Permits: None

Difficulty: Moderate

Route Name: Kindy Ridge

Snow Level: 7000 ft

Elevation Gain: 6500 ft

Total Miles: 20.00 mi

Gear: Helmet and poles were helpful. Ice axe and crampons were brought and not used. Bug repellent may be helpful depending on time of year

From Trail Head to Camp: 9.0 hours
From Camp to Summit: 1.5 hours

Weather: Sunny

Kayla organized a great schedule to have this spread between three days. We hiked in day 1, summitted day 2, and hiked out day 3.

Approach:
The first day we hiked in and noticed four distinct sections on the approach. The overgrown road walk, somewhat uneventful other than the dilapidated bridge that is now one large, slowly deteriorating tree over a ravine, with rebar sticking out. On the way there, we opted to walk across it. On the way back it was wet and we chose to go down through the ravine.

Part 2 was called “the steeps” in another trip report. After you veer off the road at an opening with a fire pit, it just goes up for a while through dense forest. And brush. Found a pair of cool 80s glacier classes in one of the more tricky spots to shimmy over and decided to carry them up hoping to run into whoever lost them.

Part 3 was called “the rollercoaster” on the other trip report. Once you are out of the steep part. The trail continues over found peak and other knolls towards Cyclone Lake. This would feel a lot easier if you hadnt just gone up “the steeps”.

Our original plan was to camp at cyclone lake, but after hearing about the mosquitos from a hiker on their way down, we filtered water at the lake (first real spot since the overgrown road 4K below) and continued up the ridge line. We were told of a camp near little tarns at about 6500ft. It felt like it took a while to get there, and was a big first day, but we finally found them. They weren’t mosquito free, but the sunset over the mountains was beautiful and we planned for a comfortable start time in the morning for the last 800 ft to the summit.

Day 2: summit bid was relatively straightforward with one fourth class move at the notch. Mostly third class scrambling over boulders. Unfortunately the summit register was misthreaded and all three of us tried to open it with no avail. Register: 1, Juliet: 0. After our summit, we packed up camp and headed down to the lakes, which looked bluer than the day before and went for a lovely swim before eating an early dinner before the bugs got bad.

Day 3: there was rain predicted so we planned to hike out early. The only challenging part other than the predictable down was that the overgrown road had been drenched in rain. The droplets covered every fern and tree and immediately soaked us from head to toe as we worked our way through the last three miles. We were glad to have a change of clothes at the car!

Info

• Latitude: 48.40830
• Longitude: -121.27810
• Elevation: 7433ft
• PeakBagger Link