Mebee Lookout, Mebee High Route & East Creek — Sunday, Jul. 19, 2020

For the second time in a week I have teamed up with awesome strangers to complete traverses I would not have attempted alone.  This trip Aric, Morgan and I pioneered a new High Route to Mebee Pass / Lookout.

I car camped at East Creek trailhead again, there's never anyone there.  In the morning another fellow was camping, too.  He asked if I was the one who had been working on the trails, he had seen my Reports.  He said he and a friend were going to spend a night in the Mebee Pass Lookout.  His friend showed up, and I started hiking toward my destination, Ridge 7167' again.

When I got to the top of the switchbacks, I started thinking, if I tagged along with the 2 guys I met, I could check out the difficult part of the East Creek Trail (beyond mile 4) with some company, turn around when I ran out of time, while they continued up.  When they caught up to me I asked and they didn't mind.

At the creek beyond the turnoff to the Mine, it was impossible to tell where the trail went.  We dropped along the close side of the creek a couple hundred feet, ended up coming back up and finding pink-flagged trail directly across from where we first hit it.

Thick trees and sparse flagging made travel difficult, we did finally hit the actual trail on the other side.  Almost walked it back to see where it started but this had cost us time and we had more ground to cover.  Trail across the next creek is also confusing, goes slightly downstream before crossing and continuing up.

These difficult spots had me worried about finding my way back alone, and it was almost time for me to turn around.  So although I was only prepared for a day trip, I decided to join the guys for a night in the Lookout.  It sounded like they had a little extra food and clothing, wasn't supposed to be too cold.

The rest of the trail is good to Mebee Pass.  From the Pass to the Lookout the path is indistinct, just climb the ridge L about 500 feet (vertical).  We had the building to ourselves, we passed a girl and her dog on her way out.

I had mentioned my possible High Route find to my cohorts and they were interested.  It involved getting either over or around the mountain opposite the Pass from the Lookout, then hiking the crest of Ridge 7167" to the bottom.  We studied the face across the Pass from our superb vantage point, looking for an easy way.  Enjoyed a few hours of glorious sunshine.

So I had no sleeping bag or pad, was hoping there might be something there like most lookouts.  All I could find was a roll of paper and a tarp, which I spread out on the floor to sleep on.  Morgan was kind enough to lend me his extra coat, also a freeze dried meal!

We hit the sack when the sun went down, Aric and I in the Lookout and Morgan in his tent.  They slept well, I almost none.  Morning couldn't come soon enough (for me), we were having breakfast at 6:45 AM.  Took our time packing up, closing up the building.

When we got back down to the Pass, we continued up the opposite side to above the big rock ahead and angled up R.  We easily crossed the first 2 gullies, then turned straight up and climbed to the very top (7200').  Not easy, but never felt dangerous, little exposure. 

We stayed along the crest until it looked safe to drop, on a big, wide, sandy slope.  We spread out here so to not kick rocks down on each other.  They had poles so walked mostly, I slid on my butt.

This put us at the Larch covered saddle at the head of East Creek (6400'), and the start of our traverse of Ridge 7167'.  I had climbed this nearly to here from the other end 3 times in the last week, left a rope in the only difficult to get through spot. Only 1 deviation from the crest before the first high point, I had done the rest and knew there were no more obstacles.

We were having trouble melting snow fast enough to drink on this hot day, had no more fuel for the stove.  Thankfully Morgan noticed a trickle coming off a low spot on an overhanging snow bank, we spent 20 minutes taking turns filling all of our bottles.

With that worry out of the way, we could enjoy the incredible views from this easily strolled ridge.  We gazed longingly and vowed to return to the unnamed lake (5925") 900 feet below.  I wonder if anyone has ever been.

Below the last high point, the crest drops to a rocky impasse, look next to the 3 dead trees a bit down on the L for white and blue rope climbing pumice gully back to top (one at a time on the rope please).  Rest of the descent uneventful, tons of easy logs to step over, flagged from 6400' to 3600'.  

This is a sweet loop we are the first humans to complete.  About 8 hours up East Creek trail to the Lookout yesterday, 8 hours down today on the Ridge.  I'm having a hard time getting excited for anything else after this fantastic trip, thanks again guys!