The winter of 2024/25 came and went with no little Girstle Action.
The winter of 2025/26 was the all-time coldest on record (so the coldest winter since recording started in 1904). From December through March, Fairbanks’ average temperature was -13.6 Fahrenheit. But after 2 months of cabin fever, a nice weekend finally materialized at the end of January which warranted scheming up a real adventure. I think Rowland might have actually proposed going for Mount Hajdukovich itself (it wouldn’t be his first 9000’er in January). But for a soft mountaineer like myself, I am more inclined to wait for a warmer month with more daylight. Still, the Little Girstle was begging Rowland and I for another visit… What to do, what to do. “Well, there is a 6083′ peak back there that I’m keen to check out…”; Spur Peak.
Despite Spur Peak being smaller than every neighboring peak, it interested me because it has steep features, is pretty distant from its deep, 1400′ prominent saddle, and from topography it seemed like it had a godsend of a gully going up to the top. It also fit our interests because it would be a good excuse to shake out any remaining snowmachine quirks for more seamless access to Mount Hajdukovich in the future.
We loaded up snowmachines and left Fairbanks the morning of January 23rd, 2026. However, upon reaching the trailhead I discovered that my snowmachine key had dissapeared (presumably blown off on the drive). Fortunately a new key could be chipped at Delta Powersports in Delta Junction. While there, we also discovered a leak in my snowmachines break fluid reservoir and got a new reservoir so that I could stop on the trail. So maybe that whole ordeal was a blessing in disguise.
Anyhow we reached the Little Girstle Trailhead for the second time at ~2:30pm and we finally set off to go make camp. Fortunately, trail had been broken all the way up to the broad pass between the Johnson and the Little Girstle River. Of the three places the trail criss-cossed the river, only one of them was partially open and the other two were slushy but supportive underneath.
Breaking trail downhill to the Johnson was easy with about only 1.5′ of snow cover and Rowland fortunately finding the entrance to that “trail” in the dark. I had an uneasiness about snowmachining new ground up the Johnson in the dark, but Rowland didn’t mind so he went first and I had his track to follow. We made it about 2 miles up the Marjory Creek, which drains the Spur Glacier, before reaching a choke point at 6pm and making camp. I’d brought my teepee tent, but with no snow to stake it in we compacted the snow into a flat campsite and cowboy camped under the clear night sky. Away from any light pollution, the stars were crisp. We collected firewood so we could cook the steaks Rowland brought for the first night, but were unable to get it to light, since most of the wood was alive and wet. So we had rehydrated food for the first night instead.
The forecast before the trip had said 18oF at night, but the first night read -5oF on my thermometer. So that wasn’t a very nice surprise. Discovering that my inflatable sleeping pad had a hole in it and wouldn’t hold air was also not a nice surprise, but I had a foam pad so I managed. (This is the very reason for the rule: “always bring a foam sleeping pad on winter camping trips”, because then you are guaranteed to have something if the inflatable pad pops/leaks)
We set alarms and woke up January 24th at 4am, leaving camp on skis at perhaps about 6pm and arriving at the base of our route at 9am (first light, right on time). Our route would be the southeast gully which splits between 6083′ Spur Peak and it’s slightly lower 6000′ contour to the northeast. We observed the impassable cliff band near the entrance of the gully, (as caltopo/satellite imagery suggested would be present), and were pleased to see that the workaround on climbers right was likely going to be fine.
We skinned 300′ up out of the vegetation, then dawned crampons and began the boot. Booting to the workaround was simple, the workaround was also simple (and even had some faint sheep footprints on it). The rest of the booting in the gully was also simple, with nice snow along the left side wall that your whole foot had purchase in without postholing. Although unlikely to slip, if you were to slip and get going, the snowpack awaiting you in the middle of the gully was hard and would be more difficult to self arrest in, ultimately going over the cliff band and likely stopping around where we had cached the skiis.
At the ridge, we could see the summits to the west (6083′) and to the northeast (the rivaling point of 6000′). With Caltopo showing a 25′ preference for 6083 being then true summit of Spur Peak, I was pretty confident that that was the high point. But our view was slightly obstructed by an inconvenient bump, and what we could see over the bump was a terrible gendarme on the ridge, with the higher summit, (also looking too difficult for us) behind it.
We decided to make our new objective getting up the lower 6000′ peak to the northeast. But shortly after making progress in that direction, we were haulted at the proposition of an inconvenient downclimb. This pause allowed us to look back on Spur Peak, and from this new angle I could see some low angle snow on the back side of the summit. Maybe it would go if we could just get around the first gendarme! So we switched our objective back to attempting the true summit. Upon scrambling up that inconvenient bump it was evident that the first gendarme could be easily walked around. Walking around to the back side of the true summit, its back ridge (with the low angle snow patch) proved to be very easy also.
The summit had extraordinary vertical relief to the north, and staring back up the Spur Glacier and the skyline full of 9000’ers; it was awesome. The skies were perfectly clear and we could even see White Princess poking up between a low point in the ridgeline. We decided to call the peak Spur Peak for its proximity to the Spur Glacier, and for it’s spur-like appearance.
At 2:45 we began the descent (our turn-around time was 3pm). Retracing our steps, we reached the skis by about 5pm, and camp by about 7pm.
Back at camp, we lit our firewood using the white gas stove as a blowtorch for 5 minutes, and cooked the steaks, which (in conjunction with their savory bone marrow broth and noodles) we are blaming for giving us explosive diarrhea the next day during the drive back to Fairbanks. But I count that as a win because if we’d gotten the fire going and eaten the steaks on the first night instead of the second night, then we would have had the diarrhea on summit day, which would have been even less ideal.
The next morning of the 25th we slept in, and for the first time all trip we got to see the campsite in good lighting. A big fin jutted out from the canyon’s west wall, forming the choke point in Majory Creek. We also got to see the Johnson River in good lighting.
On the snowmachine trail back to the road, we encountered Lyle and Ed. Lyle has a cabin back in the area that he goes out to pretty regularly, and for a long time too, since the cabin was his dad’s before now being his. Lyle described a trip from when he was 10 years old hunting caribou with his dad, wherein they walked from the cabin up Independent Ridge (going over the 4400′ peak on the way to the 4544′ Independent Peak). They then made the mistake of shooting a caribou, in the afternoon up on that plateau, and were faced with the challenge of hauling it back to the cabin. They then made another mistake; descending Independent Peak’s west ridge so that they wouldn’t have to reclimb Peak 4400. Reclimbing Peak 4400 would have been better, however, since the walking down in the bog/swamp was so difficult. They ended up cacheing their meat and packs, hiking to the cabin, and returning for the cache the next day. We pointed out Spur Peak and described our route, Lyle said that in the 35 years he’s been coming out here, he’s never been up the Majory Creek drainage, which I was surprised by, given how much time he’s spent out there. We thanked Lyle and Ed for their service in keeping the trail maintained, and then snow machined back to the truck, and then continued on back to Fairbanks.
My rapid onset diarrhea forced me to pull over and let rip underneath a powerline on some residential road. Rowland’s kindly waited till we had reached the bathrooms of North Pole.
From Rocks To Rivers 
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