Car-to-car Boston Basin > Quien Sabe Glacier > Sahale Peak > Sahale Glacier > Sahale Arm > Cascade Pass
Left the Sahale Arm trailhead parking lot ~3am and walked on the road for about .5 miles to the Boston Basin trailhead. We opted to park at the Sahale trailhead due to more parking spots being available (the Boston Basin parking lot is very small compared to how many cars can fit at the popular Sahale trailhead) and wanting to get the half mile of easy, downhill road walking out of the way in the morning when no cars were out.
The climbers trail up to Boston Basin is notorious for being steep and more of a bushwack, and it definitely did not disappoint. Some relatively straightforward stream crossings kept us alert as the first morning light started to peak through the trees and those of us with trekking poles were happy we brought them. We enjoyed the sweet relief and stellar views once we arrived at the basin as we were greeted with a gorgeous sunrise.
The Quien Sabe glacier was quite broken up on the South end so we opted to put our glacier travel gear on at the North end and traverse the East side of the glacier up to Sharkfin Tower. There were some sizable crevasses but they were easy to navigate. Once off of the glacier, it was relatively straightforward class 3 and class 4 scrambling with some occasional snow to the summit block. Other than a party coming down from the summit as we were approaching, we were delightfully surprised to have not seen anyone else in the Basin and had the summit block to ourselves.
A few (very easy) 5th class moves to the summit allowed me to set up a top rope for the other members of my party - there is some really good, new tat with rappel rings at the top that made setting up a top rope and rappels super easy. Having no parties behind us, we enjoyed lunch on the summit, took in the gorgeous 360 views, and took plenty of pictures.
We did one rappel down the South side of the summit block. A 60m rope allowed us to perfectly get to a flat ledge and then it was some easy 3rd class scrambling down from there. We opted to not rope up for the Sahale glacier as there were no visible cracks / crevasses and from there we met up with the large crowds on the Sahale Arm and Cascade Pass trail. We enjoyed a slow-paced afternoon getting down the mountain, stopping to watch the handful of baby mountain goats and ptarmigan chicks we encountered along the way.
Notes: There was plenty of water re-supply spots along the trail - only section without easily accessible running water was between getting onto the Quien Sabe glacier and getting off of the Sahale glacier. We were very thankful we started early, to avoid being in the summer sun and heat all the way until we got to the summit block.
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