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Sep 20, 2015 — A straightforward ascent using the popular Red Pine Lake Trail led to Red Pine Lake, the gorgeous peaks to come for this route visible ahead. A social trail leads on the east side of the lake and ascends a minor ridge to its south. First leading through the forest, the ridge quickly becomes rocky and open, the route clear as I ascended. Once at the ridge, a trail continued to the peak's east ridge, where some Class 2+ scrambling led up to the Pfeifferhorn summit. You can make this a shorter hike by only doing Pfeifferhorn and going back down to Red Pine Lake. White Baldy is really what makes this a harder, but more interesting day.
I headed back along the standard Pfeifferhorn route that I ascended, but rather than drop down on the somewhat popular trail, I looked across to White Baldy. Its white rock was impressive. It was still early in the day, so I decided to just start up the peak along the very slow-moving Class 2 ridgeline. I encountered some Class 2+/3 moves on the talus, but overall it was just a fun scramble to the summit. After coming all the way up, it was hard to look down at White Pine Lake and not try a route to make this lovely ridgeline into a loop hike somehow. Plus, returning the way I had come seemed silly since it was time-consuming.
I dropped down the east side of White Baldy and, without really thinking about it, descended off the north ridge onto a very, very steep and ill-advised slope. I moved slowly, encountering some snow and just picking my way down. I excluded this from my attached route because it was dangerous and loose. The standard route is Class 3+ with some cryptic route-finding and descends on more talus to the saddle on the east side of White Baldy before continung down more talus to join with the White Pine Lake Trail. I then descended via the White Pine Lake Trail down to the trailhead on an old road converted into a trail.
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