[TR] Beartooths - Ice Dragons 11/6/2010

[duckfeet]

Trip: Beartooths - Ice Dragons

 

Date: 11/6/2010

 

Trip Report:

We left Missoula late Friday night and pulled in the trailhead just after 2am. Sorted the gear, got in bed by 3, and up at 5. We took just at 4 hours to do the approach and found the first 2 pitches not to be in. No problem, we'll go up the easy looking corner to a chimney. It turned out to be in the M5R range. Still, great rock and fun climbing. Besides, 2 pitches of rock got us to the ICE. And such great ice it was. Fat and totally plastic for 500ft up to WI3+. 3 long pitches later with increasing spin drift (we were getting hammered) and decreasing light, we had 2 more rock/moss pitches up to M5 again (guidebook claims easy rock, but we found a more fun way) and a steep snow pitch put us on top about 730. Did I mention the spin drift? Well it came from the plateau where it was blowing a steady 50mph and much harder on the gusts. Oh, it was dark too. And we got lost by heading down the wrong descent gully. And we spent the next 10 hours temporarily not knowing where we were. Its okay though. If we follow water down hill it'll eventually take us to the right drainage. A few raps, lots of talus, a river crossing, and finally the trail. We made it back to the car after 30hrs. Pretty good day out!

 

 

 

Gear Notes:

Screws, rock gear .5-3 and full set of nuts

 

Approach Notes:

Easy, its getting down you gotta watch out for

[John Frieh]

HELL YES! JoJo mentioned someone nabbed it over the weekend. Well done!

[Pete_H]

got in bed by 3, and up at 5.

 

That sort of shit will make your eyes bleed.

[DanielHarro]

Sweet! Sounds like you had a great adventure!!

[cbcbd]

That looks awesome, good on you dudes!

[Doug Shepherd]

Nice job guys! It looked great last week from the valley, psyched you got on it.

 

Those plateau's are horrible in a white-out, aye? Glad you made it back safe and sound.

[Teh Phuzzy]

so thats what I should have done instead of a conditioning hike on Kings and Elk Mountains in Tillamook SF...

 

great stoke

[ColinB]

Kickass. Glad to see your season has already started!

[BigSky]

Very nice work.

[mountainsloth]

killer!

[duckfeet]

The plateau was certainly one of the more "entertaining" spots I've been recently. The route is really good and I'd recommend it, even if you're coming from WA or OR. Don't let our time fool you. If you don't botch the descent, we would have been back at the car in under 15hrs.

[YocumRidge]

Thanks for the stoke!

[t_rutl]

hellz yeah!

[jpark42]

MUST FIND ICE TO CLIMB IN WA!!!

[alpinebumm]

How was Cali ice forming?

[duckfeet]

There was little ice on Cali. What ice there was, was thin and discontinuous. There is very little snow in the front end of the canyon and the temps had been fairly warm, even up high.

[John Frieh]

How was Cali ice forming?

 

Cali Ice gets sun so it doesnt come in till later in the season.