[iron]

years ago, tvashtar and mr. brooks climbed dome and sinister on their way out of the ptarmigan traverse. instead of a standard exit, they opted to head out via the hanging gardens, remarking: "if ever there is an elysian fields for mountain people, this is it." intrigued, i placed the idea on my back burner. having been in some of the areas near the hanging gardens, i knew what kind of potential it offered. hotpantz and her brother who was visiting us (we'll call him hotbro) trusted me enough to head out on a route i wasn't fully sure would work. not only that, the part of the route in question was on day 4.5 out of 6, with a return flight the next day. gotta love blind trust! here is the quick summary: day 1: trinity TH to phelps creek basin to fortress/chiwawa saddle. climb chiwawa, descend to 5240+ (miners) lake. day 2: miners lake to valley to PCT. PCT N to miners ridge trail to lady camp. climb plummer, descend to bags and head to image lake camp. day 3: image lake to canyon lake trail. attempt climb of sitting bull (left crampons with packs), continue on to canyon lake and then up to totem pass. day 4: climb bannock in the morning. traverse from totem pass to hanging gardens. descend ross pass around N shelf of bannock down to bannock lakes. hike up to upper bannock lakes. day 5: hike up between saddle bow/bannock saddle and drop to PCT. PCT to cloudy pass cutoff trail and climb cloudy and north star. head down to lower lyman lake. day 6: hike the lyman lakes up and over spider gap and back to phelps creek TH. walk road for a bit and cut down to trinity TH. the total trip was about 75 miles and 26,000' gain. while modest in average steepness, the trip offered lots of really flat walking followed by sections of incredibly steep vegetated slopes. hotbro remarked, several tiems, how surprised he was that plants could grow on something so steep; he lives in denver. we hiked between 8-10 hrs each day, with only day 5 feeling a bit late. each evening we were treated with a swim, whether in the relatively warm waters of image lake (awesome!) or the ice cube waters of miners lake or lyman lakes. wildflowers, while missing some of the early season cohorts, were still near peak. bugs were virtually a non-factor and the weather mostly held steady, with the exception of some clouds and cool temps towards the end of the trip. overall, it was a truly special trip. prior to it, i didn't care what happened to my body when i die (burn me and toss me out, i thought). i know now where i am to be taken. day 1 after arriving in seattle from iceland only 12hrs earlier, we dragged hotbro out of the house at 6am and were at trinity and ready to roll around 9am. the TH lot was maybe 1/3 full as we set off under increadibly pleasant temperatures. we turned off the trail to head towards chiwawa basin en route to the fortress/chiwawa saddle. this basin is wonderful. if you like spider meadows and haven't been to chiwawa basin, i highly recommend it. flowers everywhere. no bugs. and running water every few minutes. what's not to love?

chiwawa basin

all trails should be like this

flowery crossing

chiwawa

the start of flower overload

there's probably a dozen ways to get up to the saddle. pick your route of choice from the 5500' flat spot --- a trail takes you to that point. the green ramp probably would have been best, but we opted for the one just right of it and encountered a few class 3 moves that we're all too pleasant with 6 days of food in our packs.

beauty flowing from fortress/chiwawa saddle

up the slabs we go

black moss

more water

at the saddle, we could see a good deal of day 2's route. we dropped packs and scrambled up chiwawa. again, many routes will work. a glance down to lyman lakes provided scale of the remaining trip as we would not seem them again for 4+ days.

on top of poodle peak

lyman lakes below and only 4 days away

dome and sinister with sitting bull in the foreground

back at the saddle, we headed down bouldery, then scree covered slopes for a few hundred feet before hitting snow. at first soft, it eventually warranted use of crampons to get down the steeper, icier sections. the basin in here has a cold, desolate feel. one large glacial moraine on skier's right tells you a bit of its history. the moraine, however, is starting to show some life. little green fuzy ferns popping out.

crampon time

eventually we reach miners lake - a place i assumed no one gets to - or at least a place where no one goes. nope. there apparently was a structure here as pipes, fuel barrels, stoves, and all kinds of other junk remain in the area. good for exploring if that's your thing, but it kind of takes away the remote feeling for me. at least the ground was flat.

i knew i left this somewhere

let's hope the fuel drained elsewhere

former work shelter

don't forget the fuel canister

made in the USA - you know it's old!

we took a dip in the mostly ice-covered lakes and bundled up. tonight was our first night of drinking baileys irish cream, totally hitting the spot.

a chilly dip

rippled reflections

plant life trying to take hold

snowy reflection

happy rock

our icebox of a campsite on night 1

glassed over tarn on night 1

day 2 hotbro woke up quite early. well, early for us at least. we were questioning if he was jetlagged, but it turned out (for the rest of the trip) he just wakes up at 6:30ish. hotpantz and i, on the other hand, like to stay in the tent until it's too warm to stay in there anymore. we packed up and walked down the valley, staying mostly E of the creek. many tributary creeks twist and wind in this area before giving into gravity and forming one larger creek. a new avi path must have ripped through earlier in the year, evident by the new piles of trees scattered about.

black flowers

flowers everywhere

fuzzy

flower roller coaster rock

beautiful long grass

down valley we go

eventually we reached the forest where we had some pleasant strolling. again, no bugs, great temperature. open forest floor too. deer paths helped us navigate the random brushy sections. we saw dozens of trees with the bark stripped off. i called bear, but hotpantz thinks its deer. what say ye nwhiker community?

aw, snap

texturized

boulder bridge

bear activity everywhere

green understory

we crossed the drainage coming from plummer mountain lake and then headed uphill until we intersected the PCT. easy walking took us to the miners ridge trail and up to ladys camp.

mini falls

a snake or a stick?

we dropped packs and headed for plummer. lots of marmot trails scattered about. incredible flowers and maybe 100,000 mouse-on-sticks overwhelmed us as we climbed up. we passed under a few false summits before hanging a left towards the true summit. looking down on plummer lake makes me wish we had gone up that way as a field of lupine was clearly visible from the summit - clear even to me and my 20/30 vision.

heading up plummer

hotbro heading up

bro and sis

the first of thousands

a scrambly section to the summit of plummer

summit shot

coming down from plummer

colorful slopes of plummer

many mouse on a stick

flowers in an otherwise rugged world

glorious mossy and flowery creeklet

elephant's head

happy yellow guys

false hellebore climbing up

after descending mostly our up route, the real flower show began as we contoured into image lake. simply amazing. i think as my years in the mountains accumulate, my favorite places are shifting from rugged, glaciated areas to those with fields of flowers. the blend is always so perfect and the smells overpowering. no army of florists could accomplish this.

leaving me in the dust

a stuffed marmot (or is he real?)

quite the trail walk

lupines litter the hillsides ahead

lupine!!!

flower density through the roof

gotta love bright green hillsides

more flowers

image lake had a few parties camped there. we selected an established campsite due S of the lake, set up, and headed to the N side of the lake for obligatory, and rightfully so, views of YES! peak. is there any more perfect alpine lake than this?

well maintained sign

a little different this time without the snow

for a change, swimming actually lasted more than 10 seconds. probably 5 minutes here. it should be noted that signs around the lake prohibit swimming when the inlet streams dry up. fortunately, this was not the case during our visit. a few bugs hung around as hotpantz read lord of the rings to us, but pretty minimal given the time of year.

splish splash i was taking a bath

a good stretch at image lake

the horizon is on fire

day 3 starting to venture into more remote places now, we followed the trail back from camp to the junction with the canyon lake trail. the aptly oriented sign indicates a lack of maintenance. meanwhile, the morning inversion created just a wonderful environment. perhaps second in my book to flower shows are inversions (caveats include: being above them, short in duration, and not obscuring the views you really want).

morning inversion at image lake

morning light on YES! peak

blue streak in the sky

green reflections

great sky reflection

green hills

rising above the clouds

last look at image lake

more miserable trail to walk

up and over miners pass we went, following the trail that was visible from plummer. some rocks and branches here and there, but for the most part, excellent tread. a few low angled snow patches presented no difficulty, but earlier in the year, expect a lot of lingering snow with steeper slopes.

surveying the route to canyon lake

walking the N side of plummer was impressive. what was a moderate sloped, flowered hillside on the S, was steep, scoured cliffbands on the N. this would be the pattern for most of the areas we traveled on this trip. reaching the middle fork of canyon creek (coming off of sitting bull), we dropped packs and sat and enjoyed the splendor. this is a fine setting. mossy creek. waterfalls above. impossing mountains in most directions. flowers everywhere. all that's missing is a nice campsite. i'm sure there's one nearby, but we weren't camping here this evening so we didn't spend time looking.

smiling lupines

spidery pink and purple lupines

a few large trees

approaching sitting bull basin

we headed up the N side of the creek, aiming for a gap between the pointy mountain in the foreground (R) and the flatter topped peak in the background (L) which is the true summit. half way up the 2200' climb, snow at the saddle started screaming crampons. a smarter person would have gone down to get them; i, on the other hand, thought axes would suffice. up we continued.

sitting bull, centered, from below

just way too many flowers again

another beautiful mossy section near a creek

the snow at the saddle was indeed firm, and it steepened to perhaps to 30 degrees above us. solo, i would have done this without pons, but as a group, i thought it too risky. instead, we tried to sniff out a scramble route on climber's right. several hundred feet of class 3 and a little class 4 on loose stuff caused the group to want to bail. next time i suppose. i was at the point where i could see the ridge and that it would have gone, but keeping us all together seemed wisest.

testing out the moat

let's try the right edge instead

view looking towards the summit of sitting bull

down we went. back through the wonderful flowers on the steep terrain. i was bummed and actually thought about grabbing the crampons and going back up. logic got the better of me and we continued on.

retreating

back down through the flowers

and some bright green fields

more steep

great clouds on sitting bull

from the creek, the trails enters a nice forest. we did our part to completely remove all branches and small logs. there are still dozens of large ones left, but none bigger than 2ft diameter. at one point, windfall and/or avi debris completely covers the trail. it's easy enough to regain, but it's a shame to lose such a nice tread. a little TLC on this trail could go a long way (WTA???).

random flower in a tree

pressing on towards canyon lake

where the trail starts to go bad

the result of clearing the trail

the trail plateaus through a nice flowered area with white granite slabs. then it plunges to canyon lake. maybe my legs aren't in shape, but this felt a bit steep.

a segregated field of lupine and mouse on a stick

a bump with lots of lupine below

canyon lake, almost in sight

totem pass

canyon lake was a great stopping place between the creek and totem pass. we all took a nice swim and i was even able to air dry before putting the pack back on. the lake is completely melted out, though some snow holds on the slopes at the far end. lots of jumping fish.

totem pass, bannock mtn, and canyon lake

canyon lake

cornucopia of colors

looks good for a swim

we crossed the outlet of the lake and followed a convenient animal trail. the trail appeared to trend toward the ridge S of pt 7078, so we jumped off and headed up the steep, flowered slopes to totem pass. a snow finger at the top confirmed we were in the right spot as we spotted it the previous day from plummer. there's running water on boths sides of the pass within minutes from it.

crossing canyon lake outlet

what a gloriously green gem

totem pass in the near future

happy times

i dropped to the N side of the pass to take a look at the route ahead. beautiful. i could only wait 'til the next day. there's room at the saddle for probably 5 tents, but we opted for a grassy bench at 6600ft E of the pass. i don't think there's a finer campspot than this. totem pass itself is completely wonderful. the sharp N faces of all the peaks on its ridge are incredible. and again, the contrast with the generally flowered slopes to the S is so striking.

north face of pt 7078

hanging at totem pass, looking south

dome, sinister, and the hanging gardens!

this night, we tapped into our second alcohol source - black death, from iceland. it was palatable by itself, but worked quite well as a mixer with hot chocolate.

fading light on dome and sinister

dinner time at totem pass

alpenglow on kololo and YES! peak

[iron]

day 4 today was the day. the day of whether we could find a way around to bannock lakes. the day we would reach the hanging gardens. such potential for highs and lows. times like this make me quite nervous, though very silently and internalized. no matter what, we would make it to the hanging gardens; if we had to turn back, i would have been okay with it.

looking back towards plummer and miners ridge

breakfast

taking in the views

still enjoying breakfast

another inversion, this time to the N

but, before all that, we headed up bannock staying entirely on the SE side of the ridge. a little scrambly in spots, but mostly it was just steep sidehilling, to which we were well accustomed by this point in the trip. views from the top showed all four of the bannock lakes with the hanging gardens sitting happily at the edge of today's inversion layer.

heading up towards bannock

steep sidehilling

bannock, false summit

dome and sinister with the hanging gardens in the inversion

making our way up with bath lakes HR behind and to the right

chillin on bannock

all four bannock lakes

bath lakes HR

hotbro and dome

back down to camp where the family of goats had scampered through the previous night (amazing what they can climb down) and off we went.

looking back at camp

some snow from the saddle, but only for a few minutes. then it's wonderful fields of flowers, white slabs, and big playful boulders. oh, don't forget the slab waterfalls where my ashes will someday be placed. this place had it all. and best of all --- it involved virtually no gain or loss of elevation!

descending from totem pass

bubbling slab creek

leave my ashes here, please

great slab waterfall in front of the hanging gardens

traversing to hanging gardens, looking back at bath lakes HR

all too soon, we were nearing ross pass. despite my attempt to sit at the slab waterfall for as long as i could, we had to press on. flowers, everywhere. marmots, everywhere. dome and sinister, in your face. itswoot ridge, spire point, buckindy traverse, all of it, right there. wow. and, the most surprising delight? looking back at totem pass and the bath lakes HR. rugged!

hanging gardens getting tangibly close

lupines, clouds, and dome

minutes away now

descending a waterfall slab

the perfect bathing spot

we dropped packs at the gap just before ross pass - a better spot to descend, as it turns out. then walked over to the gardens. they were everything i had anticipated, and more. lot of little bumps, like you were in a mario brothers game. a few tarns, some melted, some not. and upfront views of dome and sinister, both imposing their individual massive granite wills on the surroundings.

bumpy hanging gardens

flowers in the garden

looking back towards bath lakes HR

garden-like yet?

umm, yep

hiking through the hellebore

entering the gardens

we explored. ate lunch. reveled. relaxed. i went up to the high point of the gardens (6522) but somehow found no register . what i did find, however, were completely ripe huckleberries.

miserable spot for a lunch

happy pose in a happy place

as nice a tarn as i can picture

pretty sweet tarn with views of dome and sinister

looking towards bonanza, saddle bow, and our route to get into bannock lakes

flowers and granite giants

wow!

while we were there for over an hour, i felt like i could stay there a week. lots to explore and enjoy. but, we needed to get through the unknown portion of the trip - down to bannock lakes. from pt 6522, i could get a good view of what lay ahead. combining that with a picture taken by admin tom in 2006 during a lake bagging trip to the bannocks, i was fairly certain it would go. down from ross pass we went. we followed snow where we could (soft, no crampons), and traversed a couple steep grass sections that had me wishing for crampons. eventually, a talus slope that was surprisingly stable took us over the relatively broad ridge due W of lake 5324.

the shelf we took to access bannock lakes

working towards the shelf

pretty little star flowers

that wasn't so bad

from here, it was either steep grassy slopes down through the trees, or down the stream/waterfall. the stream seemed obvious as we could see all the terrain down to the lakes. the trees might have hid some slabby cliffbands. this entire area on the N side of bannock mountain is steep. i would love to view it from the N. so, down the creek we go. quite steep with a few holdless slabs thrown in there. fortunately, we're all 6ft or taller, so we could butt scoot them without too much duress. some boot skiing near the bottom at the lake sealed the deal. the loop would work.

steep descent down to bannock lakes

lower bannock lakes

our descent creek

first, negotiating some slabs

life flourishing near the creek

down we goeth

another horrible spot to have to hike through

nothing like an accent slab for the flowers

our route followed the dark green line left of center

sadly, the clouds from the inversion were in full effect now. these lower lakes, shrouded by glaciers and permanent snowfields, were not the most inviting, so we pressed on towards upper bannock lakes.

crossing the bannock lake outlet

raise your arms if you're sure

crossing the bannock lake outlet

a floater

we could see this odd reflection from way high above

there are a ton of larch trees near the lakes. i think this is a truly fine spot come larch season, though it does take some effort to get there. the way the lakes steps down to the next lower one reminded me of the idaho sawtooths.

a rock in a hard place

old fallen tree

i wonder if we can find somewhere to camp

upper bannock outlet

larches in the mist

upper bannock outlet

stream crossing with a prayer flag

upper bannock

at the upper lake, we found an established campsite and called it good. it was the coldest night and coldest lake we swam in. more hot chocolate and black death.

pretty nice campsite

upper bannock

day 5 we woke up to grey skies that did not appear set to break. bummer, today was going to be the day for saddle bow mountain - the peak i most wanted on this trip. i know of no one that's climbed it (if you have, please PM me).

upper bannocks

instead, we pressed on over the saddle to the S of saddle bow. we followed a little spur ridge for a bit, taking our time to enjoy watching a deer eat away at the flowers. then down. lots of down. around 5400', we tossed on the crampons for some steep duff decending to the PCT. ironically, the PCT was the only buggy section for the past 3 days.

now down to the pct

she wasn't the least bit concerned of our presence

soon the sky broke and i regreted, even more, not sticking around for an attempt on saddle bow. oh well. i knew the rest of the trip would get back "on schedule." we followed the PCT to the junction with the cloudy pass cutoff trail. the views of the NE sides of sitting bull and plummer are quite impressive. water was plentiful at agnes creek where we lunched and spotted our first fellow humans since image lake.

a fun house bridge

back side of sitting bull from PCT

onward to cloudy pass, we dropped packs and followed the trail to cloudy's SE ridge. we climbed up from there through more fields of flowers, with lyman lakes in the distance. quite stellar terrain. some fun class 3 stuff on the summit. it was pretty cool to be in a spot that looked over most of our route those previous 4 days.

lyman lakes from cloudy pass

cloudy peak

more brilliant meadows en route to cloudy peak from cloudy pass

again, not very afraid

nor was his younger friend

lyman lakes

photoshopped? nah. this is real.

nearing the summit of cloudy

nearing the summit of cloudy

we dropped along the ridge until we found a spot to enter towards north star. some large boulders and several snowfields took us to the false summit. we stayed on the W side and scrambled some more class 2/3 stuff to the summit. in your face views of bonzana. saddle bow seemed far away now .

coming around north star's false summit

a ledge on north star

bonanza from north star, where steph was climbing only minutes earlier

we headed back to the packs and made the descent towards lower lyman lake where we claimed a site and went for a swim. surprisingly, the water wasn't too cold, but maybe because the air had a feel of autumn in it. there were ZERO bugs at lyman lakes this evening.

heading back and hoping to make camp before dark

the hills are alive

my thoughts exactly

heading back towards cloudy pass

down towards the lake

good night mice

day 6 the lakes were nice, reminding hotpantz and me of our patagonian honeymoon. we explored a bit as we headed up to spider gap. the upper lake with the much-smaller-than-expected glacier was my favorite. crampons went on for the icy snow and before we knew it, we were staring down at spider meadows.

chiwawa is happily lit up

lyman lake is nearly perfect

a little tarn on a side trail

beautiful

glacier terminus

upper glacier

so many colors

i see why it's so colorful

a fine rest at upper lyman lake

only a little more up for the trip

we made the mistake of taking the ridge trail instead of just following the snow on the ridge. oh well. lunch at a campsite, then more down. eventually, things became flat and we enjoyed the still blooming flowers and classic U-shape of spider meadows.

coming down from the gap

into spider meadows

a beautiful way to end the trip

brother and sister

before we knew it, we arrived at the windy TH. i went off ahead and followed the road for 1/2 mile until reaching a turnout for horse trailers. i assumed there'd be a trail in here that follows the gentle ridge back to trinity. after some slide alder and small avoidable patches of devils club, sure enough, a trail. some downfall, but really nice travel. it dropped me off at the back end of the trinity TH about 50ft away from the private property sign. no need to hitch a ride for this loop - just take the trail! we stopped at the wenatchee river by the state park and washed up. then hit up the 59er diner where the food keeps getting better. satiated, we returned to seattle and watched touching the void.

[Tom_Sjolseth]

Sounds like a great trip, iron and co. That Hanging Gardens is a neat place, especially Blue Lake. I look forward to the rest of the saga.

[Magellan]

Super cool trip iron. You really know how to link them up. Looking forward to pictures.

[Randy]

Nice to read these kind of reports with adventure and exploring involved. Looking forward to the pictures.

[RichP]

Excellent! I've always wanted to visit hanging gardens since reading about it in the Beckey Guide. Looking forward to the pics.

[raising3hikers]

I'm glad your trip went well, too bad about Saddle Bow. Can't wait for the pics in that not very often visited place. Hope to see the meadow pic with 100,000 mouse on sticks

[don b]

most excellent!

[Stefan]

75 miles and no mention of blisters in 6 days? all three of you are amazing for covering that amount of ground. You sure were in a very pretty area!

[iron]

i started to get blisters during the first 7 miles of trail. i was using my new crocs which have little grippy nubs under the ball of the foot. not cool. had it not been for them, i probably would have logged 30+ miles on my crocs. hopefully the nubs wear out soon.

[iron]

pictures finally added to TR! all can be found here: general pictures panos

[ragman and rodman]

Epic...

[Bright River]

Wow! thanks for the photos. I believe that this route in part was named and published as PTARMIGAN TRAVERSE SOUTH in the l970s. The Original party came in through Bath Lakes and Canyon Lakes, and exited out through downey Creek after climbing Dome, Spire, Gunsight, and Agnus( new route). they saw nobody for 9 days. I particularily liked the ridge and gardens south of Dome and Plummer peak area. Now I get to see it again. thanks!! did yousee anybody else after you went off trail?

[iron]

between image lake and almost cloudy pass, we saw no one. best part of the trip for sure.

[Ingunn]

Wonderful, wonderful, wonderful. Thank you.