Benign Peak - What a way to finish off a 4 day vacation!
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After a 13 hour day bushwacking Icicle Creek on Monday, a cloudy, windy, buttslide-y Indianhouse on Tuesday, and a hardcore Service bouldering sesh on Wednesday (OK, not THAT hardcore!) I needed one more peak to cap off the vacay. Benign!
Benign has had my attention for a while. It's a B peak, it's over 7k feet, and it seems straightforward with very rewarding sights on a clear day. I also had the good fortune of reading recent beta regarding snow conditions on Benign - it looked good to go, as long as you got up and down early! With a lot of snow remaining in the CSP, combined with hot June afternoons, the mountains are shedding. Ie, avalanching!
With that I mind, I was riding my bike around Eklutna by 5:30am and ditching it at Serenity Falls by 6:30am. Unlike Monday's misadventure, I had taken the time to have a good look at the route for Benign. That meant I felt confident in climbing fast, and pretty soon, I was on the massive moraine bench that circled around Benign to the SE gully.
Serenity Falls center left, with scree field and Dead Goat gully just to the right
Looking up Dead Goat gully
Above Deadgoat, ascending to the moraine.
It turns out the SE gully was an absolute mess of avalanche debris. The mere sight of it took me aback, and I wondered if I was too late despite my hurrying. After a couple hundred feet, it was obvious that the nasty snow was still completely frozen solid and safe to ascend. Keeping my eyes and ears peeled for signs of melt, I started upward, spurred by the fact I knew I was on a time limit.
Looking down the SE gully at frozen avy debris
I reached the summit quickly, with no sound or indication of the snowpack destabilizing. It seemed that the previous night or two had been very cold, as the bright morning sun did little to change the snow consistency... But enough about the snow! The views up here were simply stunning - Eklutna Lake, Bold, Bashful, Baleful, the Mitre, Eklutna glacier, far and wide into the park. It was incredible, and miraculously, the day was turning out wall to wall sunny without even the slightest breeze.
I spent a few minutes, and headed down.
Summit pano. Left to right - Eklutna lake, Bold, Bashful, Baleful, the Mitre, Ovis, Eklutna glacier, and Peril
Summit selfie.
Quick video. Didn't bring my usual camera gear and I regret it!
On the way back to Serenity, I stopped for some photos on the moraine bench. Hard to beat this vantage point! A bushplane or two flew between the Mitre and I, looking like tiny little specks compared to the scale of the mountains.
Beautiful sights!
Looking down at the entrance to Deadgoat
It was a sunny, pleasant ride back around Eklutna - one of those days where you just smile to yourself, completely happy and content with the world.
Total Time - Just about 9.5 hours. 46 minutes biking in, 7:59:37 hiking, 46 mins biking out. Civic DX ready to roll! I left my house at 5:30 and was riding around Eklutna by 6:20. There was a lot of bear crap on the trail, so I did some extra "hey bear!" in addition to my two bearbells. After 10 miles, it was time to ditch the bike - but what was this? There were already some people here! A group of two declared their intention to climb Bold, and there was a group of three trying Bashful! Riding around the lake Trusty 9:ZERO:7 Whiteout with Bashful above! The two were still busy with gear, so I started walking with the trio, glad to have some company for what I had anticipated to be a very spooky (bear-ie) walk to Stiver's. Once we arrived, I bade farewell to the group and went on ahead. My Bashful Buds :) Things went great until I took a very ill-advised wrong turn, and ended up missing the alder tunnel and bushwacking through s
Skybuster/Ice Cream Cone seen from Mt. Significant, January 2019. LONG lens! I remember the first time I saw it. Eastbound on the Glenn, just before passing Kings Mountain and Chickaloon, on a clear, flat section of road, I happened to glance south, and there it was, standing tall in the distance. I couldn't take my eyes off, and couldn't help but wonder: did that insane tower of rock have a name, and what would it be like to stand on its incredible, precipitous summit? Since I wasn't driving, I easily answered the first question with Google. That inspirational behemoth was named Skybuster. Answering the second question, however, would have to wait. Several years and lots of beta gathering later, it was time to try. Since the peak is so remote, it seemed a good idea to make this our first fly in approach. With excitement and some apprehension, we loaded up at Merrill field and flew (choppered!) out. WOCKA WOCKA WOCKA Sitting in the chopper at Merrill field. Fue
11.9Mi/6:10:41/3,724ft/Plus one 400lb boulder UPDATED 2020 - See bottom of page I woke up this morning not knowing that I was going to go scrambling, much less on Hidden Peak, much less try to connect the ridge between Hidden Peak/The Ramp. Interesting how plans for the day evolve, eh? Like 80% of my days off this summer/fall, the forecast called for rain showers. That means I wake up, make coffee, go back and forth from the computer to the window, and wait for the sky to reveal itself. It didn't look so bad! OK, I'm used to seeing this by now. Since it didn't look SO bad, meaning that it still looked SORT of bad, I decided to stay close to home and climb a peak that had so far slipped underneath the radar - Hidden Peak. Hidden Peak is connected to O'Malley via a ridgeline, and many a time at the O'Malley summit I have entertained the thought of continuing toward Hidden. But every time, it just looked too dang far to be bothered. Hmmph
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