A less traveled path.

The less traveled path up Mamie Pass.

I do this hike when i want to get into the wilderness fast. And to stay in touch with what its really like to hike and climb in the North Cascades. Mamie Pass is best done at any time other then the summer,but if your route finding is good in the brush you can pick your way up in the summer. It's important to start this hike at the right spot so that you can follow the timber cone all the way up through the brush. That spot is just down from the Hannegan trailhead shelter at the picnic table. There will be a bit of thick brush at first but bear right twenty or thirty degrees and you will break out into open forest. This timber cone goes about halfway up the pass. There are game trails you can follow and every now and then and old trail marker ribbon. There are a fair number of bears in the Mamie Pass area. It's there trails you follow.The timber ends in slide maple and you have to pick a route over to the left and up until reaching a broad dirt gully that climbs rather steeply to just below the pass where there is a little slide maple and heather to go though.
Chances are you wont find to many other people up on Mamie Pass.It's mentioned in Fred Becky's guide book for the Cascades as a route into the "Skagit Range" and I am sure there is some local history associated with it in regards to logging and mining.
The hike takes a few hours, it gains 2,140 feet in about .72 miles so it's a bit of an effort to get there.