First time summit of The Brothers Mountain, a goal I've had for years now. It's my favorite mountain, and I always look for it on the Olympic Skyline from the Puget Sound. Myself, and three other fellas, all first time.
In some ways, it was easier than previous trip reports would lead me to believe. The trail was pretty easy to follow the whole way. The trail from the parking lot to Lena Lake, and from the lake to the basecamp was more or less totally maintained. The creek was pretty dry in spots, so it's possible there were spots we didn't notice that would be harder to cross otherwise. Several log bridges cross the creek along the way that are easy to cross for the sure footed. We snagged a camping spot right before the trail becomes less maintained and goes practically 45 degrees up, towards the treeline.
Camping was fine enough, though I wish we had prepared for the bugs. They were BAD. Fortunately, we were tired enough to just go to sleep. Left the parking lot at 1:15, stopped at the lake for a swim. It was perfect for swimming. Continued to the basecamp, taking plenty of breaks along the way to take in the sights. We made camp around 7:30, and were sleeping by 9:00.
We got up at 4am and were hitting the trail by 4:45. For the most part, the trail was still very easy to follow. There were tape markers all along the way, so with some basic scouting, route decisions were easy to make. The worst part of the climb (and the decent) was the burn, but all in all not terribly difficult. I had hiking poles, which I highly recommend. The bugs going up above the treeline were infuriating, constantly flying in eyes, ears, and everywhere else. The route did contain quite a bit of scree, everyones' most hated terrain, but I didn't really find it too bad. Around what we think was the hourglass, we ran into some climbers who had left before us that morning, and were having trouble passing a portion of climb that was inbetween a melting snowbank and some rocky steep bits. We were able to navigate through no problem, but the other hikers turned back. Also around this time we ran into a fellow climber who had some experience, and he provided us with some helpful tips, and summitted the mountain with us. As we emerged from the hourglass, we made our first route mistake. Instead of taking the narrow gully to the right (which we later noticed was marked with a cairne.. [a stack of rocks created by other climbers to help in route identification, if you aren't in the know]), we followed a different gully to what we THOUGHT was the summit. This happened twice, where we would finally get up to a peak, only to discover that a higher peak was behind it, approaching from the south side of the mountain. After correcting our mistake, we located the correct gully, a narrow path between two large rocks, and were upon the summit not long after that.
Lowland clouds impeded our view of the Puget Sound, but the views of the Olympics were breathtaking, and views of Rainier, Adams, and St Helens were spectacular.
The descent was much easier, especially the scree. I could more or less do a controlled slide with each step, so it wasn't that bad. I was fighting some joint and tendonitis issues throughout the trip, but the overall difficulty for the average climber isn't too bad.
We summitted at about 10:15am and stayed for about 20 minutes. Took a 30 minute break at our campsite, packed up, and headed straight to the parking lot. We were in our cars by 6:30pm. I wore light hiking boots, and had many blisters by the end.
We all had crampons and picks, which we never actually needed. The rope we did use once, to correct our route mistake. The most important piece of gear for us was the boots. I could have benefitted from some mountaineering boots, but it wasn't a dealbreaker.
All in all, wonderful trip, I want to do it again! Now when I look to the West and see that glorious mountain, I can say "I was there at the top!".
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