I Took The Path Less Traveled By: Mount Cleveland July 1-3, 2015

I have been wanting to summit this mountain for many years, at least since high school my group of friends had seen this mountain off on the horizon and had dreamt of summiting this beast ever since. In 2001 a friend and I had attempted this peak but were unsuccessful as we got lost in the Alder bushes on the west slopes. This year I had planned on doing it with my brother and my son and so after a great July first parade in our home town of Raymond, we headed to Waterton and obtained the necessary permits and took the 2nd last international boat for the day as to arrive so we could clear customs at Goat Haunt. Once we cleared that we hiked to the un-designated camping site we had reserved in the west bowl of Mt. Cleveland. I have since read a few peoples experiences of this approach and there doesn't seem to be an easy way to navigate through the endless dead fall and alder bushes. For three hours straight we bushed through the worst bushing I have ever experienced...bar none! We finally made it to where we would camp for the night and set up our tent and tried to sleep...it wasn't very comfy sleeping on an incline and being exhausted from the bush waking. We got up the next morning and hiked from 9:00 am and didn't return to the Goat Haunt boat launch till 11:00 pm that same day (we missed the boat that left at 8 pm and had to stay at the camp shelters at the boat launch). It was a beautiful day for hiking and the summit was spectacular, it was just such a physically exhausting hike. From Goat Haunt to the top is over 6000 feet elevation gain, much more than anything I had previously done. It was still worth it even though my brother was a little upset that we missed the boat home and had to wait till morning to catch a ride back. The other downside was since we had 3 hours of bush waking on day one we had just as much but maybe worse going downhill of the same 3 hours of bush waking. I may not ever try this peak again simply because it was awful. I have never ruined so much stuff hiking that that day. I had huge holes ripped in my pants, socks and pack. I still have a scar on my right shin that is still present 4 months later. All in all it was a great experience and hopefully you enjoy these photos. We saw a grizzly and 2 cubs and once you reach this summit you truly have the perspective that you are on the highest peak around because you get that sense from the top.

On the International Boat Ride to Gaunt Haunt (Cleveland in the clouds)

A Creek we had to climb through to attain the west bowl, we camped just above this waterfall

Looking west to the Citadel Peak from where we camped

This is what we looked up to in the morning. The snow in the upper right part is eventually where we climbed and around there is where we gained the summit ridge