Mount Curtis Gilbert via Klickton Divide

Trip Report

We parked at the Conrad Meadows trailhead. We met with a lot of cows on the trail through Conrad Meadows, and the trail appeared to be heavily used by horses. The only person we encountered on the whole trip was a hunter and his horse in Conrad Meadows. The alder in Conrad Meadows were in their full fall color, the larch were just starting to turn.

Half a dozen switchbacks after passing Surprise Lake we took a bootpath to the left that passed through a campsite, followed a small creek for a hundred feet, and then faded away soon after. (We didn't find the bootpath marked by two cairns that was described in 75 Scrambles, maybe that was further down trail 1120.) We continued up the slope of the Klickton Divide until we reached a spot where it leveled out (not the top) around 6,200 feet, then we contoured NW to Warm Lake.

We made camp on the west side of Warm Lake. This was one of the best campsites I've stayed in, there were impressive cliffs to the NW, good exposure to the morning sun, a lovely lake, solitude, and there were even some rocks just a hundred feet to the west that looked like they would make for excellent bouldering.

The next morning the route from Warm Lake to the summit was straightforward. We headed SW up the face of the Klickton Divide, then followed a bootpath at the top of the ridge to the summit block. A bit of rock scrambling near the base of the west side of the buttress brought us to the summit.

We made our return from Warm Lake a loop by following the meadows the creek from Warm Lake runs through until we reached point 6290. We went east of point 6290 and found a nice bootpath at 6,100 feet. We followed the bootpath north, and then NNE until we hit a trail running up from the valley, we went right on the trail and descended to trail #1120, and followed trail #1120 clockwise until it returned us to the trail #1120 loop intersection.

References

• Book: 75 Scrambles in Washington: Classic Routes to the Summits
• Book: Cascade Alpine Guide: Climbing and High Routes: Vol 1 - Columbia River to Stevens Pass

Driving Directions

Maps

• US Forest Service map: Goat Rocks Wilderness and Tatoosh Wilderness
• USGS quad: Walupt Lake

Travel Times

• 2004/10/04: 4 hours 15 minutes driving from Vancouver, Washington State to Conrad Meadows trailhead (3,970')
• 1 hour 31 minutes ascending from Conrad Meadows trailhead (3,970') to trail #1120 loop intersection (4,100')
• 1 hour 7 minutes ascending from trail #1120 loop intersection (4,100') to Surprise Lake (4,360')
• 19 minutes ascending from Surprise Lake (4,360') to bootpath (5,410')
• 1 hour 14 minutes ascending from bootpath (5,410') to Warm Lake (camp) (6,265')
• 2004/10/05: 2 hours 1 minute ascending from Warm Lake (camp) (6,265') to Mount Curtis Gilbert (8,190')
• 1 hour 24 minutes descending from Mount Curtis Gilbert (8,190') to Warm Lake (camp) (6,370')
• 1 hour 6 minutes descending from Warm Lake (camp) (6,370') to intersection of old trail and trail #1120 (5,490')
• 1 hour 9 minutes descending from intersection of old trail and trail #1120 (5,490') to trail #1120 loop intersection (4,360')
• 1 hour 45 minutes descending from trail #1120 loop intersection (4,360') to Conrad Meadows trailhead (4,205')

Visited

• Gifford Pinchot National Forest
• Goat Rocks Wilderness
• Mt. Curtis Gilbert
• Walupt Lake USGS quad
• Washington State
• Yakima County

Buttress below summit of Mount Curtis Gilbert