Dakobed Traverse - Clark, Luahna, Chocolate Glacier Headwall and Tenpeak North Couloir

Day 2 was one of the best days of skiing I had all season, or maybe ever. Five distinct peaks, glaciers, and engaging ski runs in corn snow are seared into my memory. First up was Mount Clark, the tallest peak in the Dakobed Range and an incredible view of the mountains all around us. Cell service on the summit showed a further deteriorating weather forecast, with our last day now almost certain to have a significant amount of precipitation. But today was perfectly clear, and we dropped into steep corn down the Southeast face of Clark, followed by a traverse around the summit to a great pitch of steep turns down the head (?) of the Walrus onto the Richardson glacier. We climbed to the saddle beneath Luahna peak and I couldn’t help myself to climb up the beautiful East ridge and tag the summit, skiing perfect morning corn back down the exposed ridgeline like a mini version of MacMillan Spire we had skied the week prior. This was followed by a descent to the Pilz and climb to the saddle of Chalangin Peak, into the incredible Cirque of the Butterflies.

We descended 1500’ down slightly frozen snow on the Butterfly glacier, finding a snow ramp skiers left to get through the cliff band. A longer climb up the Moth glacier was hot but uneventful, and I broke off to scout out a sneak couloir granting access into Thunder basin that Lane had mentioned. This would allow us to backdoor the Tenpeak glaciers and bypass most of the supposedly crux traverse under the ten peaks. It was tricky to get eyes and I climbed a few hundred feet down a melted out section of the access couloir, but decided it felt too committing and uncertain and opted to instead ski the North facing left side of the Moth directly underneath Neyah Point. I’m glad we did, because this run was a beautiful 2000’ of direct fall line above the Suiattle Valley, and the crux traverse through some sketchy gullies had barely enough snow to go cleanly and get us in position to traverse several benches over to our planned camp spot at 6000’ above Honeycomb Lake. 

We called this camp the “zen garden”; complete with running water, little bonsai trees, a rock garden and 360 views of stunning terrain. We were surrounded by the vast old growth forests of the Suitattle, the castle-like granitic cliffs of Tenpeak towering above us, an ancient landscape of ice on the Honeycomb glacier, and Dakobed herself looking closer than ever. We lounged in the sun all afternoon resting and refueling, until I regained the energy to more seriously consider the imposing Tenpeak North Couloir right in front of me. We had seen no natural avalanche activity all day and the snow surface looked smooth and continuous; if I could just rally for a 5th run I had a once in a lifetime opportunity to ski this beautiful, remote couloir. Henry opted to stay back at camp and I set off solo at 6pm, ready to turn at a moment's notice if I needed. The booter was painful but the conditions favorable, with the steep and massive terrain feature holding acres of reverse corn. An hour later I found myself at a fork in the couloir, choosing to head up climbers left to catch the golden sunlight on the Northwest facing slope. I’m not sure if this variation of the Tenpeak couloir has been skied before, and topped out beneath a pencil thin upper couloir with runneled snow which connected all the way to the ridgeline. I took in my unbelievable surroundings and quickly transitioned to skis, eager to surf the tantalizing tube beneath me. The couloir skied really well taking about 90 minutes up and 3 minutes down, sliding right into camp where Henry and I watched Grizzly Man on his phone and passed out after a very memorable day in the mountains.

Day 3 was the biggest mileage day of the trip, with the goal being both to reach the summit and also set ourselves up as well as we could before the incoming low pressure system. We started by skiing over to the Honeycomb glacier, skinning up and around the icecap and dropping through a gap onto the Suitattle glacier and up to the famous Glacier Gap. It felt good to drop weight at a bivy site and we began slogging up the standard Gerdine route, finally getting close to the wilderness volcano I’d put off climbing for years. I had been saving the top of Glacier Peak for when I had the opportunity to get on a route I felt more inspired by, and finally here I was, albeit quite haggard from the journey up to this point. The climb went smoothly and I stubbornly skinned as high as I possibly could, ski cramponing all the way to the summit. The view was expansive, with seemingly every mountain I’ve ever explored in the Cascades visible from this high, central vantage point. Henry and I were totally fired up on top, his third time on the summit and the mountain to ourselves.

We peered over the roll into the Chocolate Glacier headwall, and liked what we saw! Skiing this beautiful glacier down to the valley would be a treat but we settled for the upper 1500’, descending spongy spring snow down the sustained 50 degree headwall, navigating the large bergschrund, and crossing through some significant crevasses to a notch above a tower at 9k which brought us back to the Cool Glacier. We then skinned back up to just below the summit of Disappointment Peak, to ski the perfectly corned up steep South face leading onto the Gerdine Glacier. By this point I felt almost greedy with how much fun fall-line skiing we had gotten in for a traverse, but the toll was still to come with a heinously long distance back to our car. The standard ski route down the White Chuck valley was sticky and slow, and it took us a while to get down to White Pass where we branched off onto the PCT. This section was quite beautiful traversing above the head of the White River and Sauk valleys, but also quite a slog following the hiking trail with some melted out shenanigans down to Indian Pass. At the pass we couldn’t find a fully dry spot and pitched our bivy beneath some trees, mentally prepared for a very wet day to come.

Thankfully there was only a drizzle overnight which was protected by the canopy, but the storm started to move in for real at 5 AM. I woke up Henry and we had a painful start to the day packing up and putting on our ski boots in a light rain, and skiing down into the forest in a medium rain. Soon this turned into booting through a maze of slide alder in heavy rain. Oh boy. We transitioned to shoes and began the 9 mile hike down the Indian Creek valley, thoroughly soaked but staying warm enough with continuous movement and good time down the trail. We had feared the worst but things never got too dire, with a few sections of blow downs, bushwacking and persistent snow patches and a consistent pace all the way to the lower valley. 

The biggest hurdle of the day was a washed out bridge over the raging Indian Creek; we spent a lot of time looking for a suitable crossing and were forced to ford a side channel with waist deep flowing water to get to an island which had a log over the main, uncrossable current. I nearly fell in the channel but luckily stayed on my feet, made it across the log, and grinded out the last few miles back to the trailhead. We were back at the car before noon and sitting in the 59er Diner soon after, still shivering after the wettest morning I’ve ever spent outside. Despite the depravity of the fourth day there was no question it all had been well worth it. The Dakaobed Traverse was an adventure to the fullest degree, a highly rewarding journey through a diverse and pristine landscape. And getting to make turns down the Dakobed peaks, Tenpeak and the Chocolate Glacier Headwall was the cherry on top. There are very few better places to go skiing than the Cascades in May! Thanks for reading, and thank you Pavel for continuing to support and maintain this archive of adventure through the years. Let's keep the TAY site alive and happy skiing!

This is a great TR!!  Thanks so much for sharing the adventure....what a cool area. 

Maybe, just maybe, I'll do this trip one day.

Hell ya, what a stunning trip! Jealous of the weather and conditions you had, when CJ and I skied it in 2022 we spent most of the traverse day from Clark to Moth in the soup, and definitely didn't have as good of surface conditions. I have been looking at the Dakobed all spring from the Stuart range, and wondering whether it would get done this spring as it looked like it was in pretty good shape, and I'm happy to hear someone took advantage of it!

Any particular reason you decided to come out the Indian Creek boosh as opposed to Lightning Creek and White River boosh? I know Indian Creek was gladed a couple summers ago for the PCT reroute, but can't imagine it was anything but a 10mi car wash. 

Thanks guys! And 10 mile car wash sounds about right with the weather we had on the hike out ha. But rain aside the Indian Creek exit was really not too bad except for the missing bridge. We had read trip reports describing White River as very slow and tedious travel and wanted to get somewhere warm and dry as fast as possible, hard to say how it would have compared.