Lemah One – Chikamin Peak

Background

Each August, I seem to experience a similar seasonal confusion. Mid summer comes around and I start to feel less motivation yet just as inspired by my friends; I get in my head, tell myself that I’ve lost my adventurous spirit, and spiral a bit on why I don’t push myself to get out in the mountains. Enter world’s smallest violin. . .

This year, I’ve tried to push myself to go out and have one adventure per week. An adventure not focused on speed, splits, or statistics. But just a good old romp, trying to connect back with the spirit of why most of us go into the mountain in the first place: to just move and unwind and connect with the surroundings.

I set myself grand goals of doing something in the North Cascades. I asked friends for ideas, for some inspiration that would push me past my self-inflicted cloud of seasonal confusion. As the week progressed, though, I kinda lost steam, made up reasons to not drive far, and just started to waffle. Classic. I was still wanting an adventure but not wanting to invest much into it; I didn’t want to drive far, I didn’t want to wake up early. . . overall, I just wanted something with a low barrier to entry.

Earlier in the summer I did the ALCT and passed the north side of Chikamin. When I skied the south side of Chikamin with Kyle a few years back, we were engulfed in a cloud and couldn’t see any of the terrain we were passing through. I’ve wanted to go back to that zone for a while and I’m not sure how or when, but at some moment my mind latched onto doing Chikamin in a day as a worth adventure. I figured that Lemah One, which was right on the other side of the lake, would be cool to check out too and made it feel more adventurous: more ramble, more ‘play’. The balance of PCT-time with off-trail time felt right. Cool, you’ve got a plan, I told myself. I was out of my head, stoked on something that met the balance of adventure and effort I was looking for.

Trip Report

I left home at a leisurely hour and drove up to the pass in a cool fog. I was pretty stoked at the idea of a cooler start.

I’d never taken the PCT switchback all the way from the trailhead, I’ve always taken the Commonwealth direct ascent. This time, I figured why not and took the PCT. The only benefit that afforded me was more douche grade, roots, and hikers to pass. Oh well, checked that box I guess.

I found a good rhythm and banged out PCT miles throughout the morning all the way to Huckleberry shoulder. Podcasts, hi-carb drink mix, and some gels. . . not much else to report there. I didn’t fill water, as I figured that I could fill once over the shoulder from some nice, less trafficked water on the north side. Getting up the Chikamin shoulder was fine, some morning dew made the steep heather more engaging than the last time I did it earlier this year. Some class 2/3 grass scrambling ensued, with a few choss blocks kicked.

Within 3 hours I was atop the Chikamin shoulder, looking out at Lemah One. Woot! That went pretty easily. Smoke and haze were starting to build on the skyline, though, from a fire out on the eastside. Womp.

I shuffled my way down the post-glacial terrain down to the saddle between Chikamin shoulder and Lemah One. This descent had been much easier when it was boot-skiable, haha. Nothing too bad, just more tedious. Originally, I’d thought of maybe doing the west ridge of Chikamin and then going over to Lemah One, as there’d been a single Peakbagger track of someone doing the west ridge of Chikamin. I opted against that, though, as the loop of going out to Lemah One then coming back to Chikamin seemed more sensible.

I filled water from a nice stream, then began climbing up towards the SW Ridge of Lemah One. The climb was uneventful until the summit block, mostly just boulders, steep heather, and nice views. The summit block of Lemah One was a little more involved than I had read or thought. There wasn’t much written about it on Peakbagger from a number of reports, but it was certainly a Class 3/4 move or two. Not terribly exposed but pretty steep, rock climbing-y moves. I faffed around, making sure that the way I had looked at was truly the way. After process of elimination confirmed yes, this was indeed it, I made the committing moves, topped out, then had some fun with dammit Sam, now you have to get down this. It wasn’t too bad, just some big movements of center-of-mass.

I shuffled down the steep slopes back towards Chikamin Lake. I opted to descend as directly to the north slopes of the lakeshore to avoid heinous scree traversing on kitty litter. It worked out well and was quite easy.

Rather than descending all the way to Glacier Lake and then taking the climbers trail up to Chikamin, I figured I could sketch a way up from Chikamin Lake. I had seen a few Peakbagger trip reports of people that had done similar, although I hadn’t read any detailed reports. Aside from a brief section of shitty, choss traversing, it all went easily. There were even a few cairns at times.

The haze and smoke had set in when I summitted Chikamin, unfortunately. I had told myself I would eat a snack atop the summit, but the haze was a bit of a buzzkill. I snapped a photo, turned down, and started my descent.

Once down at Glacier Lake, the terrain back to the PCT was all a little arduous and slow. I mosied on, picked up the PCT, then ran home. I ended up getting back to the car in around 10.5 hours, having exactly the day I needed. Lots of podcast time, lots of joggin, and plenty of off-trail rambling.