OlympicMtnBoy
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Posts posted by OlympicMtnBoy
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If you are "in your car", you are clearly not "in line", unless you are at a drive thru. If I waited in line for an hour thinking I was first, and someone wakes up and crawls out of their van, they are in line behind me somewhere. If I pull up and walk to the door and they come out immediately and claim their space I'd probably give it to them. If you want to sleep in line, put your pad and bag by the door, not in your car. Try the camp 4 line in Yosemite some time. ;-)
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Not mine and it's in Wenatchee but it's $10: http://wenatchee.craigslist.org/spo/3249474016.html
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Nice couple of climbs, kind of a cool link up there. Any sign of the film can summit register we put on Sweat a couple years ago?
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Looks like fun even if you were "off route" for some of it. There's something nice about having your bivy gear with you, while it may slow you down it also frees you up for scenic bivies! How was Prusik?
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Cool, despite the haters, I think that route is fun. I especially liked the 5.8 lieback bit before the offwidth, fun easy moves with great exposure. And the offwidth is pretty fun too since it's not all that steep and you'll just slide back down for much of it. :-)
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Cool, that's a fun one, looks like a great trip! You should try the west arete next!
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Yeah, as Matt said, this was more fun that I thought it would be and except for the first pitch had decent rock. A worthy alternative to the busy south face if you want a slightly bigger challenge. Crampons were handy to get up the gully this late in the season but some stiffer boots and confidence with your ice axe could work, or try the rock bypass on the left. :-)
Thanks for the TR Matt!
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Yeah, the crux of the roof for me was getting from the finger crack above the belay into the horizontal hand jam. My left hand was not cooperating and I kept missing the jam with my feet skittering around over Jon's head. Eventually it worked out.
There was surprisingly little tat on the route which was nice. At the stance under the roof there were two fixed nuts and two fixed pins but not much tat. There was one fixed nut at the top of the crack right under the roof too. Nothing fixed through the crux roof anymore (and no need for it).
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Cool, sounds like a well planned and executed trip! Hopefully they passed you for it. ;-) I still need to get up there and get that one since I got weathered out a few years ago.
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I reduced the approach beta at Sol's request due to perceived access issues lest the rangers try to obfuscate the new approach somehow. Please just use your route finding instincts and don't blaze trees, prune bushes, or build giant cairns. I think the new approach is safer and causes less erosion and rock fall than the old one so just PM me if you want help.
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Actually Alkaline batteries are oddly enough Alkaline as opposed to lead-acid batteries like a car battery. The white stuff is potassium hydroxide which is a strong base.
That said, I have no idea what the effect on nylon is. If it were my gear I might wash it but given the very small amount of material leaked and the very small chance of contact I probably wouldn't worry that much. It's not as if anything was soaked with it and it's a solid and can be brushed/washed (diluted) off. But I don't know anything and will probably die. You might actually get BD to do an unscientific test if you ask nice.
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Cool, glad you were inspired, it's a great area!
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Trip: Colchuck Balanced Rock - West Face (5.11 C1)
Date: 8/7/2012
Trip Report:
Plenty of beta out there on this climb so I’ll try to keep it short and give some pics. It was over ten years ago on my first trip up to Colchuck Lake to climb the North Buttress Couloir that I looked up at Colchuck Balanced Rock and thought: “Wow that’s cool but it looks like a long way to haul an aid rack”. After two trips up there to clean and climb The Scoop a couple years ago I figured it was about time to finally take care of the West Face and see if I didn’t need the aid rack after all.
Jon and I had talked about getting on this after we had such a great time on Acid Baby a few weeks ago so when he told me he could get a day off work and kids I was all over it. I knew the approach was a butt kicker so I wanted to bivy at the base. Jon was kind enough to stand in line on Monday morning to get us a permit so we could approach after work but I was a little less excited after a raucous wedding party Sunday night. Between his drinking beer and my hangover we left the Stuart/Colchuck TH at 6:40 PM, not a lot of daylight to get up there.
Fortunately we had some beta on the better approach (to me anyways) which is faster than the old way around the lake. -redacted material- (hint, go left around the lake and follow your nose) We made it to the bivy with only a tiny bit of headlamp cairn spotting about 2 hrs and 50 mins from the parking lot. This is probably a good hour or 90 mins shorter than the old approach all the way around the lake and up past Jabberwocky.
Nasty mosquitoes got us up early but we still didn’t leave till 7:30. Jon led and approach pitch, I took the short 5.10 crack and combined it with the 5.7 to the top of the pillar. Jon led the really fun 5.9 step across and corner to some uglier dirt. I headed up the “easy” pitch to the base of the 5.11 corner but may have been too far right and had some thin mossy stuff. Jon drew the stellar corner pitch and styled it while I took a hang at the wet spot when I blew a grass jam (I blame the pack with a gallon of water still in it). Somehow I cut my finger on a crystal when I fell which dripped blood over our gear as I dug my tape out underneath the roof but I gathered myself and fired the awkward roof traverse clean next and avoided falling on Jon’s head at the start.
After this we were both feeling a little fried so we gave up any dreams of freeing the 5.12 bit and pulled on gear for the short crux. Jon did pretty well for his first aid climbing and didn’t regret leaving his fancy aiders at home in lieu of improvising with slings. I hauled us up the 5.9+ series of offwidths and chimneys which would have been more fun if I weren’t tired and we celebrated the summit by toproping the balanced rock (something I didn’t do the first time up there). We scrambled down the surprisingly fast and easy descent (Jon wore his climbing shoes down but I carried my approach shoes up). We had some food and drink at the packs and then wandered back down the trail to be home in time for dinner. Great day out!
Gear Notes:
Double rack from blue alien to #2 camalot, plus one #3 (I think). A couple extra runners to stand in if you don't climb 5.12 (or aren't in good enough shape to do those several burly pitches in a row).
Approach Notes:
Go left at the lake instead of right.
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Hehe, nice to see someone exploring over there. I found one of those routes on a day trip from Whitman many years ago. Kind of fun to poke around anyways.
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We got stopped at the top of Asgard Pass and did not get a ticket. We tried to overnight something and ended up spending the night under a rock. The ranger was very cool about it.
Going along with what Rad said, and assuming this was an unplanned bivy, it's nice to be able to follow the rules as a respectable user group and then get a little leniency when something happens and you get benighted rather than flaunt the rules and get stuck with more ticketing when you are already having a bad day/night.
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Just look at the boundary maps and figure out a way to stay out of the permit zone. Try going in Hook/Rat Creek or Crystal Creek. Or camp up Mountaineers Creek and do something. All of those are outside the permit area but will let you access the Enchantments for a day trip. Just stay off the main trail from Colchuck/Stuart to Snow Creek and you probably won't see any rangers but they do check areas like Colchuck Balanced Rock and some of the high lakes off the trail sometimes.
I'd go and try the lottery but have a plan B in mind. Also FWIW a friend got caught with a bit too much gear on a "day" trip. He got a warning and a note that he had to leave at the ranger station by 7AM the next morning to prove he had actually left that day/night. Better than a ticket though but he wasn't caught in the act of camping.
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What a great looking route! Nice job!
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I've got one but I'm in Leavenworth. If you need some specific info I could scan a couple pages for you.
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Sweet! Nice job in a day!
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Nice, my favorite alpine shoe too, sized a size bigger than my normal shoes to accommodate socks and long days. Just got my pair resoled though.
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For glacier travel I use a super light CAMP harness and clip the few pieces (picket, screw, pulley, biners) to the pack waist belt or other convenient spot. The harness is soft and under the pack hip belt. I assume that when I stop I'll be able to take my pack off in relatively stable terrain and not need my gear (no hanging belays).
If it's a harder route I'll choose a pack/hipbelt that is lower profile and doesn't interfere as much with the front two gear loops on my harness. My pack is normally light enough to not need as cushy of a hip belt then and I can take it off at belays and hang it from the anchor.
Just try it out and see what's comfortable and allows you to reach what you need quickly, it will differe a bit with each pack harness combo and what gear you are trying to rack.
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I don't recall any issues with route finding and we did it with only 3 nuts in about one third the time. Plus we did it car to car. And we had better beer.
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Cool, glad I inspired someone else to get out there (and to eat sausage)! You are correct on the name in Beckey, I must have been embellishing. ;-)
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Your original loop idea is doable BTW. There is a little bit of bushwhacking but there is still a fishermans route down from Toketie Lake (don't follow the creek). It's hot, long, and annoying and has lots of burn debris, but not that hard to follow.
[TR] Squire Creek - Oso Rodeo 9/8/2012
in North Cascades
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Cool, looks like another fun one Matt!
That the only pic you got?