My Backyard Mountain - Mt. Pilchuck, 7.18.18
Several things factored into my climb of Mt. Pilchuck today. It has been brutally hot for climbing and hiking (upper 80’s) but the forecast for the summit called for upper 50’s early in the day with a high of 63. Clouds would be present early but burn off by around 11AM. Another factor was my desire to get in better shape and I can’t think of any more enjoyable way to get in shape for hiking than to go hiking. Last, my dear wife has been back east for three weeks and she comes home tonight (no I don’t need to work on my stamina!) but I have missed her dearly and had to do something to kill the hours before leaving for the airport.
So off I went at 6AM this morning arriving at the trailhead just before 7AM. By the way, there is a really cool place in Idaho called Craters of the Moon National Monument. If you live in Washington, no need to go there. Just drive up the Mt Pilchuck road and you will see a plethora of potholes large enough to swallow a small Brontosaurus.
As predicted, it was cloudy when I left the house but I did not predict it would be raining. Still, I have so much faith in weathermen to be completely accurate all of the time that I pushed on undaunted. The trailhead was all fogged in but the rain had turned to mist which seemed non-existent once I was on the trail in the trees. As I climbed higher, the trail winds around to almost the south side of the mountain before switchbacking up and wrapping around the north side. As I came around to the north and to where the trail begins to open up to views, I could see the sun making an effort to burn off the cloud cover.
Morning sun through the clouds
I absolutely love Mt. Pilchuck. I can’t be sure, but I think this was my 12th time I’d climbed this peak. It has beautiful forest, a gorgeous rocky basin to climb through, interesting terrain at every turn and jaw-dropping views. So as I climbed out of the forest and into the basin, I literally climbed right out of the inversion layer and peaks were sticking up out of a thick layer of clouds as far as the eye could see. Mt. Baker, Mt. Shuksan, Three Fingers, White Chuck, Pugh just to name a few.
Whitehorse Mountain and Three Fingers
As the trail wraps around to the north you enter a lovely basin filled with trees and lots of big, slabby rock. As you look up, the summit can be seen, although the trail wraps around the back side and comes up from the south.
Mt. Pilchuck. The lookout can be seen in the upper left.
At the top of the basin, the trail climbs steadily as it wraps around to the south side of the mountain. Views way south to Mt. Rainier open up. The trail gets rockier and soon you can see the lookout right above you. A scramble up through huge boulders and a final short ladder leads to the lookout.
Mt. Pilchuck summit lookout
Lookout interior
Given its central position in the Washington Cascades combined with it being so far west, the views are panoramic from the summit lookout. It is rare you can see three major volcanoes from any one vantage point, but Mt. Rainier, Glacier Peak and Mt. Baker were all in view. I could even see some of the peaks on the British Columbia Coastal Range. Below me the valley of the Stillaguamish River was completely filled with clouds, but up in the lookout, an entirely different world was splayed out before me.
Rocky basin below summit. Three Fingers and Whitehorse Mountain in distance.
I have learned over the years that getting an early start on Pilchuck has its pros and cons. On the plus side, hitting the trail at 7AM on a weekday means that unlike the weekends when the mountain is more crowded than Times Square on New Year’s Eve, I saw no one going up. At the lookout, one guy showed up and he left before I did so I had the lookout to myself for the better part of fifteen minutes before I too left to head back down. Unfortunately, the best views of the entire Washington Cascade Range is to the east which is where the sun is rising. It is impossible to get good photos shooting east until much later in the day. I would like to go back sometime in the evening, maybe even stay overnight to see the late sun on all these peaks.
The Stilliguamish Valley filled with clouds