Jul 21, 2018 — Finally, Capitol Peak! This has been a bucket list item since I starting hiking in the west. The famous knife edge and infamous scramble to the summit have always inspired me. However, and not to downplay the legitimate danger of the peak, it's not nearly as terrifying as other scrambles available, despite what almost every review I have read has stated. The rock is solid, a social trail takes you up, and the Class 4 sections are short.
A very long approach on the Upper Capitol Creek Trail takes you to Capitol Lake, Capitol Peak visibly looming in the distance pretty much the entire trail. If you got to Capitol Lake, you missed the left turn a couple hundred feet back the leads up a social trail steeply to saddle of Capitol Peak and Mt. Daly. From this saddle, continue down into a boulder field, where cairns lead to the eastern slope of Capitol Peak. Class 2 talus takes you just to the base of "K2", a sub-peak of Capitol Peak that is worth getting to the top of for nice views of the ridgeline to come. A class 3+ move leads to this mini-summit. Scramble down the other side and approach the knife edge, more beautiful in real life than in the photos.
Once across the knife edge, the scrambling continues. Be sure to follow cairns. A few Class 4 moves interrupt the otherwise Class 2+ stuff, and the summit views are incredible. We went down a different way than we came up, and it was slightly more difficult, but overall nothing was particularly precarious. Bring sunglasses and don't get caught in a storm on this highly exposed bright white granite route.
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