Double Peak

5/3/15--Parked cars in small pullout (will fit 3-4 cars) on right hand side of southbound SR123; .1 miles south of mile marker 11. It has a painted white x at the north end. We left the cars at approximately 7:30 a.m. There is a boot path that leads from the north end of the parking area down to the trail paralleling Chinook Creek. We turned south on the trail and crossed Chinook Creek bridge and travelled for another 10 minutes or so until we reached the drainage coming out of Double Peak basin. We headed NW, staying on the left side of the creek picking our way through the easiest terrain, and keeping the sound of the creek in earshot. We were able to stay out of the devils club for most of the route (and it thankfully was just budding and didn’t have the big leaves to contend with). As we reached 4000’ feet we traversed right over a couple minor gulleys and then up again staying high above the creek but as close as possible to avoid very steep terrain. There we found a game trail that led us to an open basin and full snow coverage (4,400'). We traversed around the rock faces at the end of a minor ridge and then travelled south to the east-west ridge to approximately 5,000’. The snow was very soft and deep making for slow going. We considered crossing the large open basin, navigating trees before going up the ramp directly to the broad bench below the summits. After much discussion and going back and forth we elected to gain the ridge thinking there would be less snow and more consolidated…unfortunately it was still pretty soupy and deep. We followed the broad ridge towards the left side gulley. There was very little snow so we jumped on the rock as soon as we could. Ascending the rock/scree gulley was slow, tedious, and hazardous. Once on the upper summit ridge we went through a group of tight trees and scrambled class 3, with some exposure to the summit. We reached the summit at 12:35 p.m., hung out for 25 minutes and began our descent. We retraced our footsteps out on the snow and following our GPS track below, reaching the cars at 4:30 p.m. Fun group. Brush was virtually a non-issue; soft snow was more of an issue. We wished we had brought snow shoes!