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Bedal Basin
~ Mountain Birthday Trek ~
6-27-03
Ken James McLeod
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Bedal Peak © Ken James McLeod
After spending most of the day climbing up and around cliffs at around 5,000 feet on the Southwest side of Bedal Peak, with no real destination or goal in sight, I dropped back down to the road and circumvented the Bedal Creek Trail at 3:30 PM. I had hiked on this trail for a ways many years ago, but somehow just never kept going far enough to end up in Bedal Basin.
Enter Henry M. Jackson Wilderness:
Up the trail I went as it wandered along the flanks of the creek and through the forest on a blue-hued day. Numerous waterfalls poured off the cliffs to the right about mid way up. Occasionally, I was provoked onward by glimpses of Sloan Peak towering above and bathed in the late sun of the day. It appeared someone had been up the trail a few days before by the set of tracks in the mud that I saw. The trail crossed a stream coming from Bedal and went through several open areas, some of which had some nettles that stung my legs as I passed by. At around 3,500 feet, the trail took on some steepness and began to climb up the rocky creek directly from Sloan. When it crossed the stream and veered right up through the remaining forest (near 4,300') and into snow patches, there were no more tracks that I saw.
Lured by the overwhelming desire to view Sloan more closely from this angle, I pushed on up through the last bit of forest until I topped out at Bedal Basin around 5,000 feet. And wham! "What a beautiful cirque and meadow in the shadow of the bold south wall (rock-monster) of Sloan Peak," I thought. Here, I found the remains of Harry Bedal's old trapping cabin next to the gin-clear creek that flowed through the meadow, which was dotted with wildflowers here and there between the snow patches that still lingered. Bedal Peak stood out like a sore thumb...it was magnificent to say the least. But Sloan Peak loomed above so impressively it stole the show! It's no wonder as to why Harry Bedal built a cabin here if not for just the sheer pleasure of spectacular view and wanderlust. Surely, a lovely place where the mountain angels sing to the soul: one reason as to why climbers used this route in decades past I suspect. At any rate I was here all alone and it felt grand. I had spent an hour taking photographs from the shoulder of Sloan and now it was getting late.
Reluctantly, at around 7:00 PM, I gathered my gear, laced taunt my "trusted" full-leather (Raichle Montagna) 5 lbs. 5 oz. boots and let them do the work to getting me out -- back down the rocky creek and onto the trail. The forest was in shadows, the sun aglow on the peaks, and I content amid the silence except for the gurgle of the little mountain rills.....
KJM
(McPilchuck)
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