TBT Post from Hubby - Earl Peak & Bean Peak Hiking Trip Report

It's Thursday!! That means another Throwback Thursday post from Hubby. Today's post is another hike in the Teanaway area of WA, Earl and Bean peak. This one was pretty cool because it was the first time I had ever done two peaks in a day. It was pretty awesome as the views were spectacular!

Earl Peak & Bean Peak, June 11, 2007

The Teanaway region of Washington is ideal for Springtime. When the weather is poor west of the cascades, these mountains further to the east are often filled with meadows of flowers and blue skies. It also gives a great vantage point for viewing the rugged Stuart Range, one of the most impressive of the state. 

The plan was to make a loop trip out of two peaks, Earl and Bean. This is a view of Bean as we ascended the slopes of Earl. We would climb Bean from the right ridgeline in this picture.
 
We took a trail over two moderate creek crossings and up over a few patches of snow to a saddle point of the mountain. From here, we followed a boot path towards the summit. You can see the saddle behind Sharon.
 
And here I am taking a break along the boot path with a false summit behind me.

We were greeted with wonderful views when we reached the summit.
 
The best part of the view was the Stuart Range. The famed Enchantments are just on the other side of these mountains. We'll be there in July. :)  We relaxed on the summit and ate lunch, while enjoying the views. 

After lounging around a bit, we headed across the ridgeline towards Bean Peak. We tried to stay directly on top of the ridge edge to get the best views in both directions. In both pictures, we came directly over the rocks behind Sharon.


You can see Bean Peak, our destination, in these pictures. I love ridgelines!

This is the last section before the summit, which is a scramble over rocks and steep in some parts.
 
On the summit of Bean Peak. Two peaks in one day!

The views of the Stuart Range from Bean were even better than from Earl. Here's Mt. Stuart. Sharon and I have plans to climb that too. :) It's one of the ten tallest peaks in the state.
 
This is Colchuck Peak and Dragontail Peak, to the east of Stuart. I imagine the plateau on the right to be the dragon's snout, with the tail coming off the left.



After enjoying the summit, we scrambled directly down the south face of Bean Peak.
 
This lead us into the lush (and marshy) Bean Creek basin, which we followed back to our original trail to complete the loop.
 
Here's the GPS track of our route superimposed on the topographic map of the region. Total trip stats: 8 miles, 4450 ft. of elevation gain, 7 hours