[raising3hikers]

Heather Ridge 7928' A Heather Ridge TR? Where's that peak at? Heather Ridge is located in between Company Cr and Agnes Cr, West of Stehekin. It's in the neighborhood of Dark Pk. Since the Stehekin shuttle stopped running earlier this month, I chose to start my trip from highway 20 at the Bridge Cr TH instead. It would involve many more miles (22 to camp) but gave me the luxury of doing things on my own time frame. The bad thing is that the TH starts at ~4500', and eventually drops down to less than ~1500' at the Agnes creek bridge. Easy on the way in but lots of gain on the way out. I started hiking a little after 815 on Friday morning. Somewhat hazy skies but oh well, I would be descending into the forest for the day. I ran into lots of hikers on the PCT as I enjoyed the nicely maintained trail. The views to the West became more hazy as the day went on. There were a couple good streams for water, especially Maple Cr. I made my way down to High Bridge, where I'd taken the shuttle to a few times. I made it there earlier than the shuttle would have if it was running anyways. Then I took the Agnes Cr/PCT S trail another 5 miles to Pass Cr where I'd set camp below Heather Ridge. It took 6hrs 40 min to reach camp, I had plenty of daylight left to set camp and eat dinner. Pass Cr was flowing nicely, so getting water was no problem.

a playful squirrel

I woke early Sat morning, but chose to wait til it got light enough to see to get going. I crossed back to the N side of Pass Cr and headed off into the brush/forest towards HR. I had drawn out a route that I wanted to take and I was able to follow it much of the way. Some brush, down logs, open forest, grassy areas, steep spots, basically just like everything else that's off trail on the way up to the alpine. I reached the alpine to smokey views or else the view over to Agnes Pk would have been great. I kept going up the ridge but knew I wouldn't be able to follow it all the way to the summit. Several gendarmes and false summits line the way to the high point. So, things started to slow down a lot for route finding and loose terrain. There were so many ribs and gullies to go up, down and across to find a way over. I had lots of elevation change along the way, but mainly staying between the range of 7000' and 6600'. Just when I thought I was near the summit, another gully and rib was in the way. Anyways, nothing terribly technical to get there and I found a way to make the summit. I was happy to find the original Roper register and signed in for the 3rd ascent.

FA Roper/Alleback register

the other names on the register

view of Pk 7800 to the S

That traverse had taken longer than I thought it would, the views were hazy, so I didn't stay long. I hoped to remember all the different ways I went trying to weave my way there. I didn't find every way and went lower and had to fight to get back to my up path back near the tree line. There was some crawling under alder, veggie belays, etc. At least I was back on track trying to follow my way back down. I was eager to get back quickly to get some water. I only brought up 2 bottles and was only taking a splash at a time to wet my mouth.

looking back to all the false summits and typical terrain on Heather Ridge

I reached the trail and Pass Creek to guzzle a couple bottles of water. The round trip of 8.5 miles took over 9 hours, so I wasn't going to move camp closer to the TH like I had hoped. Instead, I ate an early dinner and went to bed before sunset. Since I went to bed so early, I was wide awake a little after 1am. I couldn't fall back to sleep so I packed up camp and was moving on the trail a little after 2am by headlamp. I didn't mind since I like being back early after a long trip. I was glad to have good batteries in my headlamp and put in a lot of miles in the dark. I reached the Bridge Cr TH a little after 9am. Nice to get 22 miles out of the way and still have the rest of the day to get home and do stuff. It was nice to get another obscure Pk with an original register but too bad the smoke made the views not so great 53 miles 14500' elevation gain 3 days

[Prosit]

Nice one! That summit has a nice position, and its really a shame about the smoke. I would have liked to see that perspective of Agnes. Beckey writes about an "easy" route going up the Pass Creek valley, then straight up and finishing on the south of the peak, does that sound reasonable to you based on your climb? He also calls pt 7800+ "Cassiope", so it sounds like it has also been climbed in similar fashion. Actually, now I see in your picture that Roper went over 7800+ to get to Heather Ridge. That looks like quite a ridge to traverse. Thanks for the report.

[iron]

looks like the 'real' ragged ridge. the t300 list sure has taken you to some nice spots. t400, queue it up...

[silence]

Nice work ... sweet that you got up there to sign that really cool register.

[geyer]

I was browsing my pics from a couple weekends ago and was surprised to see heather ridge in this view. Nice work getting this one! You're making my obscurity list seem not so obscure lately

3 labels

[raising3hikers]

[Stefan]

Uh. 53 miles. What??? No way would I do that in 3 days! Good on you. Dang!!!

[ozzy]

A third ascent! That's f### sweet dood! killer trip and you're making it look easy as usual. Pretty burly stats for that hike! Another peak I've never heard of, you are the king of obscurity!