As masters of the alpine start, Fern and I got going from Rainy Pass at the impressive hour of 1:30 pm. The vast majority of our hike in would be gentle miles on the PCT, up and over Cutthroat Pass and into the Snowy Lakes basin, so we felt good about just hiking fast and hopefully getting to Golden Horn that evening. Thank goodness for long, summer days!
After being stuck behind some slow horses (I didn’t know they were allowed here) we eventually were able to pass them and motored up to Cutthroat Pass in 2 hours. Views are great up there, and it made me really want to visit during larch season. We continued on, covering ground fast on the PCT. Eventually, we rounded a corner before descending down to Granite Pass and got our first good look at Tower Mountain – which looked intimidating! Tower is an appropriate name for it.
The PCT then begins a long traverse high above the Swamp Creek valley, and we hit the turn off to Snowy Lakes in 3 hours and 40 minutes after about 9 miles of hiking. We worked our way up and reached the lower lake after about 500 feet of gain. The upper lake wasn’t much further, and we decided this was a great place to spend the night. These lakes sit in a beautiful larch basin, and I could tell it would be a spectacular place to call home.
Because of our late start, there wasn’t much time to waste, so we set off cross country towards Golden Horn. We began by angling upwards on a broad open slope, with small trees and boulders. Golden Horn terminates in an abrupt, rocky point, but the surrounding terrain is gentler and covered in scree. After our rising traverse, we topped out on the ridge at around 7800’. We then had easy travel, steadily gaining elevation until we were in the summit area. The summit of Golden Horn juts abruptly up, and its north side has steep cliffs. The rock is also distinctly golden colored - which was enhanced by the late-day late it was basking in. We did a bit of searching for the tree summit, mistaking a much harder false summit for the true on at first. I started to get worried that we wouldn’t be able to climb it, before we continued around on a ledge system to see what is actually the true summit.
Some people place some protection for the final moves up to Golden Horn and then rappel down. We had brought a short rope and harnesses to rap down if necessary butwere hoping our tall frames could handle the moves to get up to the summit. I’m not sure if it’s just because I am 6’-3”, but we were confused by the final moves. We were able to just hoist ourselves up and over and onto the true summit. Again – I’m not a strong climber and maybe it is just because of my height, but it didn’t seem to warrant any extra gear.
It was a great feeling to stand on top, an hour and half after leaving Snowy Lakes. There were some swirling clouds, and the sun was beginning to set. What a spectacular place to be! We wanted to get off the summit before dark, and it was getting cold, so we prepared for our descent. Even though we brought the rope, it sure seemed like we could downclimb what we had come up. We chose that option – and easily lowered ourselves off the “technical” bits. It felt good being back on solid ground and to know that it was all “easy” off-trail travel between this point and camp, we took our time and even brought our cooking stuff to have dinner as high up as possible. The sunset was special, with just enough cloud cover to make things dramatic. We hung out until it was getting dark and then plodded our way back down to the lake, following our approximate up route.
The next morning dawned, and it was fairly cloudy at the lake. Since our only plans for the day were to summit Tower and hike out, we figured we could wait around to see if the weather would clear out any more. After some waiting around camp, we eventually decided that it looked ok to go for it. It was still cloudy but showed some signs of improvement.
We set off back down to the lower lake, and then began an angling traverse on open meadows, followed by jumbled rock pile. We worked our way up to a large cave-like opening in the rock at the base of Tower at about 7600’. This was an interesting formation, and I took some time to take a few steps into it. The “cave” didn’t go too far back but it was still interesting to step in and look back out through the opening.
This was also where the “fun” began on Tower. From the cave, we angled climber’s right until we were in the main gully. The gully wasn’t as steep as it looked from afar, which was a relief, but it was deceptively loose. The underlying rock was made up of a series of blocky steps, making it seem like it would be decent scrambling, but the loose rock and kitty litter on top made it a much less enjoyable experience. It was definitely helmet territory! Fern and I came up with a few colorful nicknames for this gully as we struggled our way up. After about an hour of careful climbing, we reached the top of the gully and angled climber’s right again. From here it was an easy scramble up to the summit, which was marked by a giant cairn – maybe the biggest I’ve ever seen. The views were nice, albeit cloudy. I especially loved the view down Swamp Creek towards the Ragged Ridge and Black Peak. Sunshine was also making it through the clouds, intermittently lighting up Golden Horn and Hardy and making for a nice mood.
We couldn't relax too much on the summit, knowing we still had to descend the crappy gully below us. We took each step with care, being very sure not to knock any rocks down on each other and before long we were passing the cave and angling back towards the lake basin.
Making it back down to camp was cause for a celebratory swim in the upper lake. We then packed up and made the long but scenic trip back to the car, arriving before dark.
Final Stats: 24.85 miles, 6,677 feet of gain
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