[olympichiker77]

These peaks seem rarely climbed, and given their proximity to NF-2530, they seemed like a fairly easy target for a beautiful day. I thought there would be quite a bit of patchy snow, but to my surprise there were only a few lingering patches in the first couple hundred feet up from the road. After passing the Murhut Falls trailhead, the water bars start showing up. They're a bit of a pain but I didn't have any issues with them in my Honda CRV. On the last stretch before Trap Pass, the road gets quite a bit worse, with a lot of rocks and debris scattered all over. I surprised a huge black bear as I rounded one of the corners! It's the first bear I've ever seen, which is kind of funny since I once spent 30 days backpacking through grizzly country in the Yukon Territory. Never even saw a sign of a bear. I parked on a nice wide mossy pullout just past the pass. I basically just walked straight up the rib towards the summit of 4510. The slide alder was pretty bad, but there wasn't anything poky. Some of the snow patches were unavoidable, and some bear crawling was necessary. Luckily the dense brush only lasted for maybe 200 feet, which then yielded to open forest with pleasant travel.

Fairly open forest with some annoying lingering snowpatches

Pretty soon after that I was atop Pt. 4510, and was surprised at how much I was able to see from up there. I was also able to see the route ahead, which to my relief looked okay.

Mt. Cruiser (center) and Mt. Bretherton (right)

Looking up to Pt. 4805 from 4510

I descended down to the pass between the two points, and started to started to ascend the ridge towards 4805.

The nice parts of the ridge

Navigation was a bit tricky in some spots. I had to backtrack many times to avoid cliffs or chasms in the ridge line. It's very narrow, sometimes with cliffs on either side. In general, the NE side is pretty much all cliffs so when it doubt stay to the SW.

NE side of the ridge is very cliffy

Don't go too close to the edge!

Close to the summit there is a section where you have to descend down to the SW quite a bit to avoid a very exposed (terrifying) scramble crossing over a huge chasm in the ridge line. There's probably another way back up, but I ascended a very narrow chute with mossy rocks (I don't recommend).

At the top of the chute looking down. Lines up exactly with the road

Skinny exposed notch at top of chute

This is the last obstacle I encountered. Afterwards, the ridge flattens out and you enter the forest again. The summit is a little rocky outcropping just to the north out of the trees. The first thing I noticed was a very in your face view of The Brothers. I've never seen them so close! Seattle was visible, as well as all 5 WA volcanoes. I had never seen them all at once before. It was pretty amazing. Looking NW I could see as far as Mt. Mystery, and to the SW I think I saw Stone and some neighboring peaks? I'm also pretty sure I saw Cruiser.

Nice view of Seattle

View to the north of Seattle

In your face view of The Brothers

I see where Cliff Creek gets its name

Mystery and Little Mystery

Constance Pass

Constance and Inner Constance

View north to Jupiter Ridge

Mt. Rainier emerges

Looking southeast

Looking northwest

Stone on the left?

(1) Mt. Baker

(2) Glacier Peak

(3) Mt. Rainier

(4) Mt. Adams

(5) Mt. St. Helens

St. Helens and south sound

Looks like Washington

Up the Duckabush Valley from the road

Duckabush from bridge (1)

Duckabush from bridge (2)

I had originally thought about making it one peak further, to really get that front row view of The Brothers, but decided to save that for another day. From what I could see of the route ahead, it didn't look too bad. Overall, I was very impressed with the accessibility and beauty of this hidden gem. Although be prepared for a some dense brush at the start. On my way back I thought I would save time by skipping the summit of 4510 and just sidehilling back. That was a big mistake. There were a lot of steep, thin snow patches, and where there was no snow it was extremely slippery. It was very slow going back to the car, and then a fun drive back to 101.

[JonnyQuest]

Nice exploration!

[RichP]

I love these off-the-beaten path type areas. Very cool.

[Jake Robinson]

Nice man! Appreciate the TR on an obscure area. I'd like to see that view of the Brothers some day.

[Stefan]

Its good to hear they removed the truck: https://www.nwhikers.net/forums/viewtopic.php?t=8031350&highlight=4729