Walupt Lake to White Pass, Goat Rocks July 25-29, 2016

[texasbb]

I led a small group of folks on a Walupt Lake to White Pass trek through the Goat Rocks last weekend. There were six of us and we took our time (5 days), bagging Hawkeye Point and Old Snowy along the way. Full pics are here if interested.

Day 1 we just went up Nannie Ridge and camped at Sheep Lake. We took the side trip up Nannie Peak for the views:


Looking south to an obviously erupting Mt Adams


Looking north to the 'Rocks


Views to the Goat Rocks get better near Sheep Lake


Sheep Lake


Beam me up, Scottie!


Adams alpenglow from camp

On day 2 we got on the PCT and headed through Cispus Pass and set up camp in the Alpine Camp area on the way toward Goat Lake. After resting a bit we headed out to visit the lake and bag Hawkeye Pt. Only two of us made it all the way to Hawkeye, but it was a marvelous little side trip.


We weren't expecting fog!


Interesting curly fog


Tilted basalt columns in Klickitat Basin


View from under Cispus Pass


Cispus Basin


Mediocre flowers by Goat Rocks standards, but a good beargrass crop


St Helens from partway up Hawkeye


View from Hawkeye Pt


Goat Lake from lower down

On day 3 we bagged Old Snowy and traversed the knife edge. The plan was to move into McCall Basin for the night, but everyone was tired so we stopped early after descending the main snowmelt stream that eventually becomes the Clear Fork Cowlitz River.


St Helens on the way to the viewpoint


Knife edge


Tieton Peak from Old Snowy's shoulder


My group


Ahhhh


Whence we came

On day 4 we made a short move to Hidden Spring, then dayhiked to Shoe Lake for baths.

Shoe Lake

We met a couple at the nice view camp a little past Hidden Spring (we'd eventually give
them a ride into Packwood the next day), and enjoyed their view for a while. Here's
Devil's Horn across the way...can't see the Washbasin where I was last weekend:

Devil's Horn

On our last day we went by Shoe Lake again and hiked on out to White Pass. It's amazing how persistent the views of the 'Rocks are.

'Rocks view on the way to Shoe Lake


Shoe Lake


PCT along Hogback Mtn


Almost done


Us


Wow

[-Q-]

those tilted basalt columns are gnarly

[retired jerry]

nice pics, that's a great route through Goat Rocks

[miah66]

How'd you arrange the shuttle? That's a heck of a drive if you stashed a car on both sides.

[texasbb]

How'd you arrange the shuttle? That's a heck of a drive if you stashed a car on both sides.

I was afraid someone would ask that. We used an unconscionable number of cars to pull it off. I almost had arrangements several times for someone to drop us off at Walupt, but those all fell through. So we dropped a car at White Pass, then drove around to Walupt to start the hike. But we actually drove two cars around so we could fit all the people and gear. And we dropped two cars at White because we had folks coming from different cities.

The round-trip time from White Pass to go pick up the other car(s) is a tad over 3 hours. We broke it up by stopping in Packwood for burgers.

[miah66]

Holy carbon footprint, Batman!

That's a heck of an undertaking. I've wanted to do something similar, but had hoped it would be possible to hire a shuttle out of White Pass or Packwood. Still, you covered a lot of ground and looks like it was worth it!

Ever do any of those trails over by Coyote Ridge?

[texasbb]

Holy carbon footprint, Batman!

That's a heck of an undertaking. I've wanted to do something similar, but had hoped it would be possible to hire a shuttle out of White Pass or Packwood. Still, you covered a lot of ground and looks like it was worth it!

Ever do any of those trails over by Coyote Ridge?

Yeah, the logistics were suboptimal but we had a good trip and I'm glad to have done it. I've spent a lot of time in the Goat Rocks but had never walked on through to White Pass. It's worth doing at least once.

If you're talking about the Coyote trail that forks off the PCT on Elk Pass, no, I've never done that stuff over there (although isn't the knife edge technically part of Coyote Ridge?). Someday.

[retired jerry]

You could hit most of that scenery with a loop from Snowgrass, to Goat Lake, with out and back side trips to Cispus Pass and Old Snowy

then you wouldn't have to worry about shuttle

[GaryGoneWalking]

Nice work! Love that zone.

How were the bugs up there?

[texasbb]

Nice work! Love that zone.

How were the bugs up there?

Depends on who you ask. They were the worst at Alpine Camp (not counting White Pass itself, where they were the absolute worst), but a little bothersome in all our camps. I found them slightly to moderately annoying. A couple of our ladies, though, seemed to be skeeter magnets and came out looking like they had the chicken pox. Others were somewhere in between.