Clark, Luahna, Chalangin - Sept 2025
- Lucas Peterson
- Sep 18
- 5 min read
I had made two previous trips to the basin below Boulder Pass. One was an attempt at Clark Mountain that ended when we found ourselves inside of a thick cloud and was comprised mostly of hanging out in the tent to avoid the rain. The second was a successful climb of Clark Mountain that was also spent mostly in the clouds. Needless to say, I was very familiar with the approach but wasn’t fully convinced the sun ever shone on Boulder Pass or the surrounding peaks.
The weather forecast for this trip looked likely to break my streak of cloudy trips to the area, but I had a different concern this time – wildfire smoke. Both the Lower Sugarloaf and Labor Mountain fires were burning, and winds were shifting. On my drive over Stevens Pass the sky was clear blue, but that changed as I descended toward Lake Wenatchee. Driving past the lake, the smoke was noticeably present and significantly affecting visibility. I was predicting that smoke concerns would be alleviated as I moved further west, so I set off at 4:30 pm. This was later than I had planned for, so I knew I had to hustle to get to the basin before dark. The first 3.9 miles of the very familiar White River trail cruised by, and before I knew it, I was hoofing it uphill toward Boulder Pass. I tried to power up the switchbacks as best I could and made pretty good time to the basin.
My previous two trips I had camped in a prime spot right off the trail, and I was hoping it would be available because the sun was beginning to set. To my disappointment, a group of hunters with horses had claimed it, so I wandered around a bit and found a suitably flat spot, trying my best not to damage any meadow foliage. I got the tent set up and dinner cooked just as dark descended on the basin.
The next morning, I got up early and was moving in the dark up the climber’s path to the ridge at 6200’. My previous experience in the area was beneficial here, but the trail is clear and seems like it gets frequent use. I traveled on the ridge for a bit, before dropping back down into the basin at 6400’ and then climbing again to a notch at about 7200’. This climb back up to the ridge was quite difficult aerobically, because the sandy surface made for two steps forward, one step back type of travel. At the ridge crest I was treated to the first rays of sunshine for the day. It looked like it would be a clear, mostly smoke-free day!
Beyond the ridge, I made a short but steep descent down a gully. Nothing is exceedingly difficult, but it is steep and caution would be required if you were with a bigger party. Once down on flatter ground, there is nothing to do but keep heading up class 2 terrain to the summit of Clark Mountain. I debated skipping Clark entirely because I had already climbed it, but I’m happy I did because the views were grand. Plus, I was able to debunk my theory that it is always cloudy on Clark’s summit!
An added benefit of climbing Clark is that I could simply drop down another gully on my way to Luahna, avoiding a tedious side-hill traverse. I went maybe a hundred vertical feet down the ridge to the south from the summit, before I turned west and made a short downclimb of a loose gully. It wasn’t too bad, and I was soon on flatter ground (but still loose) heading toward Pt. 7970. Here the terrain eased significantly, and I actually had a fairly pleasant time traversing around on climber or goat paths.
The final scramble of Luahna was now ahead of me. It was all fairly loose, but essentially just a choose your own adventure up until near the summit, where a couple of class 3 steps were encountered. It felt good to have Bulger number 2 of the trip checked off.
Before the trip I had been unsure of whether I would go for Chalangin or not. It was recently found to have enough prominence to be a WA top 200 peak and looked like it was right there from the summit of Luahna, so I decided to go for it. I dropped straight off the western ridge of Luahna, not 100% if it would go or not. I generally don’t like descending blindly, so I vowed to only turn around if there was ever anything that gave me pause. To my surprise, every time there was a difficult looking section, there was always a reasonable way down, never exceeding class 3.
The climb up from the saddle to Chalangin was a bit harder than anticipated. Nothing was ever technically difficult, but there was some exposure in places, so caution was needed. Once these sections were in the rearview mirror, there were just some gentle slopes up to my third summit of the day.
Glacier Peak felt very close from this vantage point, and I was really pleased to find a Jake Robinson register on the summit.
Knowing that I had a lot of traversing to do to get back to my camp, I didn’t stay long on the summit. The scramble back down Chalangin actually felt easier on the way down (a very rare phenomenon in my experience), and I was soon traversing below Luahna at about 7800’. This section was easy albeit loose, and I picked an obvious cleft in the rock ahead at about 7900’ to rejoin the route I had taken in. I took the same traverse around Pt. 7970 and then was faced with a decision – reascend Clark or make the long traverse below it.
For most of the day I was planning on reascending Clark. I had heard people say that it was about the same level of effort and less tedious terrain. But as I was looking back up at Clark laziness took over and I decided against the ~800-foot climb.
The traverse was a bit easier in my opinion than others made it out to be. I stuck to about 7600’ and was able to pick up traces of climbers and goat paths. There was only one sketchy section as I climbed up a hundred feet to circumvent Clark’s southern ridge. I got into some exposed terrain and had to make a few moves that I almost certainly could have avoided.
Beyond that it was easy to descend the sand and scree to easier terrain and then head back up the narrow gully I had descended hours earlier. From here I went back on autopilot and made quick work of the descent back to Boulder basin, admiring the early fall colors as I went.
After packing up camp, the rest of the hike out was uneventful but dragged a bit. This was a big but rewarding day!
Final Stats: 28.15 miles, 8045 feet of ascent
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