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 | Dru
Mountain Grammar Police
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 Sardonic sandbagging scoundrel, Cascade Climbers lobotomized spraymeister, space blanket flyer, new millennium vulgarian betaboy and friend to all squids
Climbing, a mountain
Canada
∞ Posts |
Posted - 08/06/2012 : 12:29 PM
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I was supposed to be in the Waddington Range this week but the guys I was going in with decided conditions were too hot and bailed. Funny when you take a week off and your trip gets cancelled. You ever sit around looking for a good plan B? 6 o'clock on the Friday night of the long weekend is not a good time to call people up at random looking for a trip to join.
On Saturday night I repacked. Hot or not I decided that Lillooet (forecast high of 40C on Sunday) seemed like a good place to be. I wanted to check out Siwhe and this seemed like as good a destination as any.
Left Chilliwack around 7 and arrived at the end of Texas Creek road around 10:30. I knew there was a trail to Brimful Lake but I thought it would be faster to get to Devils Lake by going up one cirque to the east of the Brimful trail and crossing the divide over there.
In actuality I went up one more cirque to the east. Didn't figure this out for sure until I got to the divide with Skimath Creek though. That one has a good name. Ski Math? Like fall angles and camber trigonometry? 60 degrees plus five degrees equals either first descent or pine box? I guess.
Once I got above treeline there were some fine views. It was hot enough the bugs were sleepy and slow. On the way to treeline there were quite a few deadfalls though.
  
I wandered past a pretty little tarnm and up a rockslide to the meadows and then over fellfields to the ridge. Looking down into Skimath Creek I recognized the double moraine at the head of that valley and concurred with my previous assessment that I was in the wrong cirque, but at least now I knew where I was.
   
Going straight up the north ridge of the 2460m+ peak on the divide seemed a little bit tough with an overnight pack so I trundled my way across the scree on the NW face and onto the upper NW ridge. I dropped my pack and wandered up to the summit, a nice spot for a view but black-lichened rocks on a hot day aren't so pleasant.
*Bivouac calls this Devils Peak and it appears as such on Google Earth but it's an uninspired name like most of those spurious creations.
   
The tarn and meadows in uppermost Siwhe Creek looked pretty damn fine so I dropped down to them and spent an hour or so drinking water and lying in the heather.
Siwhe looked pretty good from a distance but the thought of descending into Siwhe Creek and wandering through more deadfall on a hot day was unappealing. At least up in the meadow there was a breeze!
    
I found the Brimful Trail and decided that it was really too hot for a multiday trip. Plus I'd forgotten my climbing helmet and worried about the tip of my ice axe tapping the back of my head  So back to the car I went.
I decided to switch it up a bit by driving back down the west side road to Lytton,. The ferry is running again. I saw some bears, some semi-wild horses, an eagle, a rabbit, a couple native guys riding bikes in the 40C+ heat (whoa) some hippes on their way to a rainbow gathering thing in the Stein, some rednecks drinking vodka coolers on their dirt bikes at the ferry, and that kinda stuff. Only one wreck in the Fraser Canyon. I had some pie at Canyon Alpine and made it home by 9 PM.
  
This was my first trip into this area. I'd like to go back and climb Siwhe on a cooler day. The rock on most of the peaks around there is munge but Siwhe itself looks to have some solid stuff and cool pinnacles. I know Jia Condon soloed a 5.7 route on the west face back in the 90s - it looks like a big slab of solid rock, I'd like to have a closer look at that too.
Hmmmm |
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304 Posts |
Posted - 08/06/2012 : 2:26 PM
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| Place got hit with the ugly stick real bad. You got any more info on that Condon route? Rock looks like some of the good stuff around Roach . . . |
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Vancouver, BC
Canada
559 Posts |
Posted - 08/06/2012 : 2:42 PM
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| Thanks for the great info on this my mystery area. Photos with great colors! Funny crowds on the Lytton Ferry... |
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Peak bagging, bushwhacking, zamboni driving, snowshoeing, self portrait artist, and speed demon who loves to hang out on Mt. Seymour
3996 Posts |
Posted - 08/06/2012 : 5:33 PM
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That area opens up to some endless possiblities of roaming open ridges. Good looking recon.
Did you happen to check the Moly. Lake road out whilst up Texas? That area looks like a good ridge traverse around the lake. |
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| Dru
Mountain Grammar Police
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Sardonic sandbagging scoundrel, Cascade Climbers lobotomized spraymeister, space blanket flyer, new millennium vulgarian betaboy and friend to all squids
Climbing, a mountain
Canada
∞ Posts |
Posted - 08/06/2012 : 5:42 PM
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| I saw it forking off but didn't go up there. It does not seem to have been used much recently. |
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Trail running, bike hucking, fast packing, beer drinking collector of pine cones on a day pass
AKA
Dances with Trees
Forest Gnome Cabin
Canada
13048 Posts |
Posted - 08/06/2012 : 7:22 PM
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| If you end up using a bike on the Moly roads, be ready to change a flat I have heard |
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Manitoba's misadventurin' bushwhackin', dog sloggin', dehydratin', beer drinkin' biggie - who's eager to peak bag Mt Currie in a dress
Squamish
5041 Posts |
Posted - 08/06/2012 : 8:18 PM
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| Whoooooo. Looks good. |
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Abbotsford, BC
Canada
1005 Posts |
Posted - 08/06/2012 : 8:45 PM
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| Nice plan B...how were the bugs? |
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Trail blazin', backcountry bushwackin', pine huntin', photo takin', long winded story teller
3838 Posts |
Posted - 08/06/2012 : 9:16 PM
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Heck of a hot day trip Dru.
Very nice looking area.
Thanx for the TR.  |
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over the hills and far away
Canada
708 Posts |
Posted - 08/06/2012 : 9:59 PM
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Nice outing. So would you say the road to the Brimful trail is easily two-wheel drivable the whole Texas road?
Still a ways from Siwhe.... |
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North Vancouver
Canada
745 Posts |
Posted - 08/06/2012 : 10:51 PM
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| Nice trip. Those flower shots are mighty purdy. |
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359 Posts |
Posted - 08/06/2012 : 11:21 PM
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| Hmmmm indeed, intriguing area. |
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| Dru
Mountain Grammar Police
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Sardonic sandbagging scoundrel, Cascade Climbers lobotomized spraymeister, space blanket flyer, new millennium vulgarian betaboy and friend to all squids
Climbing, a mountain
Canada
∞ Posts |
Posted - 08/07/2012 : 10:46 AM
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quote:
Originally posted by Candy Sack
Nice outing. So would you say the road to the Brimful trail is easily two-wheel drivable the whole Texas road?
Nope. The first 15 km or so are high-clearance 2wd with rocks all over the road through the canyon. The last 4km or so are 4wd with the last 2 km having some deep and wide waterbars with a couple of bouldery restored stream crossings.
Apparently what I hiked out on is not the main Brimful trail but rather a secondary trail that goes more directly from the Texas FSR to the head of Cattle Creek. |
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Utah's canyon trekking,deck chair packing desert explorer who dreams of visiting Canada someday
3988 Posts |
Posted - 08/09/2012 : 4:34 PM
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Beautiful flower shots! Great plan B. 40 degress. wow. is that about 105 in F? holy crap.
with the humidity, I would die. Lie down and die. I freak when I get above 30% humidity.
Pie sounds good, too. It would be a cool short movie to do several peoples lives, that day, up til the point when they all set foot on the same Ferry crossing for the main event.
All you needed was some livestock added in there. h'heee
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Texas-Siwhe-Skimath Divide
