[cartman]

This is an area I've been wanting to see for a loooong time. Eusebio, a California transplant now living near Portland, had never been to the Cascades before. I wouldn't normally have suggested this trip for a first trip up here, but I had already planned it out for someone else who hadn't been able to make it, so I threw it out there and he was game to give it a go. Painters Thumb may be the most obscure peak with prominence between Hwy 2 and I-90. Essentially no one goes there unless they're pursuing the Back Court list. To my surprise, when we reached the top I realized it has some of the best views of ANY peak between the highways east of Daniel due to where it is positioned. This area also has some of the most sustained clouds of mosquitos I've ever experienced. These Anopheles wannabes have plenty of standing water for breeding around the two Big Jim Mtn Lakes, and they take every advantage of it. We didn't see or hear a single mammal larger than a marmot on the entire trip--if the burn doesn't keep them away, the skeeters surely do. Day 1: Approach to camp at Lower Big Jim Mtn Lake We parked at the usual trailhead for Big Jim and began hiking the trail, which quickly became overgrown with soft green brush. This trail needs a serious brushing out for the first 700' of gain. After that it's not brushy, but higher enters the burn from a few years ago.

Eusebio and burn

All is gray

Then the clouds moved in. And the 10% chance of thunderstorms suddenly became 100% as a boomer moved through the area, so we hunkered down to wait it out. A bit of rain, one flash of lightning, and a lot of thunder for about half an hour. The result was a clearing of the skies and colder temps as we continued through the ghost forest.

Cold light

Stark

Continuing thru the burn

Gnarled

The forest here must have burned very hot. Unlike the burns farther in, this one is showing no signs of recovery yet. No saplings, not even any fireweed sprouting here. Just devastation. Soon the sun came out as we passed the junction and lost the 600' down to Battle Canyon Creek on decent trail. We then gained another 1000' feet up into the Badlands.

Ash and light

The forest here is doing better on recovery in places, with multiple small evergreen saplings sprouting up through the ash. The trail disappeared as it traversed below Point 6245, and we turned toward Lower Big Jim Mtn Lake, managing to get on the wrong side of the small ridge and having to hike cross-country in damp forest to get over it and then over multiple tiny ribs and some brush to reach the lake. This is also where the mosquitos decided to show us who's boss. I thought I had brought DEET, but it turned out to be picaridin. I found out that while picaridin works to keep me from getting bit for a time, it doesn't have the staying power of DEET. Despite that and Eusebio forgetting to bring bug juice, we managed to share the bottle between us the entire trip to keep us from going nuts. Decent camping at the far side of the lake. Cool temps and bugs drove us into our tents almost immediately, and we had a calm night for the adventure the next day. Day 2: Painters Thumb and the Badlands We rose at a reasonable hour and were greeted again by the ever-persistent bloodsuckers. This just motivated us to get moving for Painters Thumb. We dropped a hundred feet or so via the east side of the lake, crossed the outlet, and pushed through minor brush and over more small ribs to walk the short uphill towards the burn on Point 6245. We bypassed the top of this point to its west and traversed right (northeast) through burn and some forest to Trail 1576 that descends to Painter Creek. We descended the trail a few hundred feet on gentle terrain through a mix of burned trees and short vegetation,

Painters Thumb

before losing it in more rocky and burned terrain lower.

Big Jim

We simply followed our noses down toward the creek, crossed a small stream, and entered a bit of brush and refound the trail that led quickly to a new sign at the juncition of Trail 1576 and the Painter Creek Trail. Shortly this led to an open flat slab about 100' above Painter Creek. Here we found a large cairn, took a break, and then dropped via the Painter Creek Trail to the creek, where we found a not large but stable log to cross. Now we're in business! The forest on the far side was easy travel for a few hundred horizontal feet. We then left the woods by exiting right onto a grassy/rocky slope that led up to the closed contour NE of the true summit. This was mostly open terrain with some bushes and trees higher, but easy travel by simply choosing the path of least resistance.

Painters Thumb flower slope

One could go directly over the bump, but we chose to exit left less than a hundred feet from the top on more grassy terrain.

Continuing on, Painter Creek valley

Then we curved up and right to gain the ridge. Here we found gentle grassy slopes mixed with scattered woods, easy and welcome healthy-looking terrain after all of the burn we'd passed through earlier.

Green corridor

Big Jim

On the broad ridge

One small false bump and we were at the summit of Painters Thumb, 6745'.

The jumbled summit

Painters Thumb summit

Because of its position, Painters Thumb is marvelously placed for outstanding views of the main Chiwaukum Range to the west, and the beautiful valleys leading to the mountains.

The Chiwaukums*

Chiwaukums and valleys*

(photos with an * taken by Eusebio) Eusebio was especially impressed by the vistas. He declared it more than worth the effort to get here, and expressed an interest in returning sometime with family just to show them these views.

Cape Horn and Ladies Peak

Grindstone?

The views from here are truly expansive, and I don't think our photos really convey just how good they are. We spent the better part of an hour hanging out here. The summit was windy and cool, and taking shelter just below was much warmer out of the wind but into the bugs. Finally it was time to depart. Strangely, once we began the descent around 2pm, the bugs disappeared and were not to be seen for most of the afternoon.

Big Jim

Descending, the Badlands in the distance

Re-crossing the creek on our log,

Crossing Painters Creek

and back up the trail to the slabs and cairn, we found a better route going up to regain the thousand feet up to the Badlands by staying a bit farther to climber's left on a bit more open terrain. After a couple of hundred feet we turned more directly uphill,

Ascending in the Badlands*

through more grass and burn,

Ghost forest

and up to our bonus summit, the 6236' most prominent point of the Badlands. After a brief break, we then descended toward Point 6254,

Lupine and Painters Thumb

Descending the Badlands, and Big Jim

gained a few hundred feet where we found the trail, traversed back around and retraced our steps more or less back up the ribs and brush near the outlet to camp. Day 3: Big Jim and return With the fine forecast for the day we knew we'd have great weather for climbing Big Jim, the highest peak in this area of the Chiwaukums. This time bringing our ice axes and crampons for potential snow on the route, we walked up treed meadow ramps the hundred feet and short descent to Upper Big Jim Mtn Lake.

Upper Big Jim Mtn Lake

This lake is pretty, but surrounded by marshes. The mosquitos were out in full force on this only moderately breezy morning, following us as we walked around the right side of the lake and to the "obvious gully" at the far end.

Ascent route

Here we stayed to the right of the snowfield as we ascended, until finally pulling out the axes and booting up and left to near its high point,

Booting up*

where we exited left and continued scrambling on somewhat loose class 2 rocky slopes.

And up we go

This area has some good larches interspersed with the evergreens especially around and above the lakes.

Light on larches

Big Jim Mtn Lake and the Badlands

Reaching the ridge we finally had a good look at Lake Augusta, the largest lake in the area.

Lake Augusta*

Traversing first below the ridge,

On the ridge

we quickly gained its top and walked the broad and easy slopes to the summit of Big Jim, 7763'.

Big Jim's South Ridge

Eusebio and Big Jim

Big Jim summit

Big Jim bench mark

Not satisfied with my modest photography skills on Painters Thumb the day before, I decided to document the surrounding peaks more thoroughly from Big Jim.

Glacier Peak and Dakobeds

Snowgrass, Big Chiwaukum, Opportunity

Big Chiwaukum, Opportunity in the foreground

Snowgrass

Ladies Peak

Daniel and Hinman

The Cradle

Frigid and The Cradle

Rainier

Ridge to Big Lou

Stuart and Big Lou

Painters Thumb

Being a thousand feet higher, Big Jim is a better viewpoint for more peaks, but doesn't have the great valley views visible from Painters Thumb. And unlike the day before, the bugs persisted all the way to the summit and down. Probably the highest I've ever been harassed by mosquitos. We decided to descend the scree slopes down the ridge but before our ascent route,

Descent route

which went well for several hundred feet where we reached greener terrain and were forced right then over to the snow-filled gully, where we were able to scramble on the rocky edge then boot down the easy lower snow slopes back to the lake.

Big Jim Mtn Lake

Probably would have been more simple to have retraced our route. However, from high on the slopes were were able to scope out a better way out from camp than the outlet route we had followed the previous day. We decided that going left from camp to the more open slopes just above the lower band of trees above the lake to connect with the gentle burned ridge leading to Point 6245 would go well, and it did, avoiding the brush and minor ribs lower. From there we simply hiked out the route we had come in on, taking note of how the burned slopes around Pt 6245 and down to Battle Canyon Creek were putting up evergreen saplings and undergrowth to begin the recovery from the fire. To our surprise, we ran into a backpacker on the way down to the creek. Dan was doing what he could to try to clear the trail. Thanks to him for putting in the effort to bring this trail back. The nicely angled trail (presumably for horses) made the 600' of gain from the creek to the junction fairly easy,

Junction

and then we walked back through the ghost forest and brush lower down to the car. Curiously, despite flowing and standing water and plenty of vegetation, there were no bugs from the junction the last three miles and 2600' of descent to the trailhead on the way up or down. This was an interesting trip, given the contrasts of terrain and burn. Parts of the route felt similar to the Pasaytens: the burns, and the easy meadow slopes high on Painters Thumb. The lakes had some similarity to other lakes in the Alpine Lakes Wilderness, and Big Jim more of an alpine feel up to the ridge, then again a Pasayten-like easy ramble to the summit. I can't thank Eusebio enough for his patience and fine camaraderie on this trip. Having battled a persistent bout of bronchitis for the past month, my uphill progress was slow with breaks taken as needed, and Eusebio never showed the slightest impatience or issue with the pace. Despite not having met before, he turned out to be the perfect partner for this trip, with unflagging enthusiasm and interest in the terrain while regaling me with anecdotes of the culture and his upbringing in the Oaxaca mountains of southern Mexico. My greatest appreciation to him for making this trip a rousing success. A few notes: Trails in ok condition but with deadfall burn and debris from 1000' above the trailhead all the way to Battle Canyon Creek. Trail still visible from the creek until approaching Point 6245, where it disappears into the ash. Trail can be found in places from there down to Painter Creek, but only intermittently. Without significant restoration, the trail from Battle Canyon Creek to Painter Creek will return to nature. No water between Battle Canyon Creek to Lower Big Jim Mtn Lake. Also no water between Battle Canyon Creek until near Painter Creek. Best approach to the lake would be to follow the minor ridge from Point 6245 and traverse below the ridge west of the lake a few hundred feet above the lake, then down and right to the western end of the lake to camp. Also the best way to travel from the lake to do Painters Thumb. Painters Thumb could be done in a long day from the car by simply traversing around the northern side of Point 6245, finding the trail as it appears or not worrying about it, since currently travel through the burn is fairly easy by choosing the path of least resistance. Trail does reappear for awhile on the northern side in more forested terrain before disappearing again on the burned slopes descending to Painter Creek. Dan the trail man also gave us beta on the Painter Creek Trail. He said it's in good condition, though disappears in places where it goes through meadows. Presumably just hike to the other side of meadows to find it again. He also mentioned that the burn had stopped moving west near Chiwaukum Lake, sparing the areas west including Larch Lake and Cup Lake. Back Court: 95 down, 5 to go. 27 miles, 10,000' gain Eric J. Johnson

[ragman and rodman]

[cartman]

Cradle and Nursery, Jack Ridge, Swallow Tail and the most difficult, Edward aka The Mole. Need to find someone who can lead 5.7 for that one. And who doesn't mind the schwack.

[Brushbuffalo]

Right you are, Eric, I hadn't heard of Painter's Thumb. But I don't claim to have knowledge of much south of SR20. What is a common comment on almost every TR lately? Skeeters!

[Justus S.]

Those are some nice views from Painters. Nice job getting that many BC peaks, looks like you have some nice peaks left.

[cascadetraverser]

Very cool trip to a remote portion of a popular area. Nice to bring a newbie along too.