Stevens Peak

Trip Date: 7/5/2014
Round trip miles: 9
Elevation gain: 5100
Elapsed Time: 11 hours

On Saturday, July 5, 2014, our group of 5 summitted both Boundary and Stevens Peak.

Followed trail to Snow Lake, put on helmets, and ascended the gully leading up towards Unicorn. Semi-awkward step to gain ridge above 6600' saddle due to moat/rock. From there followed ridge around toward Boundary (being careful to avoid cornices). At Boundary we went up a class 4 gully, but on the way down discovered a much easier path to the south. So to ascend Boundary, the best way is go all the past it to the south, then turn north and go up.

In order to get down to the Stevens/Boundary saddle we had to lose about 1000' of elevation. Due to cornices on the ridge, we actually had to go up very high on the ridge in order to find a safe way down. Plunge stepping took a lot of concentration, as the snow was pretty hard, and the runouts not good. Not hard enough for crampons though. A few places required facing in and self-belaying down. At the saddle, I wanted to avoid going straight up the ridge which had questionable rock, so we traversed below the cliff bands and headed up once we got past them.

We talked about an alternate way back to the trailhead (the Maple Creek drainage traverse over to Snow Lake), but decided it was safer to go back the way we came. We found a slightly different way back up the snow that avoided going under the cornices.

Weather started off mostly sunny, but increasing clouds throughout the day (and even a little rain).