Chatter Creek, Grindstone Mountain — Saturday, Jun. 30, 2007

Central Cascades > Leavenworth Area

Chatter Creek trail is steep and rocky as usual, but also quite brushy. When we got to the Upper Chatter Creek basin the few available campsites were still under snow, so we pitched our Tarptent on the only semi flat space available. After setting up camp we crossed the creek and headed for the saddle of Grindstone's north ridge. The snow was quite hard, even though it was 70 degrees. We crossed the saddle, dropped down about 200ft. on dirt and scree, then started a long traverse across a snow covered boulder field. The snow was a little softer on this west side of the ridge, but there was still a hard under layer that made kicking steps or a self belay difficult. And the run out was not good! Below were rocks and cliffs. As we made an ascending traverse on the second and third boulder fields the snow was softer. We then took off our crampons for a short, easy scramble, then went to the summit on easy snow. The views were spectacular! We could see Mt. Stuart, Mt. Daniel, Ladies Peak, Snowgrass, etc. As usual, the descend was the worst. The softer snow was balling up in our crampons and at times giving way. It was a very slow crossing of the boulder fields. When we reached the saddle we decided to go down(east side) with no crampons. Plunge stepping was impossible with the hard underlayer, so we glissaded quickly down to the basin. Great, fast glissade! This is a fun trip which can be done as either a short backpack trip or long day hike. Better snow conditions would make it much safer. Distance: 11 miles RT Elevation gain: 5400ft.