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Alpine Scramble - Labyrinth Mountain

Navigation and some T3/T4 moves on the ridgeline made the trip so much fun. And the views in the area were great!

Ambrose Zhi Ambrose Zhi
August 07, 2023
  • Road rough but passable

  • The almost 7 miles of FS road 6700 from Hwy 2/Stevens Pass has some rough sections, but potholes were not too bad and I think an average clearance vehicle can make it - just go slow when you need to.  The short FS road 6704 to the trailhead was in excellent condition. 

    The trail tread was in good condition, but there sure are some steep sections.  You gain about 1300 feet in the first 0.8 miles, but the rest of the trail to Minotaur Lake is much more moderate. 

Previous WTA hiking reports have mentioned bugs were a problem, but thankfully I had no such issue.  There were a few bugs lingering in the parking area, but once on the trail, the bugs seemed to stay away.  There was a nice breeze most of the day, and maybe that contributed to the mostly bug-free hike.

Instead of taking the trail to Labyrinth Mtn, we took the ridgeline to the west side of Lake Minotaur and approached Labyrinth Mtn from there. Starting from the west side of the lake, we followed a bootpath to a saddle in the south ridgeline of Labyrinth Mountain. We managed to follow the ridge south to tag Minotaur Peak (6090') and returned back to the saddle. Then we went north on the ridge, and the ridge traverse involved descending on the west side of the ridge. We regained the ridge below the prominent horn (6090') and passed on its west side. Looking back, we could have tackled the east side of the horn and took any gully (with grippy rocks) to return to the ridgeline. From there, we didn't have any issues navigating our way to the true summit.

The route we took overall was 8 miles with 3,200 feet of elevation gain and a difficulty of Strenuous 3, Technical 4

Labyrinth Mountain 07/29/2023 - CalTopo