Met with Mesahchie Mark in Sultan around 7:00 am and Mark offered to drive to the Persis trail head since this was one of his favorites and he knew the location quite well. After a small detour back into town, we again arrived back at the Persis trail head around 8:30, some of this road is very rocky and has a large boulder that recently fell onto the road and requires squeezing around it on the shoulder and into the ditch.
We were on our way up the steep trail into a low cloud ceiling wondering what the weather was going to do and hoping for unobstructed views if we were to get to the top of Index. Soon up the clear cut portion of Persis we saw that the clouds were merely a thin layer and sunny higher up in elevation. This was a good sign! The clouds were breaking up and drifting around as we made the top of Persis and we were able to see our objective across the valley. We spent some time on Persis with a snack and studying our possible route along the ridge.
The ridge drops down from the top of Persis at first into Krumholz and into a large boulder field before side hill traversing though mixed terrain until it is possible to head back up to a key point in the ridge were it starts to head east to gain the Index's ridge/slope proper. From here, we worked the ridge up and down though more mixed terrain with some faint boot paths appearing. The views of Anderson creek drainage and both Persis north walls and Index's west walls were spectacular. One last low point of the ridge had to be negotiated until we were able to work up easy slopes to the summit of Index and views of peaks abound, some we have done, and a lot we want to do. On the way back out we decided to touch the top of Persis again for good measure and had a chance to look back and reflect on our trip, plus the skys were completley clear at this point and the lighting was perfect!
Time: 6 hours from car to top of Index, plus around 6 hours return to car.
Thanks for the TR. A reminder that I need to get back up there. Oren and I took a look at Index via persis in Feb. After postholing to the top of Persis we decided there was not enough time or ambition to posthole to the top of Index. It did though inspire us to do baring and gunn.
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Thanks for the TR H
A reminder that I need to get back up there. Oren and I took a look at Index via persis in Feb. After postholing to the top of Persis we decided there was not enough time or ambition to posthole to the top of Index. It did though inspire us to do baring and gunn.
