[cartman]

A few years ago, Eric E. (raising3hikers) was recovering from an injury--after taking impromptu flying lessons from a golf cart, of all things--and put together a very accurate list of Washington's Top 500 Peaks with 400' of clean prominence. Being intrigued by certain peak lists even if I have no intention of ever completing them since they often give good leads for interesting places to go, I started keeping track of which of the Top 500 I'd done and concentrating a bit on doing more of them. Incidentally, the lowest peak on the Top 500 is at 7177'. This weekend, Tyler (christensent) joined me to do a little bit of a milestone, my 250th Washington Top 500 summit. (Edit: I initially wrote the report with limited info for others to guess which summit, but that was guessed fairly early - see below, so I've rewritten the report.) I'd been up to Hawkeye on a great trip last August after climbing Old Snowy and Ives with Dustin. Last Monday, Jeff H. invited me to come on a day trip to Hawkeye Point in the Goat Rocks via the Berry Patch Trail and I thought just maybe I'd be able to run over to my namesake peak, Johnson Pk. I gave it a shot, but ran out of time due to distance and terrain. So this weekend I resolved to give it another go, but this time from the west. Tyler and I drove down to the Lily Basin TH at the west end of the Goat Rocks, elevation 4200'. The roads are in quite good shape as there is active logging just outside the Wilderness boundary. The trail is also in fine shape the entire way, starting in decent forest and almost immediately enters the Goat Rocks Wilderness.

Into the Goat Rocks

Nice forest trail

In about a mile and a half the trail crests the ridge, then follows it on one side or the other for the next couple of miles,

Ridge trail

More ridge traversing

with good views of Rainier along the way.

First Rainier view

Rainier and Packwood Lake

As the trail traverses on the north side of the ridge, Johnson Peak comes into view:

Peek-a-Peak

Our Mountain

Crossing farther through a small pass,

Trail to pass

then traversing above Lily Basin,

Peak from the other side of pass

Continuing on

we followed the trail to a spot where the scrambling looked most reasonable. We'd briefly discussed a route farther to the left, but that looked too sketchy, and following the trail around the end of the Southwest Ridge would be a bit farther out of the way and leading to an unknown route below the large buttress on the skyline. So up we went, north of the large buttress.

Off trail start

The route started right next to a dry gully; Tyler took the rocky gully up several hundred feet, while I walked the rock & dirt meadows just to the left. Our goal was to find a not too chossy route to the visible ridgeline, then work our way over to the summit via the path of least resistance.

Trail below

Up meadows

When we reached the more rocky and steeper upper slopes,

Meadow choss

we chose to go a bit more left to stay on mixed rock and meadow as opposed to the chossier route to climber's right. What we couldn't really see was the slope above just out of sight was steeper yet, and more narrow with hardpack rock/dirt. Fortunately, the hardpack had enough protruding rock to give generally good holds as we worked the short steep slope to easier terrain above.

Easier terrain on top of ridge

Now it was a matter of working up and right, initially on the moderately angled meadow slopes above Heart Lake. Continuing up and right, we eventually reached rockier slopes leading to the upper mountain.

Upper slopes

Gendarme

Neighbors

Same gendarme, different view

Now it was simply a matter of going up as the slope laid back to the top of Johnson, 7487'.

Nearing the summit

Tyler at the top

Summit view

Old Snowy, Ives

Tieton

Old Snowy, Ives, Hawkeye, Adams

Adams haze

Rainier

Johnson on Johnson

The summit area of Johnson is strewn with numerous goat beds; goats like to make dust bowls to lie down in on high open terrain for good line of sight to escape predators. The Goat Rocks are aptly named! For our descent route, we took a good look at the slopes on the Heart Lake side of the buttress we avoided going up. The meadow slopes looked very steep, and we couldn't quite discern a good route in the shadows. So we chose to return via our ascent route, but to look for a better variation if possible. With a good view of route down, we walked the ridge to a point just slightly lower than our up route, then proceeded to carefully descend more hardpack with rock imbedded within. The terrain was unusual--dirt nearly as hard as cement, with conglomerate rock sticking out to provide mostly positive holds. We had both chosen to wear sneakers for this trip; boots may have helped a bit, but it was mostly just careful working the slope until reaching lower angled mixed rock and meadow a couple of hundred feet below.

West side basin

Choss drop

Now on better terrain, we followed the slopes next to the same gully down on skier's right, more relaxed and able to enjoy the views back to the trail.

Rainier

Ridge approach

Now on the Lily Basin Trail, we dealt with the spicy little trail crux bit,

Trail crux

and the long walk back to the trailhead.

Trail falls and pool

Trail crag

Rainier, Packwood Lake

We chose to camp in the area, and in the morning drove up to Sunrise and had a fine hike up Burroughs Mountain--another place Tyler had never been--where we saw the goats we didn't see in the Goat Rocks... Johnson Peak can be done several ways. The most scenic but longest route is from Snowgrass Flats--the traverse from the Flats to Goat Lake is incredible. There is a climbers trail leading down (chossy) about 300' from the summit of Hawkeye, or one can simply go from the junction a few hundred feet lower, but this involves crossing a permanent snowfield to stay on the trail. The route from the Berry Patch TH is a shorter way to get to the same junction. Either route would take one to the south slopes of Johnson, where steep meadows with a rock band to work through await. Our route from the Lily Basin TH is the shortest approach, and the best way to scramble the peak, especially if wishing to do it in a day. The route would go better with snow higher covering the hardpack. Expect to encounter unavoidable snow on our route through July most years with an average snowpack. No water on the route until crossing over the pass to traverse above Lily Basin, then several good running sources. Many thanks to Tyler for being a great and patient partner, and for the driving. Fun trip in a beautiful area, and good choice of route. ~13 miles, 4000' gain Eric J. Johnson

[Gimpilator]

Johnson - 7487'

[reststep]

Looks like Gimpilator has it.

[cartman]

Yep--obviously, should have requested anyone who'd done it to DQ themselves, otherwise that was too easy.

[Gimpilator]

I have not done Johnson, nor did the photo of goat hair help me narrow it down to the Goat Rocks. But the summit photo of Old Snowy, Ives, and Tieton gave it away.

[Jetlag]

Good TR, Eric, from an area I haven't visited in some time. Half of the top 500 now climbed - not too shabby!

[cartman]

[Brushbuffalo]

Wait, was this a "guess the peak?" What am I missing.....you identified it, Eric.

[cartman]

I initially wrote the report with limited info and pics for others to guess which summit, but that was guessed quickly, so I wrote the complete report as promised. Should have anticipated that would be confusing--next time, separate threads!

[Brushbuffalo]

Got it. Thanks for the clarification. Keep us guessing! Fun.

[raising3hikers]

nice going half way done, time to go get the other 250!

[ejain]

Reports from last year mention a washed-out section of the road; sounds like that has been fixed?

[christensent]

[Yana]

And where might one find this list?

[Magellan]