Chevy & GMC Vans

The bleak/dark/cold/wetness is upon us in Vancouver (there's snow on the mountains already). But I refuse to say uncle! I've decided to go on a climbing trip to Washington this weekend, to seek some dry, sunny weather.

Day 1 will be at Frenchman's Coulee near Vantage. There is supposed to be free camping right at the crags.

Day 2 will be in Leavenworth. I'm hoping to find some camping (ideally near water) on the backroads in the surrounding area. I have a map, but I'll be arriving in the dark so any tips would be much appreciated!

http://goo.gl/maps/v4xRH

Cheers.

Check out the Icicle Creek area right outside Leavenworth.

I'm not that familiar with camping options around Leavenworth. My only tip is to keep to the lower elevations as we have snow at 2500-3000 feet right now!

Leavenworth's elevation is just under 2000' so you probably won't see snow but it looks like rain this weekend. The local climbing crags are on the right on the way to Icicle Creek. There are several campgrounds in the area. When I was there I stayed at one of the campgrounds (cheap) but there was several dirt roads where you might get away with free camping.

I'm sticking to low altitudes so no worries there. The forecast for Leavenworth looks good on Sunday (10% POP), but if things turn sour we'll probably just stay at Frenchman's coulee where it should be drier.

While the weather forecast isn't terrible, it isn't inspiring either, and 1,000km is a long way. We've called off the trip. Maybe next year.

Thanks for reading guys.

I'm planning to do this trip this weekend with my gf. Looks like it's going to be pretty hot.

Have a great time Joe !

I-90 is being widened. Was almost caught in blasting delays last weekend. My buddy was 5 minutes behind me and got caught for 45 minutes. The area of the intermittent closure is about 2 hrs 15 min from Belllingham.
http://www.wsdot.com/Traffic/trafficale ... almie.aspx

http://www.nwccweb.us/information/firemap.aspx

Icicle Canyon is cool. For pay camping, Johnny Crk CG is on the creek. I can't describe the free camp area I use., and can't seem to locate it on the map...


You will be driving right by one of my favorite areas. Great free riverside camping anywhere north of the Salmon Le Sac campground. Fortune Creek Trail is my van's favorite. Was there last weekend, up to Gallaher Head Lake.

https://maps.google.ca/maps?saddr=Belli ... wd&t=m&z=8


When will you cruise thru Bellingham?

Thanks T.Low. The camping and road tips are much appreciated.

We are leaving straight from work on Fri night, and I'm hoping to reach some wilderness in the cascades along the #2 to stay the first night. Sat, stop in Leavenworth (climbing), then probably onto Banks/Sun lakes (to cool off). The rest we'll see as we go. Vantage (climbing) is still a planned stop for about half a day. We'll come back along the #90 on Monday (BC day holiday for us).

I'm looking forward to it!
USA ... the land of cheap food, beer and gas!

Pics? Report? How was it?

The trip was awesome. You better go grab a coffee, because here comes a load of photos!

Day 1 (Fri) - Escape from metropolis.

Left Vancouver around 3pm, and crossed the border after a short delay (thank you Nexus. Muah!) After stopping for supplies in Everett, we turned off on Hwy 2, climbed through Stevens Pass, and drove until it got dark, about 15 miles from Leavenworth. Nothing fancy, just a clearing on the side of the '207', next to a creek where we could hide behind some trees.
By the way, don't buy your gasoline high up in mountain passes. It costs more there because evidently, oil companies charge more to truck it uphill. Here is the Snohomish river snaking its way through the cascades.


Day 2 - Descent into the Columbia basin

Not wasting any time, we drove into the town of Leavenworth first thing, and did touristy stuff all morning. Sipped coffee, window shopped, and tasted cheeses and German pastries. We bought some tasty elk sausage and artisan gouda. In case you don't know, Leavenworth is a Bavarian alpine inspired town up in the cascade mountains. I perused through a book I found on the table at the coffee shop which tells of the town's history...

The theme is actually very artificial, as it never had any real Germanic heritage. It was founded as a violent rag tag gold rush town, then became a railroad hub until that was moved to nearby Wenatchee, and later survived on logging and mining. The breaks in between were punctuated by decline and struggle. The town was revitalized and its infrastructure received a huge boost during the era of Roosevelt's Civilian Conservation Corps. In the 60's, two business men named Bob and Ted bought a restaurant there, and decided to remodel the town as a mock Bavarian village. Leavenworth has subsisted on tourism ever since.


Here I am reading "Washington Rock" and plotting our day. We were glad to leave around noon, as the place filled up and became a zoo.



We drove over to the popular "Castle Rock", but decided against climbing it, in the interest of time, and in favour of checking out more exotic (or so I thought) rock in Peshastin.



continued ...

Peshastin Pinacles State Park

The Peshastin Pinacles are large towers of sandstone, which I had never climbed on before, so I decided to give it a try. We found a shady spot to park, but a sign informed us about a "discover pass". It's very aptly named, because you only "discover" you need one to be there after you've already arrived. It's not cheap either @ $10/day and they kick you out around 6pm. Well, we didn't want to drive back into town, so we decided to stuff cash into the provided envelopes. We didn't have enough US dollars, so we decided to give them 10 in Canadian and a US dollar bill for their trouble. Just then the ranger pulled in to check passes. He told us that you couldn't buy one from him, they didn't accept our credit cards, and their bank wouldn't cash in Canadian currency, but he let us do it anyway. I asked if we could just park outside the gate (since we had just arrived), to which he replied "well it too late for that, so go put your money in the box". There is a $30/yr option as well, but since we didn't know exactly where we were going, we didn't get it. There isn't even an option to "upgrade". Plus there's about 5 different kind of passes you need depending if you want to go to National parks, State parks, Forest districts, day use, overnight use etc.. Ah well, I hope the money goes to good use.



At any rate, we set out to climb on this amazing rock. Amazing to look at anyway. It was like moon rock or swiss cheese with all kinds of holes. Not amazing for climbing because it was so crumbly, and made me a little nervous. Someone told us there used to be one more tower in the park, but it fell over.




The holes were also home to all manner of critters ... marmots that crap all over the place, bats, swallows, and wasps/hornets which promptly stung me in the hand.



I decided I had my fill of sandstone for a very long time, so we headed out, but not before another ranger came by. He was advised by the other ranger to "check on the white van that was parked off the road". I asked him if there was a nearby place we could take a dip and cool off. He told us there were spots along the #2 where you we could access to the Wenatchee river between Cashmere and Monitor, but to be careful the water "moves". He checked the cash box, and satisfied that we paid, drove off.

Here I am under the bridge in Monitor. The water wasn't very fast. Youngsters drifted by in various inflatables.


[continued ...]

Very cool TB. We did a climbing trip to Peshastin and Icicle Creek back in '78. Then, Peshastin was privately owned and you had to walk through the guys orchard to get there! Great times! Haven't been back since. Thanks for the pics!