July 28th, 2016(part of a multi-day trip)
The Crew: Emily Archie, Me
Summit Specs: (8,883 feet (2,708 m))
Approximately 500 meters elevation gain from Hole in the Wall campground (based on Topo map).
This summit is located in Montana, but the mountain's north side borders the Cameron Lake found in Alberta's Waterton Park.
Special Skills/Equipment: wear a helmet if you value your head, hiking poles, Moderate scrambling skills, comfortable with moderate exposure/narrow ledges, Route Finding skills.
Overview:
Note: Because of this peaks location, a boat ride is required to the goat haunt docks, and a passport. You can do this peak from Canadian side, using a route connecting Forum peak to Custer. Be warned that route requires traversing a shale ledge/goat path with high exposure. We opted to take a route that included a backpacking trip to the premier camping spot, Hole in the Wall.
Goat Haunt to Hole in the Wall camp: 5 1/2 hours
Hole in the Wall camp to overlook above boulder pass: it took us 5 hours, I have no idea why...I think we missed a short cut from boulder pass.
Boulder pass overlook to Custer Summit: 1 1/2 hours
Total day trip from hole in the wall to summit and back down to hole in the wall: 10 hours
Descent from Hole in the Wall to goat haunt: 4 1/2 hours
General Route:
1. Hike up to Boulder pass and traverse unnamed peak: There is no sign indicating you have reached boulder pass. When you are in the boulder area there is a shortcut to start the circumvent along the base of the cliffs of the unnamed peak, which is a red rock peak you can see west side of hold in the wall (to your right if you are at boulder pass looking over into the next valley). We did not know about this short cut, so we hiked all the way to where the trail starts to descend into the next valley, then took a right rather than descending, and stumbled upon a very well trod trail along a moraine. This took us back tracking a ways until it led us along the front of the red, unamed peak I described earlier. This is the peak you just want to traverse, not go up!
2. Ridge walk to view point: The trail peters out a bit as you hit some shale, just walk up to the brown ridge. This ridge seems to be the ridge connecting the red, unamed peak, with the start of Custer mountain. We picked up the foot path again on this ridge and followed it up to a "view point". The foot path ends here. This is where we left our Dad to wait for us.
3. View Point to Tower #1:We descended into a saddle and ascended the other side, all brown shale. There was one incident of hands on scrambling. We put out helmets on and used them the remainder of the way to the summit. We hiked along the top of the brown shale ridge, heading northeast until we came to the first of what is two "tower-like" structures (the second tower being the summit block). This first tower is black rock. There was one incident of hands on scrambling required with overhang, but good hand holds. We tried to stay more center on this summit block to avoid steep exposure west and east. However, we did go slightly to the left and up a chimney at one point. We built cairns to indicate this path. To descend this tower we had to back track about 6 paces from the end of it, as we found the down-climb at the end of the tower involved a lot of overhang. We found a more accessible place to climb down on our right hand side. Again, we left cairns and an arrow made of rocks to indicate this path.
4. Summit block: From the first tower we walked on a flat ridge over to the summit block. The rock was now red coloured shale. We searched the entire south face of the summit block for the best way up. We found somewhat mid way along the summit block was best for us. As we ascended we noticed some cairns someone else had built, only a few steps from where we went up. We also built our own cairs to mark our path for our way down. So you may see a smattering of cairns on the summit block, as there are many paths you can take. The top of the mountain is a pile of rock, some loose rock. It is only 1 to 1 1/2 meters wide. There is a register canister, but we filled up the last space on the paper, so PLEASE BRING MORE PAPER, if you do this summit, and maybe a pen as there is only one pencil in there.
The descent is the same, everything in reverse. A good rule of thumb is just watch where you scramble up, look back and make sure you would be comfortable coming back down that same way, and you should be fine.
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| The Chimney on the first tower, the chimney was a slight veer to the left side of the tower |
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| Down-climb from the summit block |
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| Our Rock arrow at the end of the first tower, indicating a hiker may find a better way to down climb if they take several paces back along the tower and look to the east side of the tower. |
