After a quick foray over Ataraxy Peak, we now had Khutzeymateen in our sights. While this peak is not officially named, it’s at the headwaters of the Khutzeymateen River and as such an eponym is surely in order. The river and inlet themselves are worthy of a full page of writing as its home to one of the densest grizzly bear populations in Canada. This valley also hosts the largest contiguous stand of old growth Sitkas in the world! It felt somewhat special to travelling above the headwaters of such a pristine place and in the course of our trip we’d actually end up going through the headwaters of the Exchamsiks, Khutzeymateen, Khyex and Kasisks Rivers.
That was all in the back of my head as traversed along the ridgeline from Ataraxy. There was one steep and exposed finger of snow that looked like it might cause trouble ahead. However, when we made it to the base, Andrea spotted a low angle snow filled ramp that would enable us to bypass this section of ridge. We leaped at the chance and soon found ourselves trudging up the friendly glacier of Khutzeymateen Peak.
The top was reached not long after and just in time! Some unfriendly clouds had entered the fold and it was looking like we might get rained on in the first day. The next section beyond Khutzeymateen also posed one of the bigger question marks for us. A dense band of contour lines on the western most shoulder had given us pause. We intended to make for the col to Peak 1599 this day, but with threat of rain, we’d have to see.
From the summit we had pleasant ridge ramble over tame terrain and finally came face to face with our area of question. Indeed it was as steep as we’d expected and there wasn’t going to be an easy way down. Perhaps with light packs we could have down climbed, but we didn’t have that luxury so we had plan carefully. It was clear we’d need to do one, maybe two rappels. We scoped a few lines out and then the pitter patter of rain arrived.
Both of us agreed to save this for the next day and set up a lovely camp site on the shoulder. The rain subsided a few hours later and on the following morning we were greeted by a phenomenal inversion. We spent a great deal of time enjoying the views before packing up.
In the evening I had spotted a potentially better alternative that would allow us to down climb most of the way. We elected to try that first and before long we were scurrying our way down exceptionally steep and wet heather. After some engaging moves we hit a section too steep to manage with our packs. There was a reasonable looking boulder to rappel from, one of a few on this slope, and so we setup for a 60m rappel. I went first and got deposited on a relatively flat bench. Before Andrea committed I searched around for quite a while trying to find something to make the next rappel off of. Finally after more steep heather down climbing I found a perfect boulder.
Andrea rappelled down and then lead the second rappel off the slope. This took us to tamer terrain and we reached the col at last. The whole ordeal had taken us at least 2 hours so it was a relief to be past it.
Now it was time to head up Halcyon Peak where another crux awaited us.