A change of plans left me pursuing my long time goal of reaching Red Pass and its surrounding meadows. It was all I could imagine, and indeed, I must return again soon. I left Seattle I thought before the afternoon rush hour, but it met me, so I didn't arrive at the Sauk River trailhead till 5PM. At least the late afternoon was cool as I went up valley till the campsite 1/2 mile before the shelter. The crossing of Red Creek has a nice log, only a little difficult to access on its west side. Otherwise, the trail was buggy and well-maintained. Beginning the switchbacks in the early morning was an upside of my lateness. Wouldn't want to do those in the heat of the afternoon! The trail crew has done a fantastic job with managing the avalanche debris. It's really quite remarkable to see! Bugs accompanied me as I gained elevation, gaining increasing views of Sloan and the Monte Cristo peaks. After a while, I began the final traverse through lovely green meadows, surprising two marmots. I first journeyed to White Pass for lunch, hoping for a nap, but the bugs didn't allow it. So, off to Red Pass and down to the meadows. The country there is stellar; up high, I felt like I was in Alaska, rugged, alpine, etc. Found a campsite around 5600' and dove into my tent to escape those bugs. It wasn't until after dinner that I got to explore the area. I had many exploratory plans for the morning, but the clouds came in thick and wet, changing them. I spent an enjoyable day reading, napping, with short strolls, meeting my neighbors. With no change in weather on the horizon, I left the next day (had planned for 5 days but left on day 4), and headed all the way out to the car. It was a long day, and my feet may still be sore, but I have many more hiking dreams to accomplish next year...

I too am succumbing to the light weight backpacking craze. I have been gradually replacing heavy backpacking gear with lighter stuff over the past few months just so I could pack an extra 10 lbs of camera gear without breaking my back. The pack with food for 3 days and camera gear now weighs 26 lbs. This past weekend I decided to test this new equipment on a 28 mile loop trip up the North Fork Sauk trail, down the PCT to Dishpan Gap and out the Blue Lake trail (Pilot Ridge). As far as equipment is concerned: (1)The frameless pack (1 lb) was as comfortable as any internal frame pack I have ever used. Once I discovered how to distribute load (tight waist strap - loose shoulder straps) I hardly knew the pack was there. (2)The(1 lb)tarp tent works well (but buy a bug jacket - cause the tent doesn't keep out skeeters) (3) The (3 oz) alcohol stove (made of cat food cans) was easier to use than my Whisper-lite. No priming. No risk of broken parts. (4) A 24 oz sleeping bag is all you need for summer hiking. For me, carrying 10 lbs of camera gear on a trip like this would have been out of the question without the light weight items mentioned above. With the new gear the trip was a lark. Day 1: The North Fork Sauk trail (#649) begins at Sloan Creek CG and proceeds for approx 5 miles through old growth forest without much altitude gain before it starts climbing remorselessly upward for 2000 ft til it reaches 5500 ft. The last level mile of trail is etched into the upper wall of the N-Fk Sauk River valley - open flowered 'meadows' all the way to White Pass. These are not Kansas type meadows, though. They slope at 45 degrees. If you slip off the trail here you could roll for 2 or 3000'. This trail is in good shape - even though there had obviously been a whale of an avalanche this winter. A crew from Darrington has brushed, logged, and restored trail all the way to White Pass. At White Pass you meet the PCT and the meadows level out. I had never traveled this portion of the PCT - between White Pass and Indian Pass before, so it was a new experience for me. From White Pass to Indian Pass the trail is through broad level green meadows with views to the North (Glacier Peak) and East as you pass Indian Head Peak, Reflection Pond and Kid Pond. Then you descend into forested Indian Pass and ascend again to the airy open crest above Meander meadow. 1.5 miles further and Dishpan Gap appears. 4 different trails converge at this point, so its a hub of hiking activity. From Dishpan I hiked over the Blue Lake High Route (#652A) to Blue Lake to end my first day of hiking - 18 miles. Several excellent tent sites at Blue Lake. Superlative views of the Monte Cristo massif to the West down the Sloan Creek Valley. Day 2: The final (10 mile) leg of the loop was out Pilot Ridge (trail #652) - also known as the 'Blue Lake Trail'. The eastern half of this ridge walk is heavenly, with open meadows, views of Monte Cristo peaks and Sloan Peak. After a mile or so I could look across the Sauk river valley to the North and see the trail I had staggered up yesterday - the N-Fk Sauk Trail sweeping up the wall of the valley towards White Pass. Looking East up the Sauk valley is Glacier Peak and the White Pass and the White Chuck Glacier. The Western half of the ridge becomes wooded and the views disappear as the trail descends into a saddle and rises again (depressingly) and then begins the final brutal, seemingly never-ending descent to the Sauk. The ridge is completely dry. If you don't fill up at Blue Lake you will be very thirsty before you get to the Sauk. I highly recommend this loop for those who like ridge walking and open airy meadows.

There was a major avalanche on the North Fork Sauk trail this past winter, and Mike Collins made a good report on this trail describing that situtation on July 2. Mike's report noted how dificult the trail finding had become, and he also said, ""It will take a platoon of workers a week to clean up this mess."" I am not sure how many people are in a platoon, but I want to report that the ""platoon"" of five Darrington trail crew members cleaned up the major problems of windfall and stumps and rootwad debris in the trail this past week. The trail is now very accessible for hikers, but it is not passable for horses yet. The crew will return next week to start building rock cribs and such that are needed to finish the trail repair. There were patches of snow at White Pass. Red Pass has lots of snow, but from the limited view I had through fog and rain, the area trails are probably very managable to hikers who are prepared to cross some snow patches. There is no bridge over Red Creek. Use caution if you decide to find an alternate crossing on natural windfall logs. The hike up to the PCT is now going to be even hotter and more sun exposed due to the extra mile and one half of missing tree cover on the steep switchbacks. You may also notice evidence of many avalanches in this drainage this past winter. [Online Editor's Note: Way to go Darrington Crew!]

On rainy Saturday morning, Jim, Dee and I donned raingear and tarped our packs for the 12-mile trek up the North Fork Sauk River trail to White Pass and beyond to the White Chuck Glacier basin and base camp. The North Fork Sauk River trail was in excellent condition. A few short 50-yard stretches were a little bit brushy. The crossing of Red Creek was interesting but not difficult. Jim pioneered the way across, aided by a large stick that he wedged into the creek bottom and used for balance and support. By the time we reached White Pass, the rain had stopped, the visibility continued to improve, and there were occasional sun breaks. We could see Mt. Saul and Mt. David, and what we thought might be Kololo. We almost camped at White Pass, given that we were getting tired, but since there were three tents already in the camping area, we decided to explore further toward our objective for a campsite. We had enough energy for another hour of hiking, so we shouldered our packs (despite the rain tarps, they seemed to be 20 pounds heavier!), and headed up a nice well-defined and benched trail that contoured below the White Mountain ridge toward Foam Basin. We found a nice, secluded campsite on a small knoll about a mile up the abandoned but very well-defined trail. The next morning was absolutely gorgeous! The sky was nearly clear, with some scattered high clouds. The breeze had stilled, and we dispatched our cold breakfasts and headed up the trail to the saddle separating Foam Basin from the White Chuck Glacier basin. There are many camping opportunities along this trail, and in beautiful Foam Basin, as well as in the stark, rock and snow world of the White Chuck Glacier basin, which had many small tarns. We donned crampons when we reached the edge of the White Chuck Glacier. It was icy toward the bottom, with most of the small crevasses fully open. Further up the glacier, the ice diminished and the top inch or two of snow began to soften. We decided to cross at Glacier Gap, and descend to the White River Glacier and approach Kololo Peaks from the south. The White River Glacier had a section of blue ice that was very opened up (a shallow ""icefall"") near the center where the grade steepens a bit. We negotiated the crevasses and reached softer after about 200 yards, and headed up the snow-covered headwall to first to the east summit, and then to the west summit. It was a glamorous, easy scramble from the top of the snow. We hung out and played ""name that peak"", and built a summit cairn to house our improvised zip-lock bag summit register. We descended the glaciers in short time, and soon found ourselves at the Foam Basin saddle, looking up at White Mountain and the ridge that appears to have a path all the way over. Jim suggested a traverse of the ridge to White Mountain, since we had lots of daylight left. The ridge was delightful - the views down into both valleys tremendous. We met a solo hiker traveling from White Mountain over to our saddle. After many ups and downs, we reached the summit of White Mountain. What a grand view! We headed down the opposite side, following a path on the opposite ridge to the junction with the main trail at White Pass. The campers at White Pass turned out to be a Forest Service trail crew that was doing trail maintenance work in the area, including blasting! While we were on the ridge, we heard a particularly loud ""boom"" that reverberated through the Sauk River valley, and I could swear I felt through the rock beneath me. All night the wind picked up until finally, late into the night, we heard raindrops on the pyramid. Monday morning, we packed up inside in the steady rain, which was heavy at times. Decked out once again in rain gear with our packs tarped, we headed down the trail to the car and clean, dry cotton, 10 miles and 4300 feet below. Trip Stats: 30 miles, 9500 vertical.

We arrived at the N.F. Sauk trailhead to ten cars in the parking lot Saturday. We were surprised to see so many cars considering the recent poor weather and early hour. The trail was in great shape and the recent rains made for a dust free trail. The valley is a lush valley of prime old growth Firs and Cedars that extends over five mile up the valley that is a real treat to hike through. The Red Creek crossing went okay on small logs placed by others. Early season the crossing could be a problem. We passed through two brushy areas (~200 yds) that got us a little wet from the morning dew. We stopped at Mackinaw shelter area. This area had around 10 tent sites and looked heavily used. At the river we met a group of three who had been out for the last 10 days. They looked very relaxed and fresh for being out for so many days. From the shelter, the trail climbs 3000' to the PCT in 3 miles. Water is available (year round) at 1/3 of the way up and .1 miles before the PCT. A trail crew had recently brushed and re-treaded the upper sections. The last mile, we had some nice Blueberries and super views of Sloan Peak. We hiked up White Mtn from the 6200' foot level. The slope consisted of meadows and a game trail on the ridge. We were treated to wonderful views and well worth the visit. Glacier Pk showed signs of new snows from the past weeks storms and Sloan stood in full beauty. We also could see over 5 miles of the PCT. Looked like there is a bootpath from White Pass (good camping there). We scrambled Portal Peak from Red pass following a bootpath. We continued from Portal Peak to Black Mtn and on to Red Mtn. At Pk 6910, we dropped to 6450' and side-hilled to the ridge, then followed over Skullcap to 6700' on the shoulder west of Pt 6844, then dropped into the basin and ascended up meadows to the ridge west of Black Mtn. A scramble leads to the summit where we had more great views. To continue west down the ridge, we ended going down a dirty gully to the northwest of Black Mtn to gain a snowfield on the north side of the ridge to get to the saddle between Pk 6824 and Pk 6716. The gully I choose was very loose and Ian was not real happy at this point (he wondered about the mess I got him into and if he was going to make it to work the next day or get fired). From the saddle, the up's, down's, and side-hilling seemed to go on for forever (stay high on the south side of the ridge, nothing technical). The final 1000' ascent to Red Mtn went nicely on meadow like slopes but the long day was keeping our energy level low. The only problem was we had little time to enjoy before heading down 4900' to the car. I almost made a major error by loosing the faint bootpath at 5250' and going down the wrong ridge (right) that would not go. Good thing I did not like what I saw and got to the correct ridge (left most) with only a five minute loss. The path became pretty good (5200') once we reached the fisherman trail to Ruby Lake. The path was hard to follow in the dusk conditions though. We completed the final link by taking the Red Mtn LO trail the last mile, which had one log to climb over. If doing only White Pass/White Mtn/Portal Pk, allow 2days. For the more adventurous, allow 3 days if doing the full traverse. There is great camping at many places along the ridge between Portal and Red. The best places would be on the summit of Skullcap w/water from snowmelt and at 6000' saddle below Red Mtn. We encounted a few bugs but only the horse flies were a little annoying.