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Trip: Prusik Peak - Der Sportsman Trip Date: 06/23/2020 Trip Report: I was pretty hesitant to write this TR due to the current overcrowding in the area. I realized that it likely isn't going to make much of a difference cuz no-one really uses this site anymore anyhow. And as long as people follow a few key tips, you can have a good responsible Enchantments climb. 1.) Avoid weekends like the plague... as best you can. 2.) Get to the TH before 7 And try not to get yourself parked in. 3.) If you start later hitch to and from the TH if you can. (This worked better and was safer before COVID). 4.)Pick up trash you find. Quadruple points for picking up other peoples surface shits, and try to stick to trails and rock as much as possible. Now on to the actual TR Last year Sean and I climbed the West face of CBR around the same time, starting at 9:30ish and getting back to the car just before dark. We decided to keep the (almost) solstice tradition going this year with Der Sportsman. 17+ hours of daylight is pretty luxurious We left the trail head a little after 6. Our packs felt light with no water and no real insulating layers to speak of. The trail was pretty quiet at that hour on a Tuesday. The hike up Aasgard was pretty uneventful with only the usual snow patch to cross near the top. The descent down to Prusik was a nice change of pace and the soft snow seemed to make it a little lower impact and faster down the steep sections. Arriving at the base in good time, we decided to chill for a little bit and recover to give us a better shot at the cruxy first pitch. Finally the sun coming around the corner gave me enough courage to rack up and get going while the crux was still shaded. Unfortunately I pumped out and broke a foot chip so no OS for me, but Sean followed the pitch in style. P2 isn't too spicy apart from the real risk of whipping on your belayer. This is the only reason I would consider setting up the belay a little higher. P3 is absolute money! Unfortunately it has 2 fixed pieces at the beginning that detract from the cleanliness of the line, but who really cares, it's great! P4 I found the step right to be super desperate and kinda just fell onto the far right foot as a last resort, not sure how that worked out but it did. The moves off the pillar near the end of the pitch are pretty spicy. The rope looks like it would slice right across the arete if you were to fall. Best to avoid that. P5 was probably the only sandbagged pitch on the route. I'd also say it's the worst pitch on the route, which is saying a lot since it is still pretty damn good! I've seen the pitch called 10b, but I'd say 10c/d. P6 Oh boy is this the icing on the cake! Such an incredible position to be climbing such an amazing crack! Definitely not 12a, felt more like 11a/b on TR. From where we topped out, we untied and scrambled up to the summit, chatted with some nice folks and took a small nap. We then downclimbed the W Ridge and scrambled back to our packs in our rock shoes to avoid taking axes or shoes up the route. The hike out always sucks, but is the price you pay for the light packs and burrito dinner. We got down with enough light to re-set up camp and crack a beer before the headlamps came out. I feel like I've focused too much on times in my previous TR's. If you want to know our splits I have a Strava track HERE. Gear Notes: Double rack tiny to 2, single #3 and triples in a few finger sizes. We brought nuts but never used them. 60m 9mm rope Handfull of slings and QD's Water filter Trail runners Approach Notes: Over the river and through the woods, up the pass, down the hill and up another hill.

Trip: Teanaway - Iron, Teanaway, Bills, Marys, Bean, Earl, Navaho, Freedom, and Miller Trip Date: 06/21/2020 Trip Report: Peter, Matt, Steven and I climbed nine peaks in the Teanaway on the solstice, starting at the Iron Peak trailhead and ending at the Miller/Bear trailhead. We stayed true to the ridgeline the entire way, with the exception of Earl to Navaho. Snow conditions were primo, supplying water and excellent boot skiing. The technical crux was definitely the ridge between Marys and Bean, which yielded some class 4-5 on excellent rock. The SW ridge of Bills also had some steep, exposed class 3. It came out to 20 miles and 10k gain and took us 9:20. So much great bang for your buck in this area. Nice way to kick off summer! https://climberkyle.com/2020/06/21/the-teanaway-traverse/ Iron Peak. On the ridge between Marys and Bean. Looking back on the Marys Bean traverse. Navaho from Earl. Great boot skiing down Navaho towards Freedom. Gear Notes: Running shoes. 1L water. Approach Notes: All pretty straightfoward.

USGS has an online database. Just gotta find the closest upstream station https://waterdata.usgs.gov/nwis/uv?site_no=12451000

Sweet! Yeah, I've switched to TikTok for all my trip reports now.

NR Stuart is a bit of a pickle. One can go early season so you can approach from the north and descend the Sherpa Glacier (shorter) but contend with verglass, wet rock, and snow or go late season and approach and descend from the south (longer and more tedious) but enjoy dry rock and a lighter pack (no crampons or axe). Either way a full value adventure.

Trip: Monte Cristo - Standard Trip Date: 06/22/2020 Trip Report: After another disappointing weekend weather forecast my son and I opted for a one day trip up Monte Cristo on Monday. We had previously been in the area last September on a one day trip up Columbia Peak. From the latter summit we had discussed a return visit for either Monte Cristo or Cadet, and it's the right time of year now for either. We drove up to Barlow Pass Sunday night, arriving at dusk and setting our alarms for 4 am. We had our bikes with us to speed up our approach. We biked into town at dawn, locked our bikes at the rack and headed up the trail to Glacier Basin. The trail was in mostly good shape and snow free until you approach the basin above 4000'. We took a quick rest break just beyond and above Ray's Knoll, opting to put on crampons then. We ascended continuous snow from there to the v notch. The snow conditions were great - not icy but not too soft either. View up Monte Cristo in the morning: Ascending good snow From the col we roped up knowing there could be moat issues and that we needed to do one technical pitch anyways. As I approached the snow to rock transition, I could see it was already non-trivial. I downclimbed about 4 feet onto a snowy block and then tried to work my feet up to a higher snow block, but slid down and crushed the snow below me. I then tried to get into the moat higher up the slope, but it was worse there. I returned to my original spot and made several attempts to climb up 8 feet or so before finally succeeding, then made a low 5th move past a piton onto a belay ledge and brought up my son. We then got out the rock pro and I took a try at the short technical pitch. There was snow melting from above right into the crack I wanted to use. The pre-placed sling above was soaking wet and when I grabbed it water ran down my arm. Footing was not good with boots in the wet crack. I backed down and put on rock shoes so I could try to stay on dry holds on the right side of the crack, got up a few feet, then grabbed the wet sling to pull the lip. from there one more 5th class move got me to the rappel anchor. From this spot, we could see the source of the running water - a large snow patch right on top of the slabs. Fortunately the left side was dry and we were able to scramble past the snow on dry rock. Above that we also avoided snow by staying on blocky 3rd class terrain on ribs and eventually got to the finale- breccia rock on the summit block. Factoring in the moat shenanigans and wet crack for the rock pitch, we were satisified with our 8.5 hour time from cars to summit. Blocky class 3 scrambling below the summit: Kyes Peak from the summit: We downclimbed to the rappel anchor, rapped first to the belay ledge to retrieve gear, then into the moat. From there we roped up again (just to protect the moat exit) and returned to the v notch. From here we unroped and downclimbed the steep snow slopes face-in, using an ice axe and picket each for more security. The snow conditions were still good with not much more softening up since we had climbed. Once slopes moderated the hike out was cruiser. Gear Notes: Ice axe, crampons, small rack. Approach Notes: Snow in glacier basin up to base of route.