impressive how fast the weather changed.

leaving Gilbert

Marsupial Peak

looking back to Gilbert

Riley coming up the ridge towards Ramble

Marsupial, Wallaby, and Big Kangaroo

We had original intentions of going for Marsupial as well, but the connecting ridge from Ramble did not look good. The south face of Marsupial also looked really steep with bad runout. We decided to save it for another day. Instead, we dropped down Ramble's west ridge for 600 feet, until we could drop northerly and access gentle slopes down into the valley. It was full blown snowing with low visibility by now.

descending Ramble

snowing

Kangaroo Ridge above

Wallaby

We hiked up the valley towards Kangaroo Pass. Before long, we were below Wallaby. Instead of going up to Kangaroo Pass and up the ridge, we climbed Wallaby directly from the valley bottom, linking up a series of snow filled gullies. With all of the fresh snow this last week, some previously melted out holes were once again covered, which took care to negotiate.

Riley climbing Wallaby

nice snow slopes up Wallaby

a little snowy choss

nearing the summit in the heaviest snow of the day

nice view towards Big Kangaroo

Wallaby summitshot

We didnt hang out long on Wallaby before beginning our descent to Kangaroo Pass. The snow had never softened throughout the day, so we had to face-in down climb some of the steepest stuff, but before long we were down to the pass and arrived at Riley's truck at the hairpin not long after that. Awesome day!

still snowing on descent

but sunny skies from the hairpin

~8.3 miles ~6650 gain ~10 hours ~159,160/200

[raising3hikers]

All kinds of weather, what a difference a couple hours make in the north cascades. Nice route getting from the twisp river road to the hairpin!

[iron]

nice looking rib

[MangyMarmot]

Cool trip. Great photos!

[ozzy]

Sweet traverse man!! That's a cool scramble up Gilbert! The snowstorm was pretty awesome too!

[Gimpilator]

Thanks Fletcher. I enjoyed this report.

[timberghost]

Thanks for sharing

[b00]

did you give any thought to trying marsupial via the north ridge? i've often wondered how that would go? :>)

[Fletcher]

Hey b00! We originally planned for Marsupial as well, but the connecting ridge from Ramble looked much gnarlier in person than it did on the map. No real consideration was given to the north ridge as the weather really turned crappy by the time we were below it.

[Brushbuffalo]