 Location: A small range of granitic mountains in the south Chilcotin stretching for about 30km along the north shore of Downton Lake, westwards from Gold Bridge to near the head of Bridge River. Its westward boundary is Nichols Creek, and to the north it is bounded by Slim Creek.
Terrain: The peaks are mostly granitic with rubble south sides and steeper north sides. Terrain is similar to the Vayu/Athelney pass area to the south but much drier. Treeline is about 2100 m and there are extensive meadowed valleys above treeline. The western part of the range contains a few smaller glaciers but is less rugged, the terrain being ideally suited to ski touring. Nearly all of the Dickson Range glaciers are in basins open to the north - none face south, and generally the glaciation of this range has produced a series of northward-facing basins along a general east-west axis, with glaciers remaining in the upper parts of these basins, backed up against the axial ridge. Penetration of the main strike of the range by a few deep glaciated valleys has created five (or six) main "clusters" of peaks; the easternmost around Dickson (including Penrose and Dk07, the range's second-highest peak), and just west of that a fairly heavily glaciated group around Scherle Peak. The third group has Tillworth as its highest summit, west of a noticeable pass separating it from the Scherle cluster. Ipoo, Tillicum and Marrow are perhaps part of the Tillworth group, but seem a somewhat separate cluster just west of another pass similar to that separating Tillworth from Scherle. North of the Ipoo group is a broad set of marshy/barren basins which lie up a side-valley of upper Slim Creek, with another cluster of peaks to the northwest of the Ipoo group. Just north of that cluster and...more
History: The eastern part of the Dickson Range was very likely explored by prospectors at the turn of the last century, although hunting parties are known to have roamed the range for decades before. Mt. Penrose, the cockscomb-like peak at the range's eastern end, above the Gun Lakes, acquired its name after being climbed by US Sen. Boles Penrose, who had hired famed hunting guide W.G. (Bill) Manson, himself a pupil of Hunter Jack. In the western portion most first ascents were done in the early 1980s by John Baldwin and Jean Heineman.
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