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Fletcher Member
Joined: 29 Jul 2009 Posts: 1870 | TRs | Pics Location: kirkland |
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Fletcher
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Fri Aug 25, 2017 2:22 pm
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Jake and I got Copper and Dark this week via a loop entering via Holden and exiting via Stehekin. To avoid the notoriously hellish brush in Swamp Creek, we climbed a seemingly undone route up the west side of Dark. Not sure why no one has ever done this, we think it should be the standard route.
Short Version
Day 1: Take slow boat to Lucerne and bus to Holden, eat.
Day 2: Climb Copper ~10 hours round trip from Holden, eat, move camp to .5 mile past Hart Lake
Day 3: Move camp to Glacier Creek/South Fork Agnes confluence on the PCT
Day 4: Climb Dark via the West Route, hike all the way out to High Bridge, long day
Day 5: Catch first bus to Stehekin, eat, catch ferry back to real world
Long Version
Day 1
I got off work early on Saturday night and immediately hit the road. I had a nice pleasant drive to Chelan via Blewett. The Chelan Walmart Campground is actually a pretty pleasant place to stay the night.
After breakfast, I met Jake at Fields Point. We arrived in Holden around 1pm, and just decided to camp there, rather than haul overnight gear up to Copper Basin. After shooting hoops for a couple hours, we had dinner in Holden that evening. Their food is so delicious and their hospitality so appreciated. We got to bed early that night.
Day 2 ~ Copper Peak
We left camp at 4am and hiked back through Holden Village in silence. Upon reaching the top of the industrial clean-up area (which is now completely open to hikers), we lost some time finding the correct trail. We followed the Copper Creek Trail up the right-hand side of Copper Creek. That is not the right way, the trail dead-ends at some old shack after a couple hundred vertical feet. Instead, follow the Tailings Bypass Trail up the left side of Copper Creek. This will promptly take you to the Copper Basin Trail which will take you to Copper Basin and Copper Peak. We lost some time figuring this out. The lower portion of the Copper Basin trail goes through an area devastated by the Wolverine Fire. It was dusty.
We made great time up to Copper Basin. When you first enter the basin, the trail sort of peters out into a large marshy meadow. We got water and took a break here.
Copper Peak
We found all of the route descriptions for Copper to be a bit vague and confusing. Ill try to explain what we did simply because all of the descriptions that we read made the route seem more complicated than it really is.
1. Upon entering Copper Basin, you'll see a burned out bump or knoll mentioned in a few other recent TRs. Cross Copper Creek and make your way around the right side of this knoll. A rising rightward traverse worked well for us.
2. Before too long, we found ourselves in really thick larches, the thickest larch I had ever travelled through actually. It opens up quick though. We followed larchy heather slopes and talus to the obvious moraine above.
3. From the moraine, go right and find yourself in a snow-filled depression between two glacially polished slabby ribs. We climbed the snow on the ascent and took the ribs down on the descent. Go up here until a weakness opens up in the ridge to your right. This is Coppers East Ridge. When it looks easy to gain this ridge, head up. Mostly class 2 on scree and heather.
4. Once in the notch in the east ridge, head up the ridge for a very short distance until you can traverse out right. Go right on benches below the lower of 2 snowfields until an obvious class 3 route opens up to gain the bench above.
5. From there, keep taking the path of least resistance rightward, until gaining the NE ridge that will take you to the summit. The NE ridge goes mostly class 3. You are forced off to the left of the crest near the summit.
Jake working up the burned out knoll route in view heading up towards the moraine go right here, underneath the slabby rock on the left up the now or the slab here, until it looks easy to gain the ridge climbers right route to gain the east ridge upper east face, go below the lower snow patch, then head straight up blocky rock and keep traversing right class 3 to gain the upper of the 2 prominent benches views Jake on the ridge blocky class 3 just below the summit
We topped out on Copper at 9:45am and sat on the summit for over an hour to view the partial solar eclipse. Honestly, the lighting didnt change as much as I expected, still cool to view it from almost 9k though.
views during the eclipse Glacier during the eclipse Copper summitshot
We went down the same way we went up with ease. The only change we made on the descent was that we stayed higher on the burned out knoll. We sort of went more over it, than around it, and found the travel to be substantially easier.
Jake heading down the ridge Jake heading down the ridge Jake back at the short class 4 crux on the ridge back in the thick larch Wolverine Burn Bonanza from the mine cleanup site Holden
We arrived back in Holden around 3pm. We figured we'd wait around and drink coffee until dinner was served at 4:45. After chowing down, we went back to camp, packed up, and headed for Hart Lake. Lots of bear sign along the Railroad Creek Trail. All of the campsites at Hart Lake were packed, so we camped another half mile up the valley. Sleep came easy.
bear sign Copper blowdown negotiation Copper and Dark 8/20-24/17
Day 3
We slept in until nearly 8am. Tuesday was supposed to be a semi-rest day. We packed up and were hiking by 9:15. We took lengthy breaks at both Lyman Lake and Cloudy Pass. Cloudy Pass is really nice. Some marmots in the basin below the pass gave me some entertainment.
Cloudy Peak Cloudy Pass Copper and Dark 8/20-24/17 Copper and Dark 8/20-24/17 Copper and Dark 8/20-24/17 Copper and Dark 8/20-24/17
Some miles later, on the PCT, we got a great look as our prospective route up Dark the next day. I took a lot of photos to use later on.
Needle Peak, The Anonymity Towers, Dark, and our route to "Dark Fin Col" slightly closer look at our route a different view
We arrived at our camp on the PCT just past the confluence between Glacier Creek and the South Fork of the Agnes before 5pm and enjoyed a restful evening, mostly eating. I went to bed before dark.
Day 4 ~ Dark Peak
If you want to climb the Bulger Top 100 list, you have to climb Dark Peak. Most people that climb Dark Peak approach via the horribly brushy Swamp Creek approach. This approach does not sound like a good time. I didnt want to go that way. A few months back, my friend Niko (twodogdad) and I were discussing Dark Peak and he told me about this idea he had. On the map, approaching Dark from the west side and gaining the col just north of "Dark Fin Tower" and "Anonymity Tower" looked good. Jake and I decided to give it a shot. What looked good on the map, also looked good in person from across the PCT. We were pretty sure it would go. We left camp at 4am, and began hiking through the pitch black forest by headlamp.
starting out "where are we going again?"
To start off the day, we gained some easy forested slopes, but then could find nothing to continue upward and could only go down. This confused us. Coming back through here on the descent, we figured out there is a little knoll in the forest just east of camp. Keep this in mind if you decide to go this way. We ended up going over the knoll both ways. Using our gps, we got back on track and started actually gaining elevation around 5am. Its hard to explain which forested rib we took so Ill let the pics and route lines do the explaining for that.
The climb up the 2 forested ribs was amazingly cruiser, I couldn't believe this route was seemingly never done. We climbed ~2600 ft from camp to a benchy area about 1000 ft below the col just north of "Dark Fin Tower". The route was 95% easy forest travel with a little talus, a short bit of class 3 up some rock bands, and just the tiniest little hint of brush.
first light in the forest glow on Dome, Sinister, and Gunsight crossing from one forested rib to another a little scrambling above the last 1000 ft to the col
The last 1000 ft to the col was mostly talus, some of which could be bypassed by heather. Also cruiser terrain. The sun felt good at the col, but we couldn't quite see around the Anonymity Towers to the rest of the route to the Dark Glacier.
last bit of talus to the col looking back down the route looks like it might go...
From the col, we dropped 100 ft of really loose and unpleasant talus to a snowfield. From there, we had to down climb another ~150 ft of class 3 slabby rock to where we could see the rest of our route up the Dark Glacier. I believe this is near where we linked up with the standard route.
Jake descending unpleasant scree directly below the col and a little rock the rest of the way
The glacier was in sorry shape. We thought we could probably make the route go, but we would be dealing with at least a little bit of ablated ice and a seemingly tricky crossing of a crevasse/bergschrund near the top of the glacier. We opted not to rope up, as no one would be arresting a fall anywhere on this route.
We went right around this rock island. getting there short section of ice with death runout that we crossed, it reminded us of our mortality
Shortly after crossing the first section of ice, we came to the crevasse/bergschrund that looked worrisome below. Good news was that crossing it looked easy. Bad news was that immediately after the crossing was 25 ft of steep ice, also with bad runout. This gave us pause. Jake said he'd do it, but he wouldnt come down it. I agreed. We figured we could probably tease out a descent SW from the summit into the Glacier Creek side. We were so close, we went for it. I climbed up the section of ice to softer snow above. Not too bad, but down climbing it would have been hairy.
crappy shot of the crossing and section of ice "that was dangerous"
Upon reaching the top of the Dark Glacier, one more obstacle presented itself. A wide, deep moat stretched along the entirety of the head of the glacier. Once spot looked good, but once we got close we found the snow bridge to be a no go.
snow bridge we tried first, taken after we found another way across
At the western end of the head, we found a spot where we could jump across, so thats what we did. It was committing for sure, but not difficult. After that, we scrambled around a ridge and gained the easy slopes below the summit. I don't really remember what time we topped out. A lot of work for a "peak" with such little prominence!
moat jump Dark summit easy slopes reg entry summitshot Bonanza peaks i could name but I'm too lazy to the view north Dome and friends Glacier
We spent some time melting snow for water in case we got stuck for a long time without finding any. Then we began our descent toward Glacier Creek. We started down a loose gully, then exited this gully in favor of easier looking heather slopes. This slope eventually cliffs out but you can cross back into the gully that is skiers right.
dropping the gully from just below the summit of Dark heather slopes we utilized in the middle of the frame not too bad North Star gully
After descending the gully a short ways, we came to a series of vertical steps that we considered rappelling. Instead though, we found exposed slabby rock skiers left to down climb. Eventually, we arrived at a ledge that took us out of slabby terrain and back to heather. The part that we weren't sure would go was over!
tricky slabby down climb the key ledge looking up what we had just come down Copper and Dark 8/20-24/17 Bonanza
Once we got to roughly 6200 ft, we began a long traverse back toward the original treed rib that we took up from camp. This traverse was long and sometimes difficult, but paled in comparison to what descending into Glacier Creek looked like it would be like, brush hell.
typical traverse terrain typical traverse terrain bear den?
Eventually, after traversing through a lot of forest and crossing many brushy gullies, we were back on our awesome forested rib and cruised it all the way back to camp. Should this be the new standard route for Dark? Its 10 extra miles RT from High Bridge, and we think its worth every mile. In earlier season, when the glacier is in better shape, this route makes Dark Peak substantially easier than coming in Swamp Creek.
awesome descending through forest too cool back at camp
Jake made some great route overlays of what we did. Here they are.
courtesy of Jake Robinson courtesy of Jake Robinson courtesy of Jake Robinson
A special thanks to Nikolai Popov for the route idea!
Back at camp at 4pm, we completed our route in 12 hours, camp to camp. Then we ate, had coffee, packed up camp, and hauled out to High Bridge. It took us from 6pm until midnight with a few long breaks. It was a slog, but we wanted to catch the first bus into Stehekin in the morning.
Day 5
We caught the Stehekin Valley Ranch bus out of High Bridge to Stehekin Valley Ranch, then Rainbow Falls, then The Bakery, then The Landing. We were drinking IPAs at the landing before 11am. We hung out with Kevin most of the day, he'd also caught the first bus out of High Bridge that morning, super nice guy. Glad to have Copper and Dark in the bag
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silence Member
Joined: 25 Apr 2005 Posts: 4420 | TRs | Pics
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silence
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Fri Aug 25, 2017 2:29 pm
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PHOTOS
FILMS
Keep a good head and always carry a light bulb. – Bob Dylan
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wanderwild Member
Joined: 21 Jun 2004 Posts: 333 | TRs | Pics Location: Seattle, WA |
Fletcher wrote: | Copper and Dark 8/20-24/17 |
So that's "Copper" on the left and "Dark" on the right, yeah?
Nice work
"Whatever your mountain, climb on."
"Whatever your mountain, climb on."
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Jake Robinson Member
Joined: 02 Aug 2016 Posts: 521 | TRs | Pics
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Yet another awesome adventure into one of the most remote parts of the Cascades. In my mind, the ease with which our route on Dark went is well worth the 10 extra miles (round trip) on the PCT - there was no brush the entire way! Here are my photos:
Day 2: Copper Peak
Crossing from Holden to the mine cleanup at 4 am Burned out terrain above Copper Basin Pretty gross, but only two hundred vertical feet or so of this stuff Almost done Our route up Copper goes straight up the middle of this photo, then cuts right and traverses up to the slabby section on the right-hand side of this photo just below the ridge crest. From there, we scrambled class 3 to the ridge crest and rode the ridge to the summit. Getting closer to the moraine At the moraine. Sad remnants of a dying glacier are all that are left here. Fletcher climbs the moraine We climbed snow and slabby rock until there was an obvious access point to Copper's east ridge (shown in this photo, right of center) Climb straight up the middle of this. We found cairns at the obvious notch. Climbing to the east ridge This was taken from the notch in the east ridge. From here, we headed up the rocky terrain in the lower left of the photo until we could gain the heather benches in the lower-middle of the photo, below the prominent snow patch. From here we traversed up and right, then climbed the path of least resistance up blocky and exposed class 3 until we gained Copper's NE ridge (we gained the NE ridge on the upper right side of this photo). We climbed blocky class 3 right of the snow patch to the ridge. The class 3 we climbed to the ridge is right above Fletcher in this photo. Up to the ridge Blocky class 3 to the ridge Sendin' it! (thanks Larry) Bonanza and Martin from where we gained Copper's NE ridge Bonanza Once on the NE ridge, the route is mostly class 2/3. We came to a short section where we had to do a 10 foot class 4 downclimb with some exposure (shown here). Fletcher downclimbs Final stretch of ridge to Copper's summit. Just below the top, we were forced off left. It's pretty obvious where to go, just follow the path of least resistance. Class 3. Just below Copper's summit Bonaza during the eclipse Eclipse views Summit Down the Wolverine burn to Lake Chelan Fernow (which I was too lazy to climb the day before) Glacier and the Dakobed range during the eclipse Tom's 48th Bulger peak, 13 years ago. raising3hikers' 100th! Matt and Josh Fletcher in his natural habitat Back down the NE ridge Back up the class 4 section South Spectacle Butte Descent Back down the crappy burned section Take this trail - it leads you to the Copper Basin trail, which is correct. Do NOT take the Copper Creek trail! We did made that mistake at 4am, by headlamp, and it wasn't too much fun. Bonanza and the mine cleanup Last night's home Copper Bonanza from Hart Lake
Day 3: "Rest day"
Lyman Lake Lyman Lake outlet Lyman and Upper Lyman from near Cloudy Pass Cloudy Pass Cloudy Peak Cloudy Pass views Scouting the route on Dark from the PCt We used this slope to access Bannock Lakes last week Dark Fin Tower is on the ridge crest, directly in the center of this photo. Our route ascended forested ribs directly up from the PCT to the notch just left of Dark Fin Tower. Went like butter. Cool rock at a river crossing on the PCT
Day 4: Dark Peak via west slopes
Forested ribs on the ascent (not as bad as it looks, the brush was minimal) Fletcher on the ascent Dome, Sinister, Gunsight, Agnes Nearing Dark Fin Tower Dark Fin Tower is the tooth-like formation at center left on the ridge. The notch we used to gain the Dark Glacier is just below and left of Dark Fin Tower. Views down towards the Dark Glacier from the notch. We went directly down from here, then traversed the snow to the prominent flat area at lower center of this photo. From there, you can see the rest of the route to the top. Descending slabby rock behind Dark Fin Tower to gain the glacier We traversed this snow patch around the corner. Dark Peak is at the top of the photo. Dark Glacier was in rough shape. We ended up traversing high-right from here. Trying to find a way across the moat. Bonanza from the summit I hope we can get down from here! Lots of peaks More peaks Dropping the gully below the summit. Hope this goes! Descending heather skiers left of the gully More heather Near the technical crux of our descent. Slabby class 3/4 for 20 feet or so. Very exposed. Descend this until you reach a prominent ledge that cuts hard left to easier terrain Fletcher on the ledge From where we came Ready to 'scwhack We came down this stuff Traversing back to our original forested rib... Bonanza, contrails, and North Star Dome and stuff Horrible slog back to High Bridge
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Matt Lemke High on the Outdoors
Joined: 15 Jul 2010 Posts: 2052 | TRs | Pics Location: Grand Junction |
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Matt Lemke
High on the Outdoors
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Fri Aug 25, 2017 4:00 pm
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Nice work guys! Wish Josh and I did that to escape and hike out after our big trip. Swamp creek really sucked...luckily we were going down
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Ski ><((((°>
Joined: 28 May 2005 Posts: 12798 | TRs | Pics Location: tacoma |
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Ski
><((((°>
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Fri Aug 25, 2017 4:47 pm
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great work, gentlemen.
"I shall wear white flannel trousers, and walk upon the beach.
I have heard the mermaids singing, each to each."
"I shall wear white flannel trousers, and walk upon the beach.
I have heard the mermaids singing, each to each."
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Magellan Brutally Handsome
Joined: 26 Jul 2006 Posts: 13116 | TRs | Pics Location: Inexorable descent |
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Magellan
Brutally Handsome
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Fri Aug 25, 2017 4:49 pm
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Great stuff and a nice get!
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raising3hikers Member
Joined: 21 Sep 2007 Posts: 2343 | TRs | Pics Location: Edmonds, Wa |
I especially like the creative way you guys took for dark pk! keep those nice trips going
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Fletcher Member
Joined: 29 Jul 2009 Posts: 1870 | TRs | Pics Location: kirkland |
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Fletcher
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Sat Aug 26, 2017 2:02 am
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Gentleman is a loose term...
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Brushbuffalo Member
Joined: 17 Sep 2015 Posts: 1887 | TRs | Pics Location: there earlier, here now, somewhere later... Bellingham in between |
First- class adventure (= not knowing the outcome when doing something new).
Are you finishing this season, Fletcher?
Passing rocks and trees like they were standing still
Passing rocks and trees like they were standing still
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Fletcher Member
Joined: 29 Jul 2009 Posts: 1870 | TRs | Pics Location: kirkland |
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Fletcher
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Sat Aug 26, 2017 8:04 pm
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I'm going to give it a shot! Although a few of the peaks I need are a little close to the Diamond Creek Burn :-/
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rstoddard24 BBQWingz
Joined: 30 Dec 2016 Posts: 74 | TRs | Pics
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Cool to see this create route on Dark! I want to climb a west route on Dark this upcoming summer and not sure if it had been done, then I found your report! Just curious which gulley, red or blue (i couldnt tell from overlay)? Red looks easier to me on the map, but when you say "descend gully direct from summit" that makes me think u went blue. It seems going up and down gully route would avoid needing glacier specific gear..
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Jake Robinson Member
Joined: 02 Aug 2016 Posts: 521 | TRs | Pics
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rstoddard24 wrote: | Just curious which gulley, red or blue (i couldnt tell from overlay)? |
The blue one, although I wouldn't recommend going that way. There is a fair amount of tedious sidehilling and bushwhacking through slide alder required once you hit tree line. The only reason we descended that way is because the glacier was in bad shape and we didn't want to go back the way we came. I think I remember considering your red gully but deciding against it because the terrain in that area is pretty rugged and it didn't look like anything would go.
If you want to do Dark from the west, I highly recommend going up and down our ascent route, shown here:Hand drawn, not a GPS track
Basically you go straight uphill from the PCT through open forest (easy, no bushwhacking), then climb talus and scree to the ridge just north of Dark Fin tower. Cross over the ridge, descend class 3 and some moderate snow slopes, and link up with the Dark Glacier and the standard route. If you hit it when the glacier is in good shape this route is really a piece of cake.
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NorDub Member
Joined: 17 Jul 2015 Posts: 56 | TRs | Pics Location: Redmond |
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NorDub
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Fri Mar 09, 2018 11:42 am
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Wow, great photos. I really enjoyed that. That moat jump though...that angle made my palms clammy haha.
Quote: | Copper and Dark 8/20-24/17 |
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~*CutebutChossy69*~ bluebagprincess
Joined: 08 Jul 2019 Posts: 58 | TRs | Pics Location: Seattle |
Ur 1-5 step beta for Copper was clutch this weekend, thanks for writing it out!
Choss is a girl's best friend
Choss is a girl's best friend
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