[ree]

This is a great snowshoe trip. It was a bit strenuous, but the reward was fantastic. We did not summit the Buttes, but rather enjoyed the long ridge leading up to it. The avalanche forecast was “considerable” above treeline, and route up to the top of South Helen Butte looked pretty dangerous. Nevertheless, the rest of the route was fantastic. This was a Mountaineers Winter Scramble, organized by Steve. Everyone was prepared with their gear, and on-time. Luckily, the group we had was fit, so we were able to push it a long ways and keep the group together. The trailhead is maybe a half mile behind the Marblemount Visitor’s Center. We were on the trail about 8:30 am. The trail crossed the first of three creeks right off the bat. Unfortunately, the first one was the most challenging, but I did okay with my waterproof boots. The lower part of the trail then wastes no time gaining elevation and is quite steep in places. The tread is excellent though, and there were minimal blowdowns. The trail goes through a nice thick forest of cedar and hemlock. There were some pretty falls we passed, tucked in the crags of the mountain. At about 2,300’ – 2,700’ the snow was intermittent, and at about 3,200’ it was completely snow-covered. There, we lost the trail. We put on snowshoes and continued in a wnw direction from the trail. Every once in a while, as it got steeper, we spotted some flagging here and there. The snow was deep and not consolidated. Finally, on the lower part of the ridge, we broke out of the trees, and the views of the surroundings rewarded our efforts. Gorgeous views of the North Cascades… Pyramind, Colonial, Jack and the Pickets. We enjoyed our lunch about 12:30pm, and stopped for a half hour.

Since it still was early after our break, so we decided to get closer to Helen Butte and enjoy the wonderful open ridge. We stayed careful not to get close to the north edge, where it was pretty cornice-y. We passed a snow-covered tarn on the lower part of the ridge and when we got to a spot that descends to the final climb up to the Butte we stopped for a nice break. Here we could see Glacier Peak, El Dorado, and White Horse to the south. We even got a nice peak of Puget Sound and the Olympics. Helen Butte was imposing. Clearly a huge chunk of snow had broken off its north face, exposing the dark rock underneath it. The route up looked almost possible, if you didn’t mind a nice snow-ramp dangerously close to a wind-swept cornice. The margin of error was not to my liking. I joked to Steve that if we attempted it and perished, everyone on nwhikers would point to us being idiots for doing it when the nwac forecast was “considerable”. We imagined all the armchair quarterbacking and had a chuckle. We sat for a while, enjoying the views and fantastic sunshine.

At 2:30pm, we turned around and headed back. The snow had melted quite a bit. It was heavy, deep, and slippery. Thank god for the snowshoes. (Some fellow who was more or less following us with no snowshoes finally gave up after punching through 3' each step and turned around shortly after reaching the ridge.) I didn’t realize how steep the trail was until heading down. We got to the cars after 6 pm. Stats – 4,800’ gain, 12 miles roundtrip.

[RichP]

Nice to see a report from you, Deb. Those pics are nice too.

[Gimpilator]

Thanks for the report. I was just thinking about this peak today.

[Jetlag]

Great to see this trip posted, Deb! I remember the views up the buttes getting better and better and better as we climbed. Glad that everything worked out!

[zephyr]

[Jetlag]

Sweet! Must admit I failed to see that climber to the left of those immense cornices. Great trip!

[wildernessed]

[Stefan]

looks like you people had a great day! good on you!