After Devils Peak on Thursday and getting absolutely soaked I decided to wait a day for this one for better weather and it was worth it.
I road my electric pony up Gott creek FSR probably further than I should have it has become an alder tunnel in many sections past the wash out at 5km, bushwacking on a bike is a new experience I am not sure my bare arms want to repeat. I made it about 1km away from the end of the road on the eastern branch of Gott creek and I cannot recommend anyone to follow this route, some sections are very similar to how alder choked Lizzie Lake used to be if not worse.
After I gave up fighting the alders on the bike on the last bit of road I started hiking and I broke through the old slash and into a short easy bushwack then quickly into some beautiful meadows on the north side of Michelle Peak. The scramble some people have used to get up Elusive was still snow filled so I followed SimonC’s route up the gulley between Bluejay and Michelle. In the meadows I immediately crossed the creek and boulder hopped my way to the beginning of the broad gulley. I found staying a little high on climbers right of the gulley avoided 80% of the boulders and made this part more enjoyable.
Once I gained the col between Bluejay and Michelle I traversed the south side of Michelle through the Marmot fields staying avove 2200m. Elusive comes into view as you do and looks like a long plod before a small basin comes into view. Here in my stubbornness I didn’t want to drop any elevation and walked my self into some terrain that wasn’t hard but just not as easy as taking the nice grassy ramp to the beautiful little tarns below.
I had a quick snack and started the last 600m to the summit. From there is an obvious route that gets you up on the broad southern slopes of Elusive. This area seems to be a goat haven, sadly no sighting but fresh tracks on the snow and many beds in the soft sandy areas. The travel to the final ridge is beautiful with views of some of the bigger peaks in the area, Swihe, Stein, Petlush, Skihist and great views of the whole Stein park.
Getting to the summit area I stayed on the ridge which was a mistake staying 10m below the ridge is easier travel for sure, only issue is I was uncomfortable with the size of some of those boulders that moved when touched. The summit sits at 2777m and it is one of the taller peaks I have done in a while and not quiet a p600 the views were still stunning, the clouds did make it hard to pick out all the peaks in the area but I did get to see all the southern boundary peaks of the Stein that are all on my radar, they all looked pretty intimidating and from here.
The decent was uneventful other than two things, first right near the summit I found SimonC’s phallic rock from his TR and second as I got back to the Bluejay Michelle col and heard the Marmots whistling like nuts, they were whistling at me earlier but from here they couldn’t see me, just as I crest the ridge to look down it looked like a wolverine was chasing two marmots. It was far enough I couldn’t ID 100% but the marmots were Grey and silver and the wolverine was brown and gold. One of the marmots peeled off and the wolverine chased the other into a moat in a gulley and I never saw either again.
If access ever improves for this area go check it out ASAP it is gorgeous and the terrain is easy going the only hard part is the road. Until that happens I can only recommend the route to the sickos out there that love alder bashing/swimming.
