Mt. Daniel, SE Ridge

Activity Notes

At 7960 feet, Mount Daniel is the highest point in both King County, the county of Seattle, and Kittitas County. It is situated in the heart of the Alpine Lakes Wilderness on the Cascade crest, it's waters draining to the Cle Elum River on the east side and the Skykomish River to the west. Daniel is a complex glaciated massif with five main summits along its east-west trending spine.

This is a nice intermediate level mountaineering trip to the Washington Cascades.  It is challenging without being overly difficult (class 2 and some 3) and excellent for recent BCEP grads as well as any others. We will not need ropes. There could be a small snowfield, so we will carry ice axes and crampons.

A photo collection from a previous Mazama trip can be viewed here:

http://breivog.zenfolio.com/p518297215 Or http://breivog.zenfolio.com/p518297215/slideshow

We will take 3 days to do this.  To avoid traffic and crowds,  we will  drive up early Friday morning and hike into the base camp at lovely Peggy's pond. The hike in is not too long or difficult, taking about 4 hours. We will climb Saturday on a rocky ridge with perhaps a few easy snow traverses; about 5-6 hours up and 4 down. Sunday, we will rise early, hike out  and drive home.