Forum Index > Trip Reports > Tamarack, Tatie, Slate, Jim, Haystack etc. 9/10-12/11
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cartman
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Location: Fremont
cartman
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PostSun Sep 18, 2011 10:07 pm 
Summits, in order: Ninetynine 7405', Tatie 7386', Dickey 7370', Slate 7440', Little Buffalo 6928', Buffalo 6980', Tamarack 7290', Jim 7033', Shaw 7062', Devils Backbone 7056', Haystack 7303', Middle Pasayten 6935' I've given names to the unnamed summits based on local geographical features. Except for the last peak, no registers were found on any of the summits. Save for one brief section, the entire trip was road, PCT, bootpath, goat paths or class 2 terrain. There were enough remnant snow patches ideally placed that although there was little running water on most of the routes, I not only never came close to running out, but had ice cold water the entire trip. And a nice breeze kept the edge off the temps. When gregor and raising3hikers said they were interested in doing Osceola etc., I decided to ride along to engage in one of my favorite pastimes: Shameless Peakbagging. Basing myself out of Slate Pass, I settled on three solo day trips to run up as many of the peaks in the area I could reach. The routes worked out very well, except for one regrettably avoidable decision... Day 1: Ninetynine to Dickey Greg let me off at the end of Road 500, where I jumped onto the PCT and headed south, then west toward my first goal, Ninetynine Peak (aka Cone Mtn). Headed up a small depression from the SE up meadows and talus to the class 2 summit.
Ninetynine Pk
Ninetynine Pk
Ninetynine summit
Ninetynine summit
Dropping off the west ridge on a goat path, I walked down and ran the connecting ridge over to Tatie.
Looking back to Ninetynine
Looking back to Ninetynine
Tatie from Ninetynine
Tatie from Ninetynine
Traversing to Tatie
Traversing to Tatie
Lots of green meadows in the basins below.
Basin below PCT
Basin below PCT
Ninetynine Basin
Ninetynine Basin
Upper Ninetynine Basin
Upper Ninetynine Basin
Connected to a boot path on Tatie's east ridge and hiked up to the top. Looking over at my next peak to the north, I decided to first drop down Tatie's south ridge ~200-300' and traverse around on annoying talus to the saddle between the two. Once reaching Tatie's north ridge, it was a quite enjoyable ridge run to the two gentle summits of Dickey.
Traversing to Dickey
Traversing to Dickey
Dickey summits
Dickey summits
Looking back to Tatie
Looking back to Tatie
Ninetynine and Tatie
Ninetynine and Tatie
Here I had a choice: reverse my route and perhaps snag the 7560' peak to the south of Tatie--which I later learned is Syncline--or a more direct route back to Slate Pass would be to drop down into some very inviting meadows and continue down to Slate Creek, then up the hillside to the road leading to Chancellor and walk up to Hart's Pass and then to Slate Pass and the car. Not having had enough fun just last weekend on this trip dropping down into lovely meadows leading to the Bushwhack of Doom, I dropped down into the meadows--thus violating one of my primary reasons for being in the area in the first place: To Shamelessly Bag Any Peak I Could Reach.
Sucker Meadows
Sucker Meadows
Seemed like a good idea at the time...
Seemed like a good idea at the time...
All I can say in my defense is it could have been worse--it could have been last weekend. A couple of hours dropping and traversing left through not too steep and not too terribly brushy slopes, I finally reached Slate Creek.
Slate Creek
Slate Creek
Then it was "just" 500' of tiring and annoying blowdown and a long and boring road walk up to the car. Shorter route, but might have been more effort and far less scenic. The car camping was very welcome, however. I just crashed in the front seat and had the luxury of a good book to read as the brilliant full moon rose. 9 miles, 3700' gain, 9 hrs. Day 2: Slate to Devils Backbone The goal today was to walk up the road to Slate Pk and then head north, tagging peaks along the way until reaching my turnaround point near Jim Pk. In the morning light I looked back on yesterday's traverse.
Ninetynine from Slate Pass
Ninetynine from Slate Pass
Tatie from Slate Pass
Tatie from Slate Pass
Dickey from Slate Pass
Dickey from Slate Pass
Dickey with Azurite and Ballard
Dickey with Azurite and Ballard
Full Traverse
Full Traverse
So up the road I went to the lookout atop Slate.
Slate Pk Lookout
Slate Pk Lookout
The lookout is closed and signed as in too dangerous of condition to use, which is too bad as it's one of the tallest lookouts I've seen in the range and would be a great viewpoint. There are several placards detailing the history of the area; one states that the summit used to be 80' higher, but the Army Corps of Engineers blasted the top off to install a radar station during the Cold War. When that was disassembled, the lookout was built so that its top was exactly the same height as the former summit. Haystack was for tomorrow:
Haystack
Haystack
Continuing on, I ran the ridge a little way until encountering a narrow rough spot. I dropped off the ridge onto the west side and traversed over a couple of hundred feet until past that--this was the only class 3 I encountered the whole trip. Regaining the ridge, I began another enjoyable romp along the top until the ridge began to drop to the east.
Traversing
Traversing
More traversing
More traversing
Tamarack, Buffalo, Little Buffalo
5 labels
Tamarack, Buffalo, Little Buffalo
Tamarack
Tamarack
Here I simply walked down pretty meadow slopes towards Little Buffalo, the peak just south of Buffalo Pass.
Lupine
Lupine
Little Buffalo and Buffalo
Little Buffalo and Buffalo
No paths up this, but very easy. Dropping directly down to Buffalo Pass,
Buffalo Pass
Buffalo Pass
I hiked up just to the right of treeline to the summit of Buffalo.
Looking back to Buffalo
Looking back to Buffalo
Next up was the day's largest and highest objective, Tamarack. There are a number of easy routes up this; I went down to Windy Pass and took the PCT for a little way across the wilderness boundary, then up slope from the east. In retrospect I'd just head up the ridge directly from Windy Pass. Tamarack's SE ridge is initially meadows leading to open dirt and a decent bootpath to the top. Had a good view of the next peaks from the summit.
Shaw and Jim
2 labels
Shaw and Jim
I looked over at the high traverse on Tamarack's north ridge, but rejected it as I wasn't sure how it would go. Looking down the scree basin on the NE flank, I spied a low spur ridge that led more directly to Foggy Pass than my route up. I dropped a hundred feet or so on the bootpath and began a downwards traverse left off the SE ridge on not so fun talus and dirt. This went well and I was able to connect to the spur ridge and walk the top of that to its end, then traverse in the bottom of a scree basin over and down shortly to the PCT. Hiked the PCT over to Foggy Pass where I encountered the only people I would see until late in the day. Heading down the PCT from the pass were more pretty meadows still blooming with lupine, daisies, valerian and western anemone. Amazing how late we have flowers this year. EDIT TO ADD: Having traveled in this area since, there are many larches on Foggy Ridge and in the basins on either side of Foggy Pass. No larches at all farther to the north, however. Midway down from the pass the PCT traverses in forest over to an unnamed pass, then continues on the west flank of a hill to reach Jim Pass.
Devils Backbone
Devils Backbone
From the pass Jim Pk is a very straightforward walkup directly to the summit. From here I saw that Shaw, the next peak to the north, was a short and easy scramble to its summit block, which was a class 2/3 jaunt to the top. Reversing my route back to Jim, I then traversed over to Devils Backbone and completed the fastest summit trifecta I've ever done. These three peaks are so close together that moving quickly all three can be done in an hour. Shameless peakbagging at its best!
Shaw
Shaw
Devils Backbone and Jim
Devils Backbone and Jim
Backbone's backside
Backbone's backside
More beautiful meadows beckoned,
Meadows below Jim Pk
Meadows below Jim Pk
but I resisted dropping down into any more river valleys. Hiking back down to Jim Pass, I then returned to the car via the PCT.
Windy Pass
Windy Pass
I found Windy Pass to definitely be the most scenic of the six named passes I crossed on this trip. I was pleased to reach the car by 7pm with daylight to spare this time. The route went as well as I imagined it would; I was quite satisfied with having covered that much terrain and seven peaks in the bargain. 16 miles, 5500' gain, 11 hrs. Day 3: Slate Pass to Haystack and Middle Pasayten Knowing that Greg and Eric E. were due back today, I kept the goals mellow, intending to do Haystack and the peak across the way to the south. Headed up the Buckskin Trail over Slate Pass and down into the Middle Pasayten valley through more great meadows to scramble Haystack.
Hiking to Haystack
Hiking to Haystack
Haystack meadows
Haystack meadows
Kept an eye out for the side trail leading to the east but missed it. I would find out why on the way back. I left the main trail and enjoyed a nice hike up the meadows to the west ridge of Haystack. There's a good boot track a little climber's left of center heading up through the krummholz and talus to the spacious summit.
Haystack summit
Haystack summit
I got a good look over to where I'd just come from,
Slate Pass from Haystack
Slate Pass from Haystack
and scoped out the route over to Middle Pasayten Pk. Saw what looked like a good line traversing below the point adjacent to Slate Pass in woods and meadows, so decided I'd just head down to a likely spot and leave the main trail and contour cross-country. This worked out fine, and crossing over I entered the best flower meadows of the whole trip--which I enjoyed so much I forgot to take pictures. About ten minutes of contouring and I hit what Green Trails shows to be an unmaintained trail leading over to the saddle west of the peak. This trail is actually in very good shape, with about a dozen blowdowns but an easy tread leading through more woods and meadows. At the saddle I walked into a broad grassy meadow and simply began working up the southwest face of Middle Pasayten. A combination of grassy slopes, woods and little gullies leading through the very minor rock bands eventually lead to just below the summit area.
Nice camping
Nice camping
At the top I found a cairn off to the side that actually contained a register, left by Stefan. This relatively small but very worthwhile peak gets about two visits a year. Looking over at the surroundings, I got a good look at Devils Peak and Robinson.
Devils and Robinson
Devils and Robinson
Devils Peak has one of the longest and largest fields of consistently small scree on its flank I've ever seen. Returning back to the meadowy saddle, I rejoined the trail, curious where it connects to the main trail. It's a very obvious tread except for the 50' before the junction, where it fades out and is only marked by a good cairn about twenty feet off the main trail. The junction is also lower than shown on the Green Trails map, ~6600' about 50-100' before the first good brook after coming down from Slate Pass. Sure that my light day had put me well ahead of the others return, I took my time getting back to the car, and had a bit of leisure time once back. 6 miles, 2300' gain, 5 hrs. This was a very enjoyable trip and a lot of fun to run around getting up a lot of high points. This area isn't as scenic as some other regions of the Pasaytens, but still has its rewards in the many green meadows, good trails, multiple passes, and mellow terrain. This also has to be one of the largest concentrations of readily accessible summits in a relatively small area in the state, esp. so close to trailheads. Total: 31 miles, 11,500' gain Eric J. Johnson

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raising3hikers
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raising3hikers
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PostMon Sep 19, 2011 6:17 pm 
Nice to see your trip through your pics that you were explaining to us. That is quite a cluster of peaks you got done in a short time

Eric Eames
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wolfs
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PostMon Sep 19, 2011 9:18 pm 
Lovely! Tamarack really does have larches, they are mostly near the Barron Yurt and just to the N of Windy Pass. Went there last October and they were impressively yellow.

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