Gould Pass

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erutan
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Posts: 492
Joined: Tue Aug 25, 2015 4:46 pm
Experience: Level 4 Explorer

Gould Pass

Post by erutan »

TITLE: Gould Pass

GENERAL OVERVIEW: This pass leads between Onion Valley and the Rae Lakes Basin.

CLASS/DIFFICULTY: Class 2 most likely with some Class 3 moments.

LOCATION: Kings Canyon National Park south of Dragon Peak (south of Dragon Pass)

ELEVATION: 12,920ft?

COORDINATES: UTM 11 377038E 4071681N, NAD27 (from climber.org)

USGS TOPO MAP (7.5'):
Mt Clarence King

ROUTE DESCRIPTION: See first comment below for disambiguated trip reports. Hopefully this gets a canonical fill in later. In the meantime this trip report is solid and has photos: http://highsierratopix.com/community/vi ... =1&t=12494
Last edited by erutan on Wed Mar 31, 2021 7:07 pm, edited 5 times in total.
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erutan
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Posts: 492
Joined: Tue Aug 25, 2015 4:46 pm
Experience: Level 4 Explorer

Re: Gould Pass

Post by erutan »

There's a LOT of confusion about Gould & Dragon Pass, and some confusion between North Dragon and Dragon Pass. Having done Dragon and looked at Gould I have a fairly clear idea about those two, so I'm going to try and dismabiguate some trip reports after giving a brief description of both. North Dragon is it's own beast and geographically distinct so I won't bring it up aside from just mentioning that there may be naming confusion. Note I've only looked/read about Gould, but have recently done Dragon. :)

Neither are "easy" passes and should not be done by inexperienced people, but they also aren't the spiciest ones out there. YMMV. In terms of HST experience levels, 3 backpackers might find the eastern approach Gould simpler and then just brave the loose rock on the west for less talus traversing below. 4 explorers will probably appreciate that Dragon is less of a slog, and 1-2s should not do it without someone more experienced leading the party.

The two passes in a nutshell

Dragon Pass starts from the unnamed lake 3460 m+ north of Golden Lakes, goes up stable talus and some scree along the climber's route to Dragon Peak. It diverges a few hundred feet below the peak to wind it's way up some ledges to the ridge, then there's a very brief zero exposure ridge walk to a (relatively) straightforward drop on the west. The top is self braking sand/scree and small talus, which then descends into a suprisingly stable if slightly wobbly at times talus field. This pass is to the north of Gould Pass.
“Climb the broad talus gully that leads west from Lake 3460 m+ (11,360 ft+) toward the ridge crest. This gully eventually ends among cliffs below the crest. From the top of the gully head southwest and climb class 2 ledges and talus to the Sierra crest. Either continue south along the crest to Gould Pass or go north a couple of hundred feet to a class 2 chute that descends the west side of the crest to Lake 3640 m+ (12,000 ft+).”

Excerpt From: R.J. Secor. “The High Sierra, Peaks, Passes, Trails.”
Gould Pass climbs up from Golden Trout Lake (there's various ways to do it), then traverses the ridge north to a point marked by a wooden post. This is a sloggier looser climb up on the east than Dragon Pass, but bypasses having to do some class 2/3 ledges for the last couple hundred feet. The drop on the west side is a little higher and longer, and appears to be on larger talus near the top, but doesn't seem terrible. This route requires a bit more routefinding than Dragon Pass, which just funnels you in the right direction aside from the last couple hundred feet on the east, but may require a bit less technique at the cost of more effort. There's a bit less talus to traverse at the bottom of the west side if you wrap around the first lake the same way I did compared to Dragon.
“From Golden Trout Lake climb west and then north to a small notch on the ridge between Mount Gould and Dragon Peak, marked by a wooden post. The west side of the pass is descended by means of a steep chute over loose rock to the lakes in the basin west of Dragon Peak.”

Excerpt From: R.J. Secor. “The High Sierra, Peaks, Passes, Trails.”
This was shared by someone in another thread, and the dragon side is vaguely accurate as an overview at least:
file.jpg
Trip Reports:

Sean describes doing Gould Pass, along with some variations http://highsierratopix.com/community/vi ... =1&t=12494

Bluewater went up the Gould Pass side on the east, then went down Dragon Pass on the west by traversing the ridge: http://highsierratopix.com/community/vi ... f=1&t=8119 This comment describes Gould Pass and has some external sources: http://highsierratopix.com/community/vi ... 168#p59168

Ska-T describes the route they took as Dragon Pass, but judging by the ascent and descent was actually Gould Pass: http://highsierratopix.com/community/vi ... 425#p67425

Kruger did Dragon Pass, but added on some technical class 4 at the top as they are a climber: http://highsierratopix.com/community/vi ... ey#p137420

Short Youtube video clips of the east side of gould https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U1_rktm73uA and the west side https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-P8glbzyoxE & https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qKOzddZe54s.

This covers the east side of Dragon Pass up to where the cliffband where the pass is to the left and the peak to the right: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ri4mjeCHKMQ

West Side Approaches

I'm not sure why anyone would do this to themselves, but judging by two separate posters pointing out the same area for gould pass above, here's me scribbling on two panos I took with their positions (note that photos were not taken with this intent in mind, angles are not ideal).

d & g west.jpg
d & g west 2.jpg
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