Pt. 12,088, 12,567, 12783, Whale Peak (13,078), Glacier Peak (12,853)
5/31/08
~10 miles/4,300 vertical (including a bit of extra credit vert.)
From Jefferson Lake
7 hours RT
Jeff and Allison Valliere, John Prater, Pete Krzanowsky and Sierra
Failing to come up with a “local” plan to get up high for Saturday, I sent out an e-mail to a bunch of people on my e-mail list and Pete quickly indicated that he was planning Whale and some other nearby 12ers. Having wanted to climb Whale for quite some time, I was immediately in (pending approval from Allison of course…..). John was also on the same page and the group was set.
After a minor disagreement with the Jefferson Lake authorities over what passes work there and which don’t, we started from Wellington Lake around 7:50ish and headed due East up the hillside over some minor patches of still frozen snow up to the saddle between 11718 and 12,088. The going here was surprisingly easy and got us to the ridge quickly and efficiently. From the ridge, the views opened up and I was in absolute heaven. It was warm, no wind, no snow, clear….. just the day I have been patiently waiting all winter for.
We casually strolled North along the grassy undulations, picking up every ranked and unranked bump along the way, taking the occasional break to eat, photograph and chat. At the start of the final push up Whale, Sierra caught scent of what I figured to be some sort of ungulate and started to sniff all over, perk up and show too much interest. Fortunately I noticed this immediately and put her on leash. This turned out to be great as she towed me all the way up Whale, I was literally putting in half the effort as normal (maybe I can recruit her for Pikes…. Would that be cheating?).
We took a long break on Whale, then moseyed over to Glacier. The views were awesome and we were picking out nearby peaks to climb soon. John was quite bummed to not pick up Sheep along the way and we all teased him for wanting to drop down the wrong side to nab such a lowly peak. He strongly contemplated it, but figured he would save that one for another day.
The trip down was uneventful, until we came to the final pinnacle on the ridge at 12,000 feet. From here we got a great view of the lake and surrounding area. We noticed that there seemed to be too much snow to efficiently go around the West side of the lake, but there was a little ridge dropping to the East that looked like easier passage to the lake, which would then be easy street along the East side where there was no snow along the shoreline.
A few class 3 moves got us down through the worst section, then it was just steep going all the way down with the occasional patch of deep snow. We worked our way through the valley hopping over all the runoff as the day was warming significantly. The trip out along the East side of the lake went by quick and we were back at the cars about 2:50.
What an awesome day up high, super casual, great partners, great weather, great views.
Pictures: http://s147.photobucket.com/albums/r296/jeffvalliere/Whale/
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