Trip Report
Alpine Scramble - Boundary Peak
A fun scramble up a MRNP 100. Our group got to use our snow scrambling skills including crampon use, ascending a gully, crossing a small moat, traversing a ridge, using a fixed line, and an outstanding glissade. A little mix of everything on a bluebird day.
Paul Kallmann
- Sun, Jun 29, 2025
- Alpine Scramble - Boundary Peak
- Unicorn, Foss, Boundary & Stevens Peaks
- Scrambling
- Successful
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- Road suitable for all vehicles
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No snow to Snow and Bench Lakes. Once past the lakes, the snow began just below the gully at 5,200 feet up to Unicorn/West Unicorn Saddle. Once on the Unicorn/Boundary Ridge, there is still some snow hanging on the ridge, but we stayed mostly snow free. The moat at the West Unicorn/Unicorn Saddle has not opened up too badly, so it's an easy one step crossing.
Our group met at 7:30am. After our introductions and discussing our game plan, we headed on the Bench and Snow Lake trails. We took a short break at Snow Lake and then continued up the boulder field to the gully at 5,200 feet. We put on crampons and headed up the gully with no issue. We had a marmot join us along the way.
Once above the gully, we began the slow slog up to the Unicorn/West Unicorn saddle. By this time, it was getting pretty warm up and our pace started to slow, but we eventually made it to the saddle. After a quick break, we saw that we could easily kick step up to the top of the moat using the occasional self belay. The moat has not really opened up, so it was a one small step crossing to get to a platform where we could take off our crampons and continue on.
Above the moat, there is a notch that we had to scramble through, and once through the notch, we continued up to the high point of 6,863, just south of Unicorn Peak itself. From there we descended the Unicorn Boundary ridge navigating some snow fields and some minor bushwhacking eventually making our way to the summit block of Boundary.
The summit block was easy and we were rewarded with beautiful views -- it was a 4 volcano day! The infamous Stevens Peak seemed right in front of us daring us to take it on... maybe another day. After a relaxing lunch and summit treats, we descended the way we came up.
We decided to set up a fixed lined through the notch to get back to the top of the moat. From the Unicorn/West Unicorn Saddle, we began our glissade. The top of our glissade chute was a little steep, so not everyone glissaded at that point, but the snow was soft enough where we could easily control our speed. However, once below the steepest section, it was a nice glissade that brought us almost to the top of the 5,200 gully.
We continued down the gully with no issue, then across the boulder field, and back to the Bench and Snow lake trail enjoying waterfalls and avalanche lilies along the way.
We made it back to the cars just after 6pm. Our car to car time was 10:20. We probably could have made better time if it wasn't so hot, but everyone agreed that it was a successful day.