Upper Cedar Creek — Friday, Jul. 1, 2016

Spurred on by Harvey Manning's hint at the wonders to be found by following climbers' paths up the Middle Fork of Cedar Creek, we spent a couple nights camped at the main creek crossing below Abernathy Pass. Instead of crossing the creek and hiking up to the pass, we followed the increasingly faint and intermittent path up the Middle Fork valley. We found the cross country travel wasn't bad if we stayed within 100 yards of the creek, passing through a beautiful boggy meadow. Near the headwall of the basin, we ascended up/right with the northernmost branch of the creek. As we climbed the north side of the basin, we trended up/left towards two HUGE boulders beneath a prow-like rock face in the northern part of the cirque. We stopped at ~7000 feet to lunch by the boulders, soak in the incredible views, watching climbers creeping up Kangaroo Temple. From here one could gain the ridge proper by scrambling a couple hundred feet higher.