Edwards Mountain, Glacier National Park

For our 22nd anniversary, Jen and I spent two nights at my Mom's condo in Bigfork and on the in-between day climbed Edwards Mountain in Glacier Park. This is a long day at 22 miles with 6,000 feet of elevation gain, but the nine mile hike to Comeau Pass is spectacular, and the scrambling along the east ridge of Edwards, from Comeau Pass to the summit, is really fun, at least it was for me. Jen found the scrambling along the east ridge to be at her limit, but she pushed through her fear, made the summit, and was stoked when we returned to Comeau Pass and trail. It was, without a doubt, one of the best days of the year and a great way to celebrate our anniversary.

Blake Passmore, who has written several books focused on intermediate mountaineering routes in Glacier Park, rates this route Glacier III(4), meaning a class 3 route overall with a section of class 4 climbing. I find this rating to be quite accurate. In addition to Mr. Passmore's book, there are several online resources for this route.

Gray Wolf Peak, Missions

Back in spring, I had offered a Rocky Mountaineers trip to climb Sheepshead, in the Missions, on July 15. Once I realized I had over-booked myself, I cancelled the trip, but in the meantime, Fintan Maguire had written it on his calendar, and he contacted me about the trip the week before. My schedule had opened up, so we decided to get out together, and Fintan told Rocky Mountaineers president Forest Dean, who also wanted to join. I was still keen to do Sheepshead, but Forest pointed out that the grizzly closure started on the 15th, not on the 16th as I had thought, so we decided to do Gray Wolf instead. We followed the standard route, which is described in detail on summitpost. Due to the early date, there was significant snow in "the notch," but we were able to bi-pass it with only class 3 scrambling. It was a spectacular day with friends.

McLeod Peak, Rattlesnake

I climbed McLeod with the Rocky Mountaineers about a week ago. You can read the blog post I wrote for the outing here.