A popular scramble peak close to the Everett area, Pilchuck can easily be climbed car to car in one day by a fit party. Be mindful of extra routefinding challenges in low visibility.

Activity Notes

For the first day climb of our Mountain Loop Highway adventure, we'll do a long scramble to a North Cascades lookout before returning to Squire Creek camp. It's a 100 minute drive, and the last half hour is on one of the worst roads you've ever seen, so we will carpool to/from Squire Creek in our highest clearance vehicles.

From the Bear Creek trailhead we will hike an easy trail to Bear Lake and a rocky trail to Pinnacle Lake. From there our scramble route will be off-trail, with two steep sections, gaining the Bathtub Lakes from Pinnacle Lake and reaching Mt Pilchuck from an overlook above the Bathtub Lakes. At the summit we will be joined by hoards who came up on the easier trail, and then we will return the same way we came.

We will leave Squire Creek at 06:00 and start the climb around 08:00. We will turn around if we haven't reached the summit by 14:00.

Other Information
Driving Distance from Portland 220 miles
Driving Time from Portland 4 hours
Expected Duration Car to car in one day
Relevant Books 75 Scrambles in Washington by Peggy Goldman Cascade Alpine Guide: Stevens Pass to Rainy Pass by Fred Beckey
Relevant Maps USGS 7 minute series, Verlot <href="http: maps.google.com="" maps?f="q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=Mt.+Pilchuck&sll=37.0625,-95.677068&sspn=40.732051,93.164063&ie=UTF8&ll=48.058807,-121.795979&spn=0.016837,0.04549&t=p&z=15&iwloc=addr"" title="Google map">Google map</href="http:>
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