KaskadskyjKozak

Thanks for sharing... I hope the boys appreciate these experiences for years to come!

Trip: Seven Fingered Jack (7FJ) - SW Slope Date: 8/18/2013 Trip Report: I took my two younger sons backpacking this weekend to Leroy Basin. My youngest also accompanied me up to tag the summit of 7FJ via the standard talus/scree-slog. My friend PG met us at camp separately and joined us for the climb and descent before motoring out early for home. The hike in: The boys before the hike out. Nice view of the objective (and snow melt): Scrambling talus and scree in the early morning: The infamous, ominous 7FJ-Maude col: Close-up of the N side traverse from the col: Summit shots: N Face of Maude: My boy scrambling down talus. Warms the heart! Glacier Peak still looking snowy from the E: The contrasting colors were awesome this weekend. Shot down to Leroy Basin from high on 7FJ: Glacier Peak and surrounding environs: Gear Notes: Helmet. Approach Notes: Lots of black flies.

Cool! And glad to see you enjoyed the gully and felt it was not so bad :-)

Some ice is exposed on the Redoubt gl already below Redoubt and at the nose by the slabs where you first gain the glacier. You can easily walk up these sections with crampons. I would guess you'd be OK in a few weeks and say the trip is worth a go.

A shit-ton-of-class 4 and no helicopter calls. Props! :-)

There's a balance between "going for it" and trying to expand what you have done, and being conservative and developing more slowly. NE ridge of Black is a pretty logical step up from something like Liberty/Beckey or E ridge of Ingalls.

The thunderstorms in the area most likely caused the one party to descend rather than wait on the summit. Probably didn't know anything was really wrong (other than a slow moving team) until it was late and getting dark. They may have been too tired and didn't want to take on further risk by climbing in the night. Personally, I wouldn't really want to be climbing a loose-ish route in the dark if I was tired and relatively new to alpine climbing. Easy to armchair quarterback though. At least nobody was hurt and valuable lessons learned, I'm sure. I didn't mean to suggest to go up in the dark, but the next morning. I don't agree about the armchair quarterback comment. I think it's worth talking/thinking about alternatives to handling a situation. Next time you, I or someone are in one, maybe that prior thought/discussion might trigger a memory and a good response to the situation. One theme in ANAM reports are rescues involving parties that separate. It's easy to separate when two rope teams are on a route for sure, and worth trying not to let that happen.

I wonder why the party that summitted did not go back up themselves to see what was up? Maybe borrowing some food from folks at Wing Lake so they'd have the energy they needed to get up there???

I'm really motivated to climb J-berg now... :-/

Yeah you're right, better safe than sorry. a 30m will suffice for up to 4 on the glacier. pretty light rope to carry up. I'd ditch it at the base of the summit pyramid though

As opposed to going up the central gully? I think I would feel more comfortable staying in the gully, but I guess we can take a look when we get up there. How did you finish the pyramid, DPS? And did you bring a rope to rap off, or just downclimb? Thanks everyone, good beta here. I climbed the summit pyramid twice via the gully and I did it unroped up and down. The biggest risk in there is rockfall from other people.

Sounds like we shouldn't have any problems. We'll have some daylight by the time we get up to that point, like you say. Do you recall how many hours your climb was? We did it in two days. If you plan C2C you probably could do it in 12, maybe a bit more.

Well that is good to know, thanks. I mapped it out best I could and it seems like it would only be about 12-13 miles roundtrip, but a trip report over at summit posts mentioned it was 15 miles and took them 16 hours...maybe they were just slow. (http://www.summitpost.org/shuksan-in-a-day/734236) the first few miles of trail follows an old forest road. that will probably burn an hour then there is a pretty good trail up to the ridge that you break out on. This part gets muddy and eroded with roots, but I don't remember it being hard at all to follow, but we did it in daylight. Unless you are starting before 4 am, I think you'd be in some amount of daylight by the time you are on this part of the approach

Call the Marblemount RS. I talked to them and they indicated you'd be able to get to the Eldorado TH by today. If that's the case, it is a 2.5 mile hike to the Boston Basin TH from there, and a little farther to Cascade Pass.

No idea. Maybe a return to epic form?

I'll bet you could easily entice Nastia to head up there... and there will be no border probs.

Indeed. I've had two trips back there already, and I do plan to return.

Sweet! Thanks!

Nice job and report! We also had a long day on Hard Mox: 4:15 am to 12:15 pm (camp to summit) and 1 pm to 6:30 pm (summit to camp).

Thanks! Nice register entry, BTW :-)

Thanks, Eric! But to clarify - Andy finished the Bulger. I am at a measly 24 right now...

True - you should not *rely* on help either. But... odds are in your favor (and if you end up totally alone and are spooked, you can bail)

If you do it on a weekend you are not likely to be really "alone". Something to weigh against your cautiousness - help is likely nearby. The route is really mellow (and fun). Enjoy!

Trip: Mox Peaks SE Spire (Hard Mox) - West Face (Beckey) Date: 8/6/2013 Trip Report: I had planned to climb Goode this Sat to Tue but my plans fell through. I had previously corresponded with my friend Andy B who was one summit short of completing the Bulger List about climbing Hard Mox, so I pinged him and he was available to climb Mon-Wed. I got the time off from work - game on! We approached on Monday per the usual and camped at the Depot-Redoubt Creek divide. Depot Creek Falls were flowing fast and furious, with lots of spray. Lake Ouzel is completely melted out and the outlet was a bit tricky to cross. Andy donned some rubber shoes he brought for camp and I chose to wade across barefoot. Drying off feet after crossing the outlet: Ascending slabs above Lake Ouzel: We started out from camp around 4 am on Tuesday. The first part of the traverse was entirely melted out and the talus was tedious to negotiate. Once we hit snow, it was a lot easier. The snow stopped short of the Col of the Wild by a few hundred feet, and more tedious talus and scree was in order. Looking back at the traverse from camp: The Col of the Wild in August conditions: Route-finding to the base of the final gully leading to the start of the route was straight-forward and pretty much exactly as Beckey describes. The snow finger was quite melted out and undercut so we rappelled it (60m). We were not sure how we'd get back up, but figured we'd do what we had to when the time came. We started up the rightmost gully around the rib below the snow finger and hit the class 4 terrain. Since we were not sure if we were on route or what was above we set up a belay. 20 feet higher, we knew all was well, and so we shortened the rope and simulsolo'd up the class 3 gully (loose) to the base of the route. The 10-foot step: Man what a place! Andy traverses the crumbly ledge: Checking out the snow finger: I led the first two pitches. You can't exactly zip up the route, but there is pro where you need it. I then gave Andy the honor of leading the third pitch to complete his final Bulger summit. As for rock quality: "doveryaj, no proveryaj" ("trust but verify"). We did 3 rappels back to the start of the route, downclimbed the top of the gully and then did 2 rappels to get past the class 4 section. Everything else went smoothly with one bit of trickiness at the snow finger. We camped a second night and hiked out early Wednesday. Andy prepares to rappel from the summit: Some shenanigans at the snow finger: We were the only souls on Hard Mox or at Lake Ouzel as far as we could tell, with the exception of a party of two that we spied ascending Easy Mox while we were summitting the SE Spire. View towards NW Spire from the summit of Hard Mox: Congratulations to Andy on this notable summit! And thanks for such a great trip! KK summit stoke: Andy celebrates on the summit: Gear Notes: 4-5 C4's .5 to #3, a few nuts, #1-2 Master Cams, pink and red tri-cams.

Like Torment and TFT?