Big Jim Mountain

Lots of recent trip reports call out the huge number of blowdowns on the trail due a wildfire 10 years ago. BUT: the first 1.5 miles of trail have been cleared off all the dead wood very recently making this trip much more pleasant!

Anyway, this is a fantastic Fall / larch season scramble and we even had the luck of encountering the first layer of snow on the upper mountain turning everything into a Winter Wonderland.

The first 1.5 miles were as mentioned pretty fast-going. I was expecting tons of blowdowns but encountered NONE! There is a bit of brush that's encroaching on the partially eroded trail but that was manageable. The leaves of all the post-fire growth turned this side of the hill into shades of yellow, orange, and red.

You can immediately tell where the trail crew stopped. You're still ascending on the side of the hill with some big logs blocking the way. It didn't last that long though. Once you're on the ridge the grade mellows out and it becomes easier to just bypass the downed trees or jump over them.

At this point we encountered snow as well as a glimpse of the summit. It looks pretty far away... well, and it is! :) Progress is much faster at this point. Still some blowdowns to deal with but at gentle grade and once you exit the burn area it's a breeze. Five miles in we finally spotted the first yellow larch and there were many more to come. At this point you're reentering the burn area again for a short time (with, surprise... a couple more blowdowns!) but once past that section it's easy going all the way to the lake with some elevation loss (!) that you'll certainly look forward to gaining again on the way back (/end of sarcasm). The path to the lake goes through snow-covered meadows with larches sticking out everywhere.

Once at the lake we slowly gained the ridge towards the false (!) summit. Thin layer of snow here with some slick rocks underneath, thus some care was warranted, nothing really technical though (T2 at most). At times the snow would get knee-deep and with over 5000 feet of elevation gain in our legs this certainly tapped into our reserves, but it was really worth it!

We made the summit at 2:30pm leaving little time before our cutoff time and still ended up descending the last mile or so in the dark. Overall: left trailhead at 7:30am, back at 7:45pm. Strava clocked 6,200ft of elevation gain.

Final note about when to maybe do this: I think we timed this perfectly. Fall colors are stunning, temperatures very pleasant. I would not want to do this at any point in summer. There is pretty much zero shade in the burn area and even though vegetation is coming back it still feels dusty in spots.

Track and a few more pictures: https://www.strava.com/activities/16153503151