A nice day climb.

Left the Logan Pass visitor center at 10:45 am and hiked down to Hidden Lake where we forded the outlet stream which was filled with spawning Cutthroat Trout. Worked or way down the climbers trail that heads towards floral park. Once we were below the large cleft that extends up Bearhat we began ascending up through the scree and talus aiming for an obvious break in the initial cliffs just to the climber's left of the cleft. From there we worked our way up typical class three cliffs and ledges staying somewhat close to the cleft where we found the climbing to be a bit more challenging and fun that further to the left. Exposure was minimal and mostly avoidable but there were sections that demanded full attention and concentration for a fall would have been really bad... As we neared the summit ridge we were confronted with a large cornice that required us to work to climber's left where we found a route over a boulder that created a break in the cornice. I never recall seeing a cornice like this on bearhat. We also observed a lot of fresh avalanche damage on the lower slopes of the mountain. We summited around 3pm... I think. Chilled a few kokanees in the cornice and took in the view. We descended via the easier slopes that are far left of the cleft. Lots of scree, scree filled gullies. I was glad that we had climbed up the more difficult slopes closer to the cleft instead of shlepping up the scree. Hiked out and got back to the car around 6:30pm. It was a great day.

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