The Twin Sisters are a jagged subrange of the Cascades west of Mount Baker that have drawn my eye for years. Their reddish orange rock and sharp ridges are a pretty amazing sight when contrasted against the broad, glaciated surface of Baker. The range gets its coloring because it is primarily composed of olivine, which lends itself to some great scrambling with good holds on nice, grippy rock. Because of this, North and South Twin both see a fair amount of traffic from peakbaggers, and are often included near the top of best scrambles in Washington lists. We had to go see for ourselves whether that was true!
Because the start of the west ridge is about 5 miles in and 2000 feet up a logging road from the Middle Fork of the Nooksack, most parties choose to bike in and out. This turns an otherwise very long day into a fairly manageable one with a fun cruise on the way out. There are still some active logging operations on this road, so make sure your car doesn’t block the gate, and to be aware of your surroundings as you are biking.
Katie and Eric both had e-bikes, so they were able to power up the road with ease. Meanwhile, I had to push my old, standard bike for most of the first few miles. I am not a frequent mountain biker, so I’m sure others could do better, but I was sweating hard and had to tap out quickly each time I tried to pedal up one of the steeper sections of road. Thankfully, the road moderated after about 3 miles and 1600’ and I was able to bike a lot more consistently.
By the time we hit the trailhead at Dailey Prairie I was a lot more exhausted than I typically am when setting out from the trailhead on a day trip, but bringing the bikes was undoubtedly the right choice. We stashed the bikes in the woods and began our ascent, which switchbacked up some more old logging roads until about 4100’. From here, the route becomes a more typical trail in the woods, which was a nice relief from baking in the hot sun on the logging roads.
Before long, the forest started thinning and we could see the full west ridge of North Twin come into view. It looked fun and slightly intimidating from this angle and we were all excited to see how the grippy olivine felt. We dawned our gardening gloves (not necessary but recommended for the ultra-grippy rock) and began our way up. The route is mostly obvious, staying near the ridge crest for the vast majority of the climb. As we began our climb, we all were amazed at how different the terrain was compared to the typical western Washington alpine scenery. The red rock and the baffling presence of pine trees made it seem like we had stumbled into Utah or somewhere in Colorado, rather than the wet, western slopes of the Cascades.
There was one section of class 3+ that we encountered in the first third of the climb, but other than that the scrambling was as advertised: grippy, good holds when you need them, and mostly class 3. At about 6300’ we ran into a bit of confusion when it seemed like our nice, cairned route on the left side of the ridge terminated with nothing but cliffs around it. Eric and I looked around to no avail, but Katie, ever the excellent route finder, sniffed out a route up and over the ridge through a notch that worked perfectly. We deemed this the “Katie Gap”, and its discovery saved our summit chances!
Beyond the Katie Gap, the summit looked far away still but we ended up reaching it surprisingly quickly. We relished our time on top, enjoying the great views of South Town, Mount Baker, BC peaks, and the water and islands far below us. It was a satisfying summit to reach.
Some parties choose to take the descent route which drops off the north side of the peak on a snowfield, but we opted to just downclimb the ridge. Everything stayed under class 3 and went smoothly, but we were all excited to finally hit dirt trail and turn off our brains after hours of sustained scrambling and decision making.
The bike ride down was everything we hoped for. We absolutely cruised down it and got some awesome sunset views of Mount Baker on the way. Having to walk out those extra five miles would have been pretty soul-crushing.
At the trailhead I met another friendly hiker who was hoping to make an ascent the next day, but had realized his bike tire had popped when he pulled into the trailhead. I ended up lending him my crappy bike so he could do his climb the next day. When he later returned it after a successful summit, I asked him how the bike worked for him, and he said, “I wouldn’t buy one, but it got the job done.”
Final Stats (including biking): 15.6 miles / 5318 feet of gain
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