Unnamed 13170

Route: East ridge up, east gully down
Posted On: 9/11/2024, By: SnowAlien
Info: This was my 2nd attempt at this peak. Back in mid-April, I tried to ski the SE gully. After losing a lot of time during the multiple creek crossings on snow-covered logs, I finally got to the base of the gully ~10,200 ft only to discover that it was melted out below 11k. Demoralized, I turned around, and to add an insult to the injury I fell into the creek on the way back, soaking all my gear and the phone. But I did note a good place to start heading up the East ridge and was cautiously optimistic that hiking it in trailrunners would be easier than in ski boots. Given a decent forecast - 30% chance of rain after 3pm, I started on the trail around 8am. The creek crossings were NOT a problem this time, in fact, I was able to skip 4 in total after the first 2 ones, although the river was still running pretty high after the recent rains. After that, I was able to head up the left ridge trying to get away from the dense aspen grove at the base of the gully, but it was difficult to see the best route. At around 11.3k the trees ended and the stable talus ridge emerged. Around 12.30pm I heard some thunder and saw rain on nearby high peaks, which was significantly earlier than the forecast. The northern faces started to show some traces of snow/graupel. I stepped on the gas and got to the summit around 1pm. It lightly graupeled and hailed on me for 10 minutes, but then the clouds started to clear out, and the rainbow appeared. The register is in good shape, just needs more paper. I started the descent at 2pm, and decided to come down the NE ridge, but soon ran into the dense trees around 12,000 ft. I thought the gully looked pretty open, so I bailed into the east gully which was a good choice and made for a speedy descent. Around 10.5k when I saw the dense aspen trees in the gully I bailed left up and over the ridge and down to the trail. Now I'm left pondering about the best way to ski this peak, but I got some time! 

Route: East Rib
Posted On: 8/7/2024, By: astranko
Info: One of the peaks god forgot. Impressive in it's capacity to keep changing character while never actually becoming nice. Bushwacked from the Alpine Trail up the face under the east rib and took that all the way up. I returned by taking the gully from ~12.8k down till it became untenable. I bailed north onto the face at 10.4k or so. There really isn't a good way to get this peak, but if you're going to take the Alpine way I would recommend traversing into the grassy face/gully anywhere that is reasonable above 10.8k or so. 

Route: SW ridge
Posted On: 7/9/2024, By: 9patrickmurphy
Info: I took supranihilest's route and am glad I did. More trail and less steep bushwhacking is always welcome in my book. The first creek crossing is a little messy, but I kept my feet dry by hopping from logs to a willow island and then to the other side. The second crossing has a great log bridge. The third and fourth crossings can be easily bypassed by taking an informal trail that stays on the west side of the creek, and the same is true for the fifth and sixth crossings (I don't know why the trail even crosses the creek at all here). The seventh crossing had a nice fallen tree just downstream of it. The West Fork trail is a bit overgrown and has some deadfall, but is easy to follow until it crosses the creek (againnnn). The grassy slope to the ridge is straightforward, and so is the ridge. I descended the East slopes, which is very steep and very direct. Some bushwhacking near the bottom until you get back to the trail. This was a good amount of work for a single peak, so I would recommend combining it with "Every Mountain" and "Cooper Creek Peak" if you haven't done those already. A car shuttle from Cooper Creek to Alpine Gulch would work quite well. 

Route: East Gully from Alpine Gulch
Posted On: 5/21/2024, By: HikerGuy
Info: Started from Alpine Gulch TH. First stream crossing was doable on a mishmash of small logs. Second stream crossing has two nice logs. They were icy in the morning, but dry on descent. Third stream crossing was not doable due to high water flow. I decided to scramble up a steep slope above an old mine entrance and then do a gentle ascending traverse over to the gully to pick up my planned route. Forest was thin and the occasional game trail made the traverse easy. Gully dry until the very top. Game trails and easy terrain the whole way up, just unrelentingly steep. Ridges holding some snow, but nothing that required anything other than microspikes. Descent was MUCH faster than the ascent, this is a steep damn mountain. 7.99 miles and 4,415 feet roundtrip. 

Route: Southwest ridge from Alpine gulch
Posted On: 6/8/2022, By: EigenDylan
Info: Creek crossings are annoying but doable. Some of the log bridges from previous reports are gone/not currently useful. A few of the sets of crossings are bypassable if you prefer steep loose dirt to getting your feet wet (I do), but they can be hard to find on the way up. 

Route: Southwest Ridge from Alping Gulch West Fork
Posted On: 8/15/2021, By: supranihilest
Info: The lower trail is covered in annoying loose rock and dirt, and there are three pairs of creek crossings before reaching the east/west fork trail split. The first and third are on logs, the second can be avoided by hugging the cliffs on climber's right. Once at the west fork the trail starts strong and begins to fade higher up. There's one more single creek crossing that's a bit hard to locate, but only if you go off-trail. Another half mile or so past the creek crossing we left the trail (right before the gulch narrows dramatically, there's a huge pile of avalanche debris here), ascended a steep dirt/talus/aspen ridge to some grassy flats, and then took easy grass to an obvious saddle a couple thousand feet above and to the left. Once on the ridge it was one mile on somewhat loose rock over multiple false summits to the true summit. There's no scrambling at all on our route and nothing that even looks remotely difficult, unlike various other routes described here. Having made a previous attempt on a different, terrible route I recommend ours as probably the easiest. 

Route: Cooper Creek/Silver Creek
Posted On: 8/18/2018, By: JasonKline
Info: Summer conditions. Totally dry.