Thunder mountain Southeast wash scramble

 https://ridewithgps.com/trips/157521899

Fingers were sore in the morning so we didn't climb and went scrambling. I had just seen a YouTube video talking about getting to thunder mountain summit through a wash from the andante trailhead instead of the terrible devil's bridge one; then I saw a faint line on Google maps for the scramble, so we went for it.

We ended up not really following the original route up and not quite the same way down. I recorded with ride with gps hoping to follow the breadcrumbs on the way back but it was unreliable and often didn't show so we navigated by landmarks more than gps.

The scramble was super fun. First we followed a trail up to a wash, then followed the wash. I think ideally when the washes fork you should take the right hand wash, which we did, but then take a trail back to the left hand one, which we didn't. So a little above the limestone band we got somewhat cliffed out and saw the trail going up from the wash on the left so we traversed some bad terrain to get to it. It was on, but I think following the trail would have been better. 

This took us to a nice notch where we met the trail coming up the south face, which looked steeper / sketchier than what we did. The view from the notch was gorgeous with a mini tower and a wall.

From there the trail was more straightforward and switch backed up with scrambling. Often more than one option but at least a third class one easy to find until the chimney.

Pretty easy fourth class moves get you up it. Even with a backpack you won't have a hard time with a partner to hand packs over.

From there there's another similar looking chimney soon but it can be bypassed on the right (it doesn't look like it but it can, we fourth classed the chimney but down climbed the bypass later). Then there's a nice notch again and from there you see the summit.

The last bit of scramble was looser. The summit was gorgeous though. 

We got a bit lost on the way down to the notch and went cross country on loose steep terrain. That wasn't super fun but eventually we found the trail and then the descent from there was a lot less eventful than the climb. I wouldn't follow our breadcrumbs exactly because we stayed in the wash a lot longer than we should have but the down climb on slippery rocks was very fun.

Don't do this unless you're very comfortable with scrambles, chimneys, and loose steep terrain, but if you are it can be a good adventure and avoids the devil's bridge parking area.