Prusik Peak and the Enchantments #
Done at the beginning of July 2024.
Complete photo album can be found at https://photos.app.goo.gl/U7eW6R2zFRehbVT3A.
A map of our route, with our approximate campsite shown as a purple dot.
Day 0: Leavenworth #
We arrived in Leavenworth the day before starting our backpack to give us the most time possible on our hike in. We mostly just explored the town on this day; my favorite part was the sauce shop that had probably 50 different sauces (mostly hot sauces) available to sample.
Dinner in Leavenworth
After our dinner, it started to rain very heavily, and some members of our party were starting to reconsider our plans to camp nearby that night. Eventually we split up, with some staying in a hotel and some (my cheap self included) camping in the rain. Luckily, the rain petered out by bed time and our tent held out the moisture. We did at least have to endure a very wet, but surprisingly tolerable, campfire while we waited for bedtime.
Day 1: Colchuck, Aasgard, and Finding Camp #
We woke up early and headed to the trailhead to start our adventure.
The trail in was very well maintained and easy going, with us quickly making it to Colchuck Lake, our first destination. There were some bugs here which made me nervous for the rest of the trip, but luckily here was the worst they would be.
On the hike in I was pretty happy to have some old beat up ski poles that originally I had brought for someone else (who ended up refusing them). I had never backpacked with poles before, and was surprised at how much they helped me stay stable on the trail.
The imposing Dragontail Peak, towering over Colchuck Lake.
Mist was rolling over the mountains around the lake, making for a very dramatic view at times.
Aasgard Pass, our next obstacle, to the left of Dragontail.
We next made our way around the lake to the start of Aasgard Pass. The trail somewhat disappeared here into a boulder field, but all the landmarks nearby made it impossible to get lost.
Heading up Aasgard!
The pass was very steep, but I was able to make it more fun for myself by going somewhat off trail and scrambling between the boulders. Frequently I would have to stop and think about the best way to navigate the rocks.
Dragontail Peak from Aasgard Pass.
Towards the top of the pass I started running into more and more snow, under which I could hear the roar of water. Before the trip I had read a harrowing report of a hiker walking on this very snowfield. The hiker fell through the snow and was swept downhill by the water, only being saved by a lucky constriction in the underground river. Made me glad I was on the rocks.
I noticed some climbers on a route to the left of me, on a beautiful very exposed spire. I also noticed a mountain goat and excitedly gestured towards it to some climbers at the base. They didn’t seem very excited and later I felt a bit silly, as the goats were everywhere over the pass. In fact, for the next couple miles there would always be at least one in sight.
My first goat sighting!
Later I would not need to zoom in so much to get a good shot.
See if you can spot the climbers towards the top of the spire!
A more normal goat sighting, just a little while further up the trail.
Once we rounded the top of Aasgard, the valley below was like another world.
Wending our way through the snow.
The extremely cold lakes were a welcome way to fill up our water. One of my companions had a neat squeezable bottle with a built in filter, so we could easily drink directly from the snowmelt.
The next part of the hike was a bit of a slog, as we descended through lots of snow looking for a good campsite. I was pretty tired at this point, so constantly not running into a good spot as we passed lake after lake was a bit disappointing.
We did have one exciting moment where we needed to cross a pretty steep snowfield. I was first, and I tried to follow some goat tracks that made their way across. As I was crossing, I slipped into an uncontrolled slide down the hill! Luckily the bottom petered out safely, but this was my first firsthand experience with the dangers of steep snow travel, and why always being ready to self-arrest is so important.
Others tried to descend without sliding, but everyone slipped just like me so eventually we just started having fun with it.
Towards the end of our day, we finally found a good place to camp. There was only one more obstacle to overcome: a rushing river draining out of a nearby lake. Our best way across after much searching was one of the snowbridges crossing the water.
None of the snowbridges were particularly confidence inspiring…
Finally, we started setting up camp.
Yours truly setting up a tent in my climbing shoes while unsuccessfully
attempting to dry my boots.
Prusik Peak, our goal for tomorrow is in the background.
The ever present goats were with us even at camp.
Once when taking a pee one came right up behind me and spooked me!
They seem to be attracted to pee residue.
Goats usually traveled in adorable families.
Day 2: Prusik Peak #
The next day, my climbing partner and I set out to climb Prusik Peak, whilst the others went off on other various adventures.
Finding our way to the base of the climb was pretty fun; the wide open terrain made it easy to see where we were going, yet still was engaging to traverse.
Walking on the gently sloping rock was pleasant and made the world feel wide
open for exploration.
Fairly quickly, after needing to walk back on the trail from yesterday for a time, we found ourselves at the base of the climb.
A useful map we used to try to navigate up the west ridge of Prusik.
We still got somewhat lost at least once.
As you may see, the first “pitch” of the climb was really just a hike/scramble up what felt like a pile of boulders.
Looking down the first pitch.
The views were, as expected, incredible.
Looking back at our camp (located by the waterfall draining into the lake) from
early on in the climb.
Doing pitch 1 of climbing above “Balanced Rock”.
The climbing continued to be mostly an adventurous scramble more than a technical climb. I remember one moment distinctly where I was following my partner around a corner while on belay. As I rounded the corner, I couldn’t help but smile as I saw the rope just hanging in the wind with no protection between me and my partner fairly far away, and the rest of the pitch just consisting of a flat - yet quite exposed - ridge. Falling would have been bad, but really it was unprotectable.
Looking up pitches 2 and 3, the crux slab pitch.
A shot of us, as well as several parties ahead of us.
Unfortunately, our route did not take us up the beautiful steep slabs to the
right.
The route wound its way around large rock formations that made it hard to communicate and find the next belay. As an illustration, the trickiest part of the climb was not actually physically challenging, but a test of routefinding. Just after the crux slab (pitch 3), my partner, leading, had veered too far right and ran low on gear. We think he may have found a belay for one of the steeper routes heading up the south side of the peak. Eventually he was able to backtrack and get back on route, but there was a time I was just sitting there nervously waiting - walkie talkies would have been nice.
The best climbing in my opinion was at the very top (pitch 5), where we found some solid cracks to climb and even a chimney to squeeze through!
A crack on pitch 5.
After these pitches, we found ourselves at the summit. It was cool to see all the other, harder routes on the south side of the peak facing our camp site from above.
A picture of (we think) us at the summit, taken from our campsite.
Shows off some of the harder routes, one of them being currently climbed!
From the summit we could see other sheer spires continuing down the ridge.
This area really has so much high quality climbing to explore!
Soon enough, we started descending, almost directly behind another party. All the rappel stations were rap rings through slings of a questionable age, but they all had 3-4 slings piled up redundantly so I felt pretty good about them.
It started getting a little gloomy as we descended, giving us some extra
motivation to get down.
Once we got to the bottom, we found ourselves right in the middle of some steep snowfields. The party ahead of us had completely disappeared, without even leaving footsteps, so we were quite confused about where to go. We ended up having to do a lot of rough traversing of steep snow to get back to the start of the climb. We kicked our climbing shoes into the snow toe first up to our heels to stay secure and avoid slipping into a slide like yesterday on the trail - the runout here was much less friendly looking! I felt bad for my partner, who had tighter, less comfortable shoes than me.
The snowfields we had to traverse to get back to the start of the climb.
Some fields were extremely steep and we spent a lot of time trying to find the
safest way around them.
The start of our climb in sight: “Balanced Rock”!
Luckily, we eventually made it back to the start of the climb without incident. The hike back to camp was just as enjoyable as the walk there - a relaxing adventure finding our own way over the fields of rock slab.
Dinner time!
My diet throughout the trip: I pretty much just ate raw rolled oats, peanut
butter, and dried mango for every meal.
Normally my digestion wouldn’t tolerate this very well (especially the peanut
butter), but something about the constant exercise or environment made me feel
great digestive speaking the whole time!
That night we played some cards and tried our best to ignore the incessant loud wind rushing through our campsite while sleeping.
Day 3: The Long Walk Out #
Our last day started with us packing up camp and chatting with other hikers making their way through the same trail.
As one of these groups passed by, one of their members tried to jump over the sketchy snowbridge we had crossed the day before and landed full force right in the middle of it. Of course, their heel broke through and I watched in horror as I expected them to be swept away by the river. Amazingly, the rest of the snow held, letting them get out of the way, but the bridge was destroyed.
Note the footsteps leading up to the broken bridge.
This video shows the entire snowbridge area, post destruction. Note that the snow on the far side of the river was too steep to allow access to the bridge downstream to the right of the initial frame.
After the breakage, the rest of the group opted to wade through the river upstream, which was treacherous in its own right (deep cold water with slippery stones below), but at least was a known quantity.
Once packed up, we started our hike out. At first we traversed through the fun rock slabs we had explored all of yesterday, but soon the trail became a much more standard walk in the woods.
The trail was very well maintained, with steel traction bars added to this
particularly steep and wet section.
The transition from rocky alpine terrain to forest.
A typical view on the way down.
The temperature got steadily more hot and humid as we descended and, thematically, the final area we walked through to get to the car was a hot, dry, dusty valley full of burned trees from a forest fire. By the end I was very thankful the hike was over!
Us before and after the trip.
Lessons Learned For Future Trips #
- The squeezable water bottle with a built in filter I used a couple times was super handy - I should get one.
- Poles were particularly useful when backpacking.
- Wind at night can be very loud and annoying. It may be worth trying earplugs or something similar for future trips.
- Walkie talkies would have been very useful for communication on the climb, and possibly even on the hike depending on their range.
- Staying as high as possible on the rappel down from the climb may have given us some opportunities to avoid the steep snowfields.
- Someone in our group had a Garmin watch which showed our exact position on a map and our progress on an elevation gain chart. This was very nice to refer to every so often to satisfy curiosity.
- My boots got very wet after the first day of hiking, and I had trouble drying them for the rest of the trip. Next time I should bring a second pair of shoes besides climbing shoes, and do some research about the best way to dry boots overnight in the wilderness.
Categories: Climbing, Event Reports, Recent