Arrowhead is a great winter climb – steep, but avalanche-safe, with a fun and scenic route and great views. Eric and I set off from the unceremonious pullout on Highway 2 just east of a WSDOT maintenance yard. To start we walked back west on the shoulder of the highway and left the road shortly after crossing over Nason Creek.
I was wondering whether snowshoes would be necessary for the lower parts of the mountain, so I took an optimistic first step onto the snow. Would it support my weight? Nope! I immediately sank down to past my knee. This patch of snow was particularly bad since it was a bank of less consolidated snow created by snowplows, but needless to say, we were in snowshoes from the moment we left the highway.
In order to reach Arrowhead, a climber must also cross the train tracks that parallel route 2 over Stevens Pass. They are used frequently, so be sure to look both ways to ensure that no one in your party gets hit by an Empire Builder Amtrak Train bound for Chicago.
Safely across the tracks, we eventually dove into the woods and began the steep ascent. The snow was much firmer under the tree cover, but we kept our snowshoes on as we climbed. We more or less headed straight up, except for one slightly tricky bit where we avoided some minor cliff-bands around 3400’.
Eventually we hit the ridge proper at about 4800’. Here we encountered some more fresh snow that promised to deepen as we continued. We took turns breaking trail so neither of us got too exhausted by the effort.
Things started to open up a bit on the ridge, but gray clouds were still clinging to the mountain peaks despite a mostly sunny forecast. As we continued through open glades on the ridge, the clouds miraculously began to clear, giving way to brilliant blue skies in what felt like a few minutes. It was one of the most dramatic clearings of the sky that I have witnessed.
Excitement reached new heights as we were now walking through a winter wonderland of snow-draped trees under a bluebird sky. The ridge was steep in places, but we slogged through it in our snowshoes, eventually topping out to great views of countless mountains like Glacier, the Chiwaukums, and Jim Hill, to name a few. We were surprised to see a group of skiers appear at the summit from the west side, and they were just as surprised to see us coming up from the east. Apparently, climbers and skiers have different standard routes on Arrowhead.
Despite the comfortable temps, we forced ourselves to leave and head down, following our exact tracks. Descending the ridge was uneventful, and we were treated to great views of the Chiwaukums in the softening afternoon light. Once off the ridge, we experimented with taking our snowshoes off, which worked quite well for a bit, before putting them back on around 3400’.
We again made sure the tracks were clear before crossing and making our way back to highway 2. The time between getting to the tracks and reaching our car seemed to take twice as long as it did on the way in, but we eventually got back to the unceremonious pullout 7 hours and 20 minutes after we left it. The crux of the whole trip might have been making a blind U turn on the highway, but we were able to do that safely as well, capping off a great winter day in the mountains.
Final Stats: 8.9 miles / 3554 feet of gain
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