Vesper Peak, Headlee Pass and Vesper Lake — Friday, Jun. 23, 2006

North Cascades > Mountain Loop Highway

Though we got a late start (11a), there was still ample time for a nice scramble up Vesper peak. The stream crossings were not a problem - the last, and largest, was made easier by a crossing log with rope line for hand that was already in place. Plenty of snow piled up in Wirtz basin, with obvious avalanche leftovers. The acsent to Headlee pass was a bit tricky as it is quite steep and still snow-covered, so we didn't reap the benefit of any switchbacks. However there had been two parties up before us so we had the benefit of some kicked steps in the snow. After gaining Headlee Pass everything was quite straightfoward to the summit, all snow after the lake, which isn't even close to melting out yet. The summit itself is snow-free, and we found the (former) summit register which is missing one of its caps and lacking paper. Several pencils though. No clouds made for fantastic views from the top. The trip down was glorious as we had many good glissades, essentially all the way from the summit to the lake, then traversed around to Headlee pass and did some more glissading from there. The first 500' of descent from Headlee pass were a bit dicey as it was difficult to plunge-step on the steep and packed snow, but a bit sketchy for glissading as the slope had a rocky bottom. Basically only a semi-controlled descent that we were relieved to be done with. Then we traversed around to the back of the basin for some rather bumpy glissades on the massive amount of avalanche-deposited snow. Highly recommended scramble with the ascent to (and descent from) Headlee pass being the most challenging part. We made it from car to summit in 4.5 hr, descent took 2.75 hr; with 45 mins. on the summit it added up to exactly 8 hr. round trip.