Forum Index > Trip Reports > Tyler, Baldy, Gray Wolf Mountains. 6.21-22.2014
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Opus
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Joined: 04 Mar 2006
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Location: The big rock candy mountain
Opus
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PostMon Jun 23, 2014 1:50 pm 
Summer is here! This year with actually sunny weather on the first day. After some map searching, we set our sights on the eastern Olympics. The hope was to find mostly snow free trails and good views. This ridge delivered on both. After a long and bumpy drive we reached the Maynard Burn Trail, above the Dungeness River trailhead. We chose to ascend by the Tyler Peak boot path. The route starts steep from the start. We would repeatedly find and lose this track the whole way up the ridge but overall it offered easy travel. The last water we noted was near where the trail breaks out of the forest into the meadows. No more snow up there. We reached the ridge and stashed our packs for a quick run out to Tyler. Again, no snow on the way. Nice travel on the ridge crest with interesting rock formations. Great views in all directions! We stayed up there for awhile before returning to gather up our packs. Our plans were to spend the night somewhere on the ridge but hadn't decided where yet.
Tyler trail
Tyler trail
Chocolate lily
Chocolate lily
Exiting the forest
Exiting the forest
Tyler ridge
Tyler ridge
Baldy and Graywolf
Baldy and Graywolf
Stegosaurus
Stegosaurus
Packs on, we continued along the ridge to Baldy, entering the park along the way. Patchy snow in the shade as we ascended false baldy but snow free up to Baldy itself. We saw three hikers leaving the summit as we approached but that was the extent of our human interaction all day. Nicely isolated and peaceful. After a long break on top of Baldy we decided to camp on the summit. There were clouds around but the forecast was good and the wind light. The snow was mostly gone but there was one patch just large enough to use for water. The clouds faded away and we had a pretty nice sunset. The longest day of the year - sunset at 9:15! Overnight temperatures were in the high 30s but with no wind it was quite pleasant.
Clark, Deception, Fricaba
Clark, Deception, Fricaba
Camp on Baldy
Camp on Baldy
Graywolf Mountain
Graywolf Mountain
Sunset (at 9:15pm)
Sunset (at 9:15pm)
Morning light hit us far too early and brought warm temperatures too. By 7 am we were already in shorts and short sleeves! After breakfast we packed up and descended towards Graywolf. We stashed our overnight gear at the saddle behind a large rock and headed up the ridge. Most of the way up was snow free. This meant no ice axe but we would also have to deal with annoying scree fields. We were able to stay off snow except for one or two 10 foot stretches near the summit. Poles were helpful but we never took out our axes or microspikes. Great views from the top! But also gray clouds. We even felt some raindrops. This is summer - that's not allowed! We descended off the summit and plunge stepped down a big scree slope before traversing back to retrieve our overnight gear. We decided to descend directly instead of retreating to the Baldy bootpath.
Descent from Baldy, ridge ascent to Graywolf
Descent from Baldy, ridge ascent to Graywolf
Steep part of Graywolf
Steep part of Graywolf
Mountain woman
Mountain woman
Royal Basin
Royal Basin
Mt Olympus
Mt Olympus
Scree descent
Scree descent
The descent started out quite nicely. Steep meadows for several hundred feet but easy travel. We continued down a dry creekbed that offered easy travel. Then around 5400 ft this ran out and dumped us in an endless sea of blowdown and tree parts. What a mess. Every time we thought we'd find a way through we found more mess. Or fields of prickly bushes. Or stinging nettles. Probably the worst brush-bash I've ever had. Finally we made our way through the mess but walking down a marshy creek bed and started to find flagging! This led us to much easier terrain and the remaining few thousand feet were through pleasant open forest. I do not recommend our route (see map).
The descent starts nicely...
The descent starts nicely...
...getting kind of questionable....
...getting kind of questionable....
...becomes awful...
...becomes awful...
...comically awful...
...comically awful...
...ends on happier terrain!
...ends on happier terrain!
Daisies
Daisies
Back on the Royal Creek trail we quickly made our way towards the trailhead. One last climb up to Maynard Burn trailhead and another 1.5 miles back to the car, happy to take the packs off. Great start to summer!
TylerBaldyGraywolf
TylerBaldyGraywolf

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tigermn
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tigermn
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PostMon Jun 23, 2014 3:48 pm 
Last year I went to Baldy and had in the back of my mind to try and get to Greywolf as a day hike. Once I got up there I decided Baldy was enough for the day and the "hike" over to Greywolf looked like not much fun unless you are fond of slipping and sliding around on moondust/scree etc. Still need to go back and get Tyler though.

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l'Emmerdeur
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Location: Western Slopes
l'Emmerdeur
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PostMon Jun 23, 2014 4:08 pm 
Nice work, Opus! A group of us went up Maynard Burn on Saturday. We started out on the Tyler trail, but decided we were off track pretty quickly, not that Maynard was much better in terms of steepness. Maynard Burn? Hell, my LEGS still burn! Great conditioner for the first day of summer, though. We talked about going for Baldy, but called it a day at the false summit. Thanks for sharing what we missed (and then some!). up.gif

SEMPER IMPROVISIO -or- You can't always get what you want, but if you try some times you just might find that you learn how to Deal...
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Abert
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Abert
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PostMon Jun 23, 2014 5:52 pm 
I passed your stuff on the way to Gray Wolf and wondered if you planned on dropping down from there or had camped at the lake. I tried traversing once across the slope below Baldy (not nearly as difficult as what you did) and decided it was more trouble than it was worth to avoid going over the summit. I saw you on the ridge above me at one point but somehow we passed without making contact.

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Opus
Wannabe



Joined: 04 Mar 2006
Posts: 3700 | TRs | Pics
Location: The big rock candy mountain
Opus
Wannabe
PostMon Jun 23, 2014 6:05 pm 
Nice! We were probably descending the western scree slope and traversing around from Graywolf. We saw one person going up the ridge just as we reached the saddle. The descent was indeed a piece of hell, at least the middle 1000 ft of it. I really feel like there would be a route through the mess, possible closer to Graywolf than Baldy. The lower part was quite nice.

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RodF
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RodF
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PostMon Jun 23, 2014 9:40 pm 
Map? Thought I'd look to see where NOT to descend to Royal Creek!

"of all the paths you take in life, make sure a few of them are dirt" - John Muir "the wild is not the opposite of cultivated. It is the opposite of the captivated” - Vandana Shiva
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Opus
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Joined: 04 Mar 2006
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Location: The big rock candy mountain
Opus
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PostMon Jun 23, 2014 10:07 pm 
Oops, attached the wrong map. Fixed it with the correct one.

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RodF
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PostWed Jun 25, 2014 12:54 am 
Thanks! Yes, makes sense. An easy but less adventurous option is to traverse back to the Maynard Burn ridge (park boundary line) and take it down to intercept the Maynard Burn trail at ~5700'. I may know the origin of that flagging, but wish I didn't...

"of all the paths you take in life, make sure a few of them are dirt" - John Muir "the wild is not the opposite of cultivated. It is the opposite of the captivated” - Vandana Shiva
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