Smith Creek Pass to Holland Lake traverse in the Swans

As much as I enjoy exploring, it is enjoyable to return to old favorites in the mountains.  I recently did the Cooney pass to Holland lake traverse in the central Swan range, my favorite long summer outing near Missoula.  The only real competitor is the Mission traverse, but in my opinion, the unmarred high quality terrain of the Swan outweighs the prominence and definitive nature of the Mission traverse.

Holland peak and the knife edge section leading up to the North ridge.

After working a full day, I didn’t roll out of town until 7 pm, which did not allow enough time to get the shuttle set.  So I just dropped a bike at Holland lake and drove to the Falls creek road.  I was running up the road at first light the next morning.  In an effort to reduce biking, I ran three miles of the Falls creek road to the trailhead, which went quickly.  Since I was going for time, however casually, I took a few minutes to stretch at the trailhead and set a stop watch.  The trail up to Cooney pass opens with a long set of switchbacks ascending the east face overlooking the valley.  The sunrise illuminating the Missions was spectacular.  I took my time, running where possible but mostly walking with purpose, knowing that I should be on top of Cooney within an hour of wrapping into the drainage.  Aside from some minor fretting due to no water along the trail (I had left the car with only a half liter), the mile or so up Falls creek went quickly.  I made a game day decision to leave the trail at the mouth of the upper hanging basin instead of taking the trail all the way to Smith Creek pass and climb Cooney via the East ridge.  The ascent of Cooney was slightly quicker this way, and I was surprised to top out at two hours.  

At the trailhead, excited for the day.

Fireweed, burned trees, sunrise, Mission mountains.

Early morning light on Cooney.

Another purposeful thirty minutes of movement had me on Cooney’s sister southern summit.  The entire route to Holland is nothing short of delightful.  The crest goes over five small summits perched above the Albino glacier, and the ridge gradually tapers from open and fast to knife edge.  I was able to collect snow in two spots, which was sufficient to stay hydrated.  The highlight is the half mile knife edge section just North of Holland peak.  Having no head for exposure anymore, I took my time through this section.  I also passed the final ridgeline north of the notch via loose ledges on the East, but I do think this saved any time.  Holland’s 4^th class North ridge route flowed easily as well.  From the notch, stay on the crest until it gets steep, bypass the first step on the west, then transition immediately into a bypass on the East.  From there, stay more or less on top to the summit.  I arrived on the summit of Holland in 4.45, feeling a bit tired but good overall, and spooked a herd of nine goats enjoying the lofty perch.

Looking back at the opening quarter of the traverse.

Starting into the knife edge section.  A crux (shown below)
is hidden in the notch at the base of the cleanest slabs on the ridge.

Looking back at the crux.  I walked across the black ledge and did a few exposed sidestepping moves across a small gap.  Then up an easy 5 foot dihedral to the stance where I took the photo.  One could, in a pinch, back up about 500 feet, drop about 800 vertical feet to the east, and bypass all of these difficulties off the ridge.

Goats on Holland peak.

Buck took fifty five minutes.  I stopped one last time to pack my bladder and bottle with snow and shoot a GU packet, but otherwise it was all fun movement.  I took the gully immediately east of the North ridge, which is less elegant than the ridge but a bit faster.  Someday I will get the route off the South side of Buck dialed (the south face, southeast ridge, and west face all go), but I took the conservative route down the south face, scree skiing about 800 feet of terrible loose scree, then traversing terrible loose scree back to the ridge.  From there it is easy and enjoyable sailing to the peak above Rubble lake.  And from there it is easy and enjoyable sailing to Woodward.  I topped out on Woodward appropriately tired right at 7 hours.  The descent off the South side of Woodward is a little slow, but soon enough I was once again in smooth sailing territory, which I rode to the Holland lookout.  It was clear that I would be able to easily beat my previous best time, so I took a minute at the lookout to stretch, eat, and get psyched for the descent to the trailhead.  The legs had enough pep left to click the last five miles of immaculate, enjoyable trail running off in 45 minutes.  I emerged at the trailhead at 8.23, over an hour faster than my previous best time.  Roughly 9,000 vertical feet.  Having survived the day intact, my knee moaned for the entire 15-mile bike shuttle, but I didn’t care, and a dip in Lake Alva was enough to check the biking induced inflammation.

Looking South from Holland to Buck.

Looking South from Buck to Woodward.

Bad/loose scree skiing on the South side of Buck.

Looking South from Woodward to the lookout.

Starting down the trail home.

Thoughts

This route is just fantastic.  I am familiar enough with the terrain that it was fun to not think about routefinding and spend much of the day simply enjoying the movement.  For time, I had great conditions and went relatively hard, but still took a lot of pictures and stopped for water breaks.  I have no doubts that a fit mountain runner could go sub-6.  On the flip side, less experienced routefinding parties, parties with limited climbing experience, and hiking parties may find the entire traverse hard to complete in a day, especially given the nonexistent bail options north of Holland peak.

The traverse from Smith Creek pass to Rumble lake, with the option to climb Holland peak would be considered a classic mountain scramble if it was in a more popular area.  I can not recommend it more highly, as long as one respects the exposure and lack of bail options. I'll try to get some route beta up soon.

Swan peak loop

After an enjoyable hike above Glen lake with my two favorites on Saturday, the news started coming in from Charlottesville.  Unbridled racism, hatred, fear that a new status quo has arrived where armed factions seeking to oppress are normalized and equated with those seeking relief from oppression.  I was sick to my stomach.  The night brought only restless sleep.

It that context, it was a little intense rolling out of town in the dark, with an acrid odor of smoke in the air.  But we rallied.  The forecast was mixed, with thunderstorms in the afternoon, and I was glad that Conor and Jeffrey were amenable to shelving more ambitious plans for a better weather day.  Even with a few wrong turns on the road, we jogged out from the Squeezer creek road gate at a respectable 7:30.  The adequately maintained user trail had been cleared this year, and was remarkably enjoyable all the way to the lower lake.  We followed the normal summer route to the upper lake, then up Swan peak.  The route up the Southwest ridge was just steep and craggy enough to be interesting and enjoyable.

Approaching the lower lake.  All photos: Conor Phelan

Water getting high on Swan peak.

From the summit, we began the ridge traverse to Lion creek.  The initial descent was fast and beautiful.  The morning was sunny and warm, and views down to Sunbeam lake and out to the Bob were striking.  Soon we were in the thick of it, negotiating tricky snow moats, rock steps up to stout 4th class on crap rock, and scrappy vegetation.  I kind of lead the whole way and did my best to keep everyone safe as we worked through the technical difficulties.  It took over two hours to summit the high point on the northeast corner of our loop.  The terrain looked quicker getting to the final unnamed peak, and I was cautiously optimistic that we would beat the impending rain showers to the trail.

Fun terrain dropping off Swan peak.

I think it goes

I think it goes.

I think it goes.

Instead, we spent the next few hours finding creative ways to pass cliff bands along the ridge.  I had hoped to climb the last peak directly from the pass, but there was too much uncertainty with steep terrain for my liking.  Plus, it was already raining lightly.  So it was an easy sell to instead climb a loose gully east of the peak.  When we topped out on the gully, the weather was holding, more or less, so we pushed to the summit.  On top, we speculated how many people summit each year.  Conor thought a handful at least, I thought we might be the first this year.  Jeffrey, still recovering from a hard race last week, sucked down water and ate food.

Looking out to the last peak. We climbed the gully on far looker's right.

Jeffrey glad to be about done with the loose gully.

On the last peak in the rain.  Good times.

The descent to the trail was not ideal.  It was loose the whole way, and it took a long time to pass a large cliff band.  In the future, I would try staying on the crest.  But we eventually made it.  My legs felt surprisingly wonderful all day, and I enjoyed pushing a bit on the eleven mile trail exit.  The Lion creek trail is a great, runable trail, and waterfalls and Cedar forests kept us in awe as we clicked off the miles back to civilization.  We did take a major deviation into an outfitter camp, but eventually figured it out.  Plus, it rained, which felt great after 50 days without precipitation.  It would have been easiest to drive two cars and do a short shuttle, but we instead closed the loop on foot by piecing two road systems together along the face of the range.  At this point Jeffrey and I were both pretty knackered, but Conor seemed unphased, so we just tried to keep up.  We wandered a bit linking the two roads, but figured it out eventually, and were soon back at the car, 11.5 hours after leaving.  The day was not quite as elegant as I had hoped, so thanks to Conor and Jeffrey for patience and level heads as we pieced the route together.  Our watches said almost 30 miles and over 10k of vert for the day (although I think 8,500 is more realistic).

Trying to keep the pace up on the Lion creek exit.

Thoughts:  I would go back to Swan peak, but I don't know if I would do this route again, especially since there are so many other things to do in the immediate area.  A simple out and back climb from Squeezer creek would be a fun, relatively simple day.  A long trail run over Lion pass and around to Cooney pass would also be a long but potentially rewarding outing.  And, I need to finally go and investigate the crest from Union peak to Cooney pass.  Been on my list for a few years, and I am running out of excuses to not do it.  On a more out-there note, it is hard to not start wondering about doing a monster Swan to Pyramid full traverse someday.  It seems conceptually possible in two very long days.