Рет қаралды 648
In this video I’m visiting my home state of Washington! I was so excited to be able to pick a hike while I was visiting, I’m glad that out of all the beautiful hikes in this state it fell on this one! It meant a lot to me to be able to finally climb one of the peaks out of this basin, having climbed to the 5,100 ft basin 3 other times I felt I needed to finally do this! I wasn’t mentally or physically ready for it the other times I had hiked here but thankfully with my hikes in Maine, I was more or less ready lol. One of the main reasons I wanted to do this was because it was just enough outside my comfort zone to stretch me in a good way. Glad I did it! No regrets! Thankful for the friends I met on the trail who were heading up at the same time as me - we stuck together and formed our own climbing group and had a blast! I was the only one with working navigation and the gentlemen had tons more experience, Erica had been a seasoned hiker and climber but had come out of a long break and was ready to get back into it again. This is a perfect beginner scramble for people who are wanting to learn the skill or brush up on it. Some navigation skills necessary and experience with the terrain, not all areas are marked and it is a sort of pick your own route kind of climb. There are sections of class 2,3, and maybe a small section of more exposed 4 that you have to get through. I only say there may be a small area of class 4 (if you choose it) because in my opinion if you fell in certain areas that it may result in more than just a broken bone if you know what I mean. We chose to try and stick to the ridgeline as much as possible even though the scree field was an option, it was a very sketchy one and we quickly learned that the loose rocks were not stable enough for our liking.
I had done as much research as I could about the mines in this area and locating the easiest one, which in my opinion was the Upper Del Campo Mine. This one, though unmarked and not advertised, has trails leading right to it if you know where to look. The mines location is actually marked in AllTrails by a yellow dot, as well as other reports online giving its exact location and coordinates. I felt so Intrigued by it and had to find it, and was so glad I did! Being bore into solid rock made it feel even better as that is on the safer side when it comes to mines from my limited knowledge. Going inside was surreal and the temps dropped at least 20 degrees cooling me off after a hard and grueling ascent to the basin. I felt like a true explorer finding this, and was happy to share my exploration with others who had overheard and wanted to come along. It was one of my favorite if not favorite moments along this trek.
Here’s a link to an old photo from 1912 of the entrance.
commons.m.wiki...
There is no cell service on this hike and most along the Mt Loop HWY. I recommend bringing a sattelite com device in case of emergency.
Thank you for watching this video! Let me know if there is anything else you would like to know in the comments and I will get back to you!!
Here is a link to this hike - (the mileage and gains are a bit higher than stated here)
Gothic Peak on AllTrails
www.alltrails....