Fred Beckey, Challenge of the North Cascades (1969)

In the Heart of the Skagit

The virtuous find delight in mountains, the wise in rivers.
Confucius

The North Cascades give an impression of greater height and magnitude than other ranges of the United States. Glaciers armor the peaks, slabby precipices wall the valleys, and impetuous torrents rush down canyons. The maze between Glacier Peak and Canada is so complex the eye tires trying to untangle the ridges, decipher the drainage outine. The early geologist, I. C. Russell, noted that the sameness of peak elevations adds to the complex appearance of the North Cascades. “Instead of being sharp-crested uplift, they consist in reality of a broad, deeply stream-cut plateau,” he wrote. One party called the region “A wild waste of tumultuous mountains.” Herman Ulrichs correctly stated that “for 20 miles or so between the Suiattle and Cascade Pass the range could only be crossed by difficult mountaineering.”

Professor W. D. Lyman mentioned that an early miner, describing his view from one of the loftiest peaks (perhaps Sahale); had counted 200 distinct “snow mountains.” It is not surprising that now more than 700 living glaciers have been identified between Snoqualmie Pass and the Canadian border. Harvey Manning aptly points out in The Wild Cascades: “What

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distinguishes the North Cascades is that though the ancient glaciers have mostly melted away . . . many are currently thriving; some are advancing.” Its distinction of ice, he points out, “is not so much its relative plenty as its context of meadows, streams, and forests—a context not common anywhere in the world.” Truly, it is rare. Professor Peter Misch has stated that in his experience no other American ranges, and few in the world, are so geologically complex. This is due partly to the close proximity of the peaks, a fact recognized by members of the Sentinel Peak first-ascent party, who wrote that the “peaks range regularly between 8000 and 9000 feet, and are as thick as bees in a hive.”

Climbers whose names have become legendary prepared the way for the feats of their successors. Blanks on the map attracted men like Ulrichs, who at one time or other during his career of 21 first ascents and many other climbs touched most of the secluded valleys. He aspired to Cutthroat Peak and Mt.

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Goode, but both eluded him. In 1934 he was stopped less than 100 feet from the summit of Cutthroat. “The other sides of this precipitous pinnacle,” he wrote, “show no obvious route.” A bright early success was that of the 1936 challengers of Goode, a group including some of the ablest mountaineers of the day. The Sierra Club party finally victorious on Cutthroat in 1937 admitted that “peaks of the Cascades are mush more difficult than those of the Sierra due to the tremendous topographical relief and problems of climbing and accessibility.”

From the climbing standpoint, the real credit for exploring the region from the Skagit to the Methow must go to Ulrichs, who made such first ascents as Maude, Fernow, Azurite, and Silver Star. Ulrichs ranks high among the pioneers of western mountains not because of climbing abilities, but because of a vigorous pursuit of unexplored problems. Many more severe climbs than his have now been made, but his spirit and courage have not been surpassed. In penetrating unknown valleys he spent a rounded life of adventure within a framework of achievable ambition, and his lively pen-pictures were a major factor in heralding the North Cascades as a future alpine playground.

The upper valleys of the three forks of the Cascade River symbolize this majestic region. One can look through a forest of profuse undergrowth and dense woods of large red cedars, hemlocks, and Douglas fir, often 250 feet high, and see heights of dazzling beauty. Especially magnificent are the waterfalls flowing from snowfields, leaping from cliffs and shooting through the sunlight, reflecting and refracting its rays. Trails are banked with berries, elk-horn moss, the glossy leaves of flower vines, and the small creeping raspberry vines running close to the ground, with their tiny clusters of bright red fruit-like beads peeping from beneath leaves. Mellow green shades are diffused in luxuriance and impenetrability. Huge fallen trees decay slowly and often support several generations of young trees on their prostrate sides. In days of bad weather these forests become somber with the dark gloom of clouds shedding themselves on the treetops. The Skagit-Chelan area is actually much more mysterious and secluded than the Olympic

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Mountains, often called the “last wilderness.” Two Mountaineer explorers, Art Winder and Norval Grigg, climbing on the crest south of Cascade Pass in 1934, praised the country they found. They wrote, “the surface has just been scratched. There are hundreds of peaks still waiting that have never felt the mark of nailed boots, and there are any number of glaciers and hidden valleys that have never been seen. Here are mountains for Mountaineers.”

Perhaps the most frequently-climbed peak in this wilderness, and now an easy day from the road, is Sahale, “the great spirit,” rising above Cascade Pass with a mixture of flowered slopes, snow, and an appetizer of rock. On top is a plaque incorrectly inscribed “Boston Peak” by surveyors; the true Boston is the steeper reddish peak just north.

On the first Mazama climb of Sahale, in July 1899, W. G. Steel described the startling view from the top: “Minarets along the crest beyond seemed even sharper than from the valley, whereas rough and broken glaciers glittered in the bright sunlight as jewels in a sea of snow.”

Coming up the Stehekin valley, early explorers glorified the relatively-accessible Horseshoe Basin, curving to the east of Sahale. Professor W. D. Lyman described it as “a scene which surpasses anything the writer has ever witnessed, in a course of extensive mountaineering. A scene which is the crowning work of this whole gallery of wonders, which not Yellowstone nor Yosemite can surpass.

“The outmost northern rim of the whole basin is a semi-circular escarpment surrounded by minarets of granite, stained to a deep red by iron deposits, rising perpendicularly, to a height of from 1000 to 3000 above the inclosed amphitheatre, two miles across, which is known as the upper basin. . . . a great glacier, whose dazzling white surface, covered with green crevasses, contrasts wonderfully with the towering spires of red behind. In front the basin breaks off in a semi-circular descent, circling opposite to the red towers on the north, over whose perpendic-

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ular front, of apparently 2000 feet, the waters of the glacier pour in twenty-one waterfalls and cataracts.”

Now the major summits have all been scaled and only pinnacles are left unclimbed. But until the last few years most peaks were very infrequently visited after the initial ascent, left years at a time to their solitudes of mist. Even yet few climbers know such beauty spots as the green lake on the north side of Sentinel Peak or the hanging meadows above the Middle Cascade Glacier. The most luxuriant floral growths of the area are on the south side of the Triplets, above the seldom-visited Middle Fork of the Cascade River—acres of avalanche lilies, lupine, and heather bloom. Between the rocks grow saxifrage and amid the crags is a sprinkling of juniper and black hemlock.

Remote terrain always seems the most perilous, and uncertainties of the Skagit area delayed alpine exploration. Aside from a few sporadic bursts upward, the pioneers were content to gaze from below, to marvel and worship but not to climb. The Indians felt even less at home among the peaks, perhaps because of the exceptionally-rich mountain mythology they developed. When boulders rumbled on the beds of fast-moving stream currants, when the storm clouds gathered over mountains and their forces shrieked with reckless furry, when lightning snakes darted among the peaks, is it any wonder the Indians felt this was a spectacle of war between the ranges?

Indians from the Fraser River trapped, hunted, and gathered berries as far south on the Skagit as the Diablo area, long before the appearance of the white man. The Indians of the upper Skagit left no permanent villages there, or along the Sauk or Suiattle, but they used the land for hunting, fishing, and drying and curing food. It is known they hunted goat on Glacier Peak, Bacon Peak, and Mt. Baker, sometimes using a moccasin and a snowshoe with bear claws attached in front. Long before contact with the white man they used a stick to aid balance when walking on snow. By the mid 1880s the route from Fort Hope to the Skagit was well-trod by Hudson’s Bay and other fur trappers, who improved the Indian trail, the Skagit

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canyon to the west being too difficult to negotiate. John Rowley is credited with making the initial gold find at Ruby Creek, a branch of the Skagit, after fighting his way through the canyon in 1872. A legendary character, John McMillan, came to the area about 1874 and lived under Jack Mountain, from where he trapped the upper Skagit; later he had a homestead near Big Beaver Creek. McMillan Creek now bears his name; Jack Mountain was named for “Jack” Rowley.

With the discovery of gold in 1879 on Slate Creek a true “gold rush” up the Skagit’s canyon began. The area entered history in a big way—with a mob seeking gold along the lower river in canoes, scows, and skiffs. During this time the famous “Goat Trail” was built by prospectors, who were required to work on it a specified number of days; years later it was improved and maintained by the Forest Service. (The old Skagit River canyon, which had vertical and overhanging walls 150 feet high, is now completely drowned.) But the difficulties of this route inspired efforts to reach the Ruby Creek gold mines from the Mt. Baker area; deep snows on the passes stopped a trail venture in 1880. At the height of the rush, Ruby Creek had many camps—3000 to 5000 miners poured into the area. Those who came from Puget Sound went up the Skagit by steamer, then traveled by canoe 40 miles and finally by pack trail to Ruby Creek. They also came over passes to Slate Creek from the Methow, from Stehekin to Cascade Pass, and into Thunder Creek via Park Creek Pass or Thunder Pass (North Fork Bridge Creek). Coincidentally they explored up the Suiattle, Sauk, Stillaguamish, and Skykomish.

In the early ‘90s these Skagit pony trails were made good enough for heavy packing. Miners then took the railroad to Hamilton, the wagon road to Marblemount, and continued by trail to Cascade Pass or Ruby Creek. Later, light-draft steamers ran up the Skagit as far as “Portage,” 8 miles above Marblemount.

Barron, a town on Slate Creek named for Alex Barron, had a population of 2000 at one time, with a wagon road built over

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[a photo of the Southern Pickets, rising from McMillan Cirque appears on page 67]

Harts Pass about 1902 by a Colonel Hart to connect with the one up the Methow from Ive’s Landing.

Many North Cascades names smack of the prospector—Azurite, Ruby, Eldorado, Bonanza, Gold Bar—though in fact the rocks of the range proved to be no treasure house. One cannot help be amazed by the number of mines and prospect holes in precipitous places. On the walls of Johannesberg Mountain are several excavations that require nerve to reach. High-elevation operations in Boston Basin, Horseshoe Basin, Thunder Creek, and the Red Mountain Mines near the Canadian border represent a large investment in money and back-breaking work. The largest producing mine in the state and one of the very few successful developments was that of the Howe Sound Company at Holden, near the upper end of Lake Chelan, an all-year mine and community, surrounded by great peaks, which operated from 1937 to 1957. (J. H. Holden, in July 1896, found a great deposit of gold-bearing copper ore running through Railroad Creek mountains, and here located the Holden Mine.)

No other mining district of the Cascades matched the feverish activity and notoriety of Monte Cristo, however. Prospectors exploring up Silver Creek from the Skykomish in 1889 learned the mountains over the divide north were stained with red streaks of oxidized iron. Convinced a broad silvery-glistening streak was galena, Joseph Pearsall exclaimed, “It is rich as Monte Cristo!” Soon prospectors discovered Barlow Pass, the natural gateway from the west. Rockefeller interests pushed a narrow-gauge railway from tidewater to Monte Cristo at a cost of over $2 million, and by 1896 the “Eldorado” amid the peaks, with its saloons, gambling halls, and brothels supported a population of nearly 1000, ruled by M. T. J. Cummings, the “Count of Monte Cristo.” While several million dollars in gold and silver were shipped to the Everett smelter, far more was spent in development, gambling, and stock promotion, much to the grief of investors. The creaking of buckets on overhead cables eventually halted; now a small wooden bridge over the bouldery Sauk leads to a nestle of buildings, rusty boilers, broken wheels and cogs, skeletons idle more than a half-century; the old town

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is now a tourist resort. High on the cliffs of Wilmon Peaks one still finds mine tunnels and a spectacular overhead cable.

By 1910 the mining fever waned; towns like Barron became “ghosts” overnight. The Skagit mines failed because the cost of hauling equipment in and ore out proved prohibitive; few of the seekers realized their dreams—some proceeded on to Fort Hope; others to the Klondike. The 1901 Boundary Survey party reported they found the Skagit trail from Ruby Creek to Fort Hope abandoned.

The other resources were noted. Timber interests built an empire; in 1888 Lyman became an important logging town. In 1905 the Portland Cement Company mill was built at the town of Baker, which changed its name to Concrete; under an injunction to cease air pollution, the mill and quarry seem now about to shut down, and there is talk of returning to the old name of Baker. In 1907 engineers invaded the mountains, seeking the wealth of water power; two decades later Rockport was developed as a Seattle City Light operations center.

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On the way up the 126-mile-long Skagit River, the natural gateway to the North Cascades, gentle forest-clad undulations lead the eye to the backdrop of colossal peaks. Mt. Triumph, the prominent rock peak north of the main valley, attracted Lloyd Anderson and his party in 1938, after opening of the auto road to Newhalem—previously reached by trail or railroad. Three of us retraced the Triumph route in 1939 and climbed the more remote Mt. Despair as well. Beyond Newhalem the road, river, and Gorge Dam’s lake are boxed in by narrow canyon walls; frail scaffolding of the old Goat Trail can still be seen on the furrowed, cliffy mountainside.

Newhalem came into existence in 1919, when Seattle began constructing its system of hydroelectric dams; the Skagit is now ponded all the way to the Canadian boundary by George, Diablo, and Ross Dams. From 1927 to 1954 access to Diablo Dam was by a “Toonerville Trolley” (electrified); now one travels with ease and speed—but much less charm—along a highway sched-

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uled to cross the Cascades via Rainy and Washington Passes. A boat trip across Diablo Lake passes enchanted little basins surrounded by slabs of rock and clumps of fir. I remember the transient temper of the water, with its deep blue when the north wind bent the trees. We once arrived at the lake with hopes of catching a construction boat for a free ride to Ross Dam.

“These hikers are getting smart,” the skipper said. “We used to charge money and bring up hundreds of tourists. Now we try to keep them out but you mountain goats find out about the work boat and show up all the time.” At the other end, an hour later, we met a half-dozen women in skirts, who in order to qualify as hikers were carrying small rucksacks.

When Diablo Dam was completed in 1930 the newly-created lake enabled barges to ferry equipment and material for the difficult construction of Ross Dam, begun 7 years later. The dam and reservoir-filling was completed in two separate steps, finished in 1949. Meanwhile the timber was cut from the Skagit valley, above the Ross Dam, and removed to the north through the Silver-Skagit road.

Little is known about early visitors to the startling summits above Diablo Lake. In 1931 William Degenhardt and H. V. Strandberg explored the alpine horizon to its south, traversing the main system of the Névé Glacier and climbing Snowfield, Colonial, and Pyramid Peaks. The even more inaccessible region to the south of Snowfield, along the sides and head of McAllister Creek, was not climbed in until years later, when parties began to work their way north from Eldorado. From the Snowfield region Degenhardt and Strandberg fixed their eyes on a group of amazing jagged peaks to the north—the Picket Range—which they had glimpsed from below when passing by the mouth of Goodell Creek on the Skagit. They could scarcely wait for the next summer to come to grips with these peaks.

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In August 1950 I flew across the Skagit wilderness on a trip to

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Canada. The summer had been dry, and many forest lands were closed to travel. Smoke pillars from numerous fires were building a dull, hazy overcast; some of the parched lands suggested a dead earth.

Flying through the Skagit velley I stared at the incredible Picket Range, the most concentrated mass of steep-walled peaks in the Cascades. It was one of the few areas Ulrichs did not visit, but he warned “on the other unclimbed peaks, pitons, judging by appearance, will be handy, if not absolutely necessary.” The Picket Range evoked a metaphor in a recent National Geographic Magazine article which commented: “Sharp as a cougar’s fangs, the Picket Range spikes a summer sky in the wilderness empire of the North Cascades.” The name, however, derives from Captain George E. Pickett of the U.S. Army, who was in charge of Fort Bellingham in 1856 and later gained fame in the Civil War. H. V. Strandberg in the 1932 The Mountaineer commented that “viewed from the west the Picket Range appears as a vertical wall surmounted by innumerable high pinnacles, any one of which would afford rock climbing calling for the best of skill and technique . . . at the head of Terror-McMillan Creek divide. These peaks seem to have only two dimensions, width and height. These would offer most difficult climbing, in fact, we might, without much danger of contradiction, say that these peaks are impossible to climb.” He concluded this startling announcement with the suggestion that “a 7-day trip up Terror Creek would be extremely interesting and might settle the question.”

When Strandberg and Degenhardt explored the region they entered by the dense valley of Goodell Creek. Not least of their problems was finding the right peaks. Though Terror’s group stands out unmistakably from Newhalem, its base is almost lost among a vast jungle of forest, cliffs, and lesser summits. The party spent a long day searching out a route from the creek to the upper brush slopes, then camped beneath Pinnacle Peak. Climbing along “The Barrier” between Terror and Crescent Creeks, they could look directly west into Crescent Creek basin,

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a huge stadium of weathered granite, one endless rockery of alpine flowers. Pinnacle and West Peaks guard the ends, and “a long ridge in the shape of a horseshoe connects these peaks. The ridge is nearly 3 miles long, and it consists of one sharp pinnacle after another rising from 100 to 500 feet above the general level of the ridge and from 500 to 2000 feet above glaciers and snow at their base. They increase in height progressively to the east, the highest being the true summit of Mt. Terror (8360).”

On this first exploration they climbed Peak 8200 (now called Mt. Degenhardt), then descended the rock and glacier to the head of Terror Creek in an all-night ordeal; traversing east they peered down at Azure Lake, “most beautiful, very deep, and surrounded by perpendicular cliffs.” They did not come to grips with Terror until the following summer, when they returned with a companion, James Martin. They then found a problem above a notch in its main ridge, but once above that, completed the climb without incident. They also climbed Pinnacle Peak, West Peak, and one of the twin needles in the center of the Crescent Creek Basin, but abandoned thoughts of climbing the “impossible” summits at the head of Terror Creek or traversing the northern ramparts of the range to Whatcom Pass. They saw so signs of any previous human visit, and Gaspar Petta, the trapper who had a cabin on Goodell Creek, said he was certain nobody had preceded them into this alpine region.

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Superlatives have a fascination for comrades in adventure, so after our 1940 expedition to the Northern Pickets Helmy and I were anxious to grapple with these summits of splendor. Reaching Newhalem proved as difficult as making the climbs. We hitchhiked from Seattle and after sleeping in the forest when left off by the last motorist driving home, we waited all the next day for a ride. It finally came at 5 o’clock, provided by a nervous, cumbersome woman whose auto antics were almost too much for us—especially with the white water of the Skagit close by the narrow road.

If the mountain traveler can stand a combination of inspiration

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and frustration, the horizon north of Newhalem is provocative. Jagges peaks glittered in the sun that afternoon, beckoning conquerors. Yet one look at the green hell of mountainside made us fume at the approach obstacles. Darkness caught us after we had done perhaps 3 miles; we made a camp of spartan simplicity, sleeping on the trail itself. It is said wandering bears detour around such “camps”; we certainly hoped so. Fortunately we were only annoyed—considerably—by the lowly mosquito. Through black forest came the faint hiss of Goodell Creek.

A half-hour of morning hiking brought us to a windfall obliterating the crude trail, and after some searching we concluded here was the spot our predecessors had forded the stream. In our judgment, any possible trail on the opposite bank was not worth the double wetting. The point settled, we continued along the eastern bank. By perhaps 10 o’clock we heard the rushing sound of a large tributary. A study of the map, with checks of hilly landmarks, made us certain this was Terror Creek. We easily crossed the torrent on a fallen tree, then followed game trails up its rough, wooded left bank to an open brush basin at about 3000 feet, amid thick alder clumps and footings of innumerable cliffs. We pushed upward through the jungle. When not forcing a way for ourselves and our heavy packs through festoons of alder, we were taunted by jabs of devil’s club or the prickly needles of Englemann spruce. I cannot recall a more tiring and unpleasant climb to timber line than along the waterfalls of Terror Creek.

Finally we emerged onto talus avenues through the alder. These led us up to a series of steep moraine ridgelets covered by brilliant flowers and heather. Above, little streamlets flowed down ice-polished granite slabs. Higher, atop the crevassed glacier, rose a row of fantastically-serrated granite peaks, all slanting to the right as if pushed by a giant’s hand. The one above camp was Standberg’s “impossible.” We dubbed it “Inspiration” and laid immediate plans for an attempt. First things first, though: behind a clump of noble firs we saw colorings of blueberries; we ate hundreds that afternoon. Huckleberry brush

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[a photo of the Southern Pickets from Elephant Butte appears on page 74]

growing below timberline can be quite an impediment to travel, but the upland blueberries make a delightful walking carpet.

Indian paintbrush flamed these steep, miniature meadows. Lupine beamed in blue-and-white masses in sunlit spaces between spruces. There were clumps of giant hellebore, with heavy parallel-veined leaves and a tall stem bearing drooping panicles of greenish flowers. Thriving in less hospitable spots amid rocks were the five-petaled saxifrages. Hummingbirds flitted through paintbrush, fireweed, tiger lilies, and columbine. Occasionally we heard the curiously-ventriloquial call notes of the “coney” or rock rabbit, a witty little grayish-brown creature with large rounded ears but no tail. (Fortunately they are not as ravenous as their relative, the “snafflehound,” that frequents the Bugaboos in Canada.)

From our camp, the morning sun illuminated every rocky tooth. We hurried breakfast and began climbing toward McMillan Spire, the double-pointed peak at the eastern end of the row. Dawn burnt on distant snows, and the sun lept upward, igniting peak after peak of the hidden ranges west to the foothills. We could agree with Smythe that the “distant view of snow must ever remain the greatest of all views.” But the loveliness of snow is for meditation; we were hurrying to reach an unknown summit.

Before 6 we were already climbing crusted névé. A gust of autumn air, the vindictive shot of retreating shadows, quickened our gratitude for the sun. As painters learned centuries ago, beauty is at its best in the cool fragrant hour following dawn.

An hour’s steady climbing on the glacier led to a couloir leading toward the col between McMillan and Inspiration Peaks. The sun had risen above the rock ramparts, bringing a flood of color and warmth.

Inspiration, to our left and now almost overhead like a skyscraper, looked unclimbable. But the eye could never tire of its

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superb lines. It seemed easy to believe the peak as in some sense a creation of man’s adoration. We scrambled up McMillan’s slopes—which always proved easier than they appeared. From the summit our eyes looked sharply down into the hanging glaciers of McMillan Creek. Below us, and on across to Terror, were crumpling sections of very steep glaciers, poised far above the green, brushy valley. Directly across the 5000-foot depths rose the Northern Pickets. Only the abruptness of the facing walls allowed us to grasp even partially the vastness of the intervening empty space.

In mid-morning we descended from the summit and crossed a broken stretch of glacier beneath the imposing south face of Inspiration. Helmy, whose skillful manipulation amid the crevasses saved us much time, was chopping a passage of steps. As I looked up in slanting sunshine, the cliff seemed to hang completely over our heads. Certainly the west ridge was our best chance, for it fell back enough to justify some optimism. But there was a stern 700-foot wall between the glacier and its flat crest, west of the peak. After this pause, really a ritual of superstition, we hacked our way around numerous seracs and crossed delicate snow bridges to a ledge at the foot of the peak. Here a chimney series offered steep but broken rock to the ridge crest. We left our ice axes and boots, and in tennis shoes started up the couloir system, which was complicated by several abrupt walls. We moved deftly up steep buttresses along the main chimney, climbing quickly even though roped; we had teamed together so much that time could be saved from merely knowing each other’s habits.

As we rose, the bladelike west edge of the summit obelisk—which we estimated to be some 500 feet tall—loomed close overhead. One little spot was made dangerous by loose rock that had eroded the standing room next to a chockstone. We climbed this in turn, them clambered up a sanded granite slab. It was dangerous, but not really difficult.

What lay above? The west edge seemed to bulge with a gray overhang not over 100 feet away. A sloping slab led upward,

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and it appeared we might creep on all fours to the base of the upthrust wall. High above, the sharp summit showed above the soaring granite edge. A person can get dizzy bending his neck that way; we dropped our eyes, determined to study this problem out carefully.

Adjoining the south face was a vertical seam of the same shade as the sounder rock above the overhang. We had ignored this corner because of its great exposure above the glacier, but on further examination realized it was our best opportunity.

In 20 minutes the proposal showed hope; certainly it now appeared better than the rotten overhangs on our left. I led a steep section of the solid seam, a vertical corner just wide enough to permit an avenue to the broader face above. The holds were small, but sufficient. We kept alert to every move, belaying and climbing tensely, for this was the crux. If we were stopped here the climb would certainly fail.

I anchored above and shouted “belay on!” Using carefully-planned belays and balance climbing we continued three more leads. Then, to our surprise, the angle suddenly retreated; we had been too intent on immediate problems to realize how near the summit we had come. We felt the radiance that comes with success. The very top was only minutes away.

Judgments formed on a first ascent are notoriously untrustworthy, and the propriety interest one takes in a mountain with which one has struggled colors the valuation of everything connected with it, but this “impossible” climb did seem spectacular—not on par with the Southeast Peak of Twin Spires, but certainly more strenuous than Forbidden. Much that is worthwhile in life was packed into the short span of that afternoon. I remember our climb of Inspiration as if it were yesterday: a serene, silent peak, beautiful in sunlight, the perfect summit of dreams.

Arrows of light began to radiate toward Terror from an invisible focus behind the Pickets, and the late-day lighting did wonders for the snowfields. It also pointed out the need for haste. While

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dropping quickly down the west edge on several long rappels, we gained a special appreciation of the grandeur of the peaks: when ascending one tends to underestimate the steepness of a wall, the mind being occupied with technical details of the craft; on the way down one feels the full exposure and magnitude of the mountain.

By the time we descended the crevassed glacier and found a better route to camp through its pitfalls, the atmosphere bathing the Skagit peaks had lost transparency and changed to a gloomy blur. Night changed the appearance of the peaks we had left behind; they were felt even if not seen. It had been a day marked by the magic bond of cooperation which had given us a thin line of consistent success all through that summer.

But now it was the beginning of September, often a time of premature winter in the Cascades. Opening the tent flap in the morning, Helmy peered sulkily at the outdoors. There had been no light to waken us, and our suspicions were correct. The overhead canopy presaged a blow, evidence confirmed by two layers and scud lenticular clouds. Later in the day mists dropped over the craggy peaks. Then came a gray veil of rain, obliterating the landscape as we went to sleep. Why did it have to fall on us after such perfect weather and with several days’ food left?

We could only part with regret. Elsewhere, perhaps in the Sierra, the sun was shining bright, but we faced a miserable prospect. Wet from a torrential night with wind and rain driving furiously at our thin white tent, we now had to wade soaked vegetation.

The tumbling struggle down steep thicket-land was pure misery. Even the “open spots” turned into traps disguised by devil’s club and similar entanglements. Mossy rocks and logs were so slick we often had to avoid them or else cross them hanging onto anything we could grip. Once down Terror Creek we plodded and crashed through the flatter woods of Goodell Creek, gaining a soaked, powerful, unstoppable sensation. Wet clothes

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and gear made us feel heavier; the brush challenged us to a duel which we accepted with bulldozer force. At times we picked up traces of the trail. It mattered little, but I believe Helmy first found the path by falling headlong down a bank of huckleberry onto the abrupt surprise of a horizontal surface. In another hour of hiking our valiant, short, but highly-successful adventure was another memory. All, that is, except for the hitchhike home.

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The Southern Pickets have beckoned me twice more, though not until memories of our original experience with the approach had somewhat dimmed. In mid-October of 1958, Dave Collins, Ed Cooper, and I camped overnight at the eastern side of the head or Terror Creek. Instead of coming up the cliffs and brush of the creek valley itself, we climbed a timbered sub-ridge directly east from Goodell Creek not far from where Terror Creek branches off; once at timberline we made a long traverse across basins, heading north.

The weather was perfect—a true Indian Summer—with no fresh snow at all on the rocks as we climbed Inspiration Peak via a new route, the direct eastern corner. The rock was generally excellent granite, often formed in gigantic blocks. Several of the pitches were quite difficult free climbing; piton protection was good, and I was thankful for that, for exposure above the glaciers and walls falling to McMillan Creek was tremendous. It was a spectacular new way up the peak; we returned by the same route, with numerous rappels to the glacier.

Another memorable trip was in midsummer of 1963 with Jerry Fuller. Our plan was somewhat unusual: we would make a circling traverse of the range, coming up Stetattle Creek, traversing around to McMillan Creek drainage, and then, by climbing over McMillan Spire, return by way of the old Terror Creek route to Newhalem. To do this efficiently, we took food for just 4 days, a minimum of technical equipment, and carried down jackets instead of sleeping bags. Fortunately the weather was perfect, enabling us to complete our scheme without delays.

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The trail vanished in the brush of Stetattle Creek, and we were a full day hauling out of the deep valley to heathered meadows far above Azure Lake, where we built a fire to warm our bivouac. Climbing snowfields, we crossed the divide to the north, finding it necessary to glissade and descend snow for well over 1000 feet to get below blue ice and crevasses that fringed McMillan Spire’s huge black walls. Traversing west and weaving in and out of crevasses we came under the great north face, at least 2500 feet below the summit. Several steep and fairly difficult snow couloirs and ice patches led us to the main rock wall. Climbing in a direct line to the top took some 22 pitches and all the rest of the day. Somehow we managed to get down into Terror Creek that evening, spending over 2 hours in inky blackness crawling and falling through alder-covered boulders to reach the bank of the creek where it broke out of the worst portion of the jungle.

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Fred Beckey, Challenge of the North Cascades (Seattle: The Mountaineers, 1969), 61-80.