Mike_G

Wow, there's a lot of snow up there this year! We did this route about three or four years ago on the exact same date you did, and had virtually no snow or ice on the knife edge ridge. Conditions were excellent, and we managed to summit. Thanks for the report and the great photos!

Anyone been up there recently? What are the falls looking like?

Thanks for the kind words. Yeah, sorry about the super-long Mountaineers meeting beforehand. I'm not actually part of the Mountaineers group, so I had no idea that they had official business to conduct before the show. It was definitely a slow start to the evening. Thanks for hanging in there... Mike

This Wednesday, Dec 12th, three of us will be presenting a couple of different slideshows/movies of climbs on Mt. Jefferson's Jefferson Park Glacier route and also on Three Finger Jack. They'll be from 7-8pm in Bend at the Environmental Center (16 NW Kansas), free of charge. Any Oregon climber or outdoor enthusiast will enjoy the stunning imagery presented by local photographers Brent McGregor and myself (Mike Geisen) as we documented one of the finest alpine climbs in the state. Our 40 minute show is a creative mix of photo, video and funny stories, and is definitely not one to miss. As a prelude, Greg Ouelette and Brent will present a 20 minute show that will detail the 'crawl' and the summit chimney on Three Finger Jack with a high-definition video camera. We're looking forward to seeing you there!

Check your PM's

When melting snow or ice for drinking water, how many of you also boil it to kill microorganisms? How necessary is this, because it takes at least twice as much fuel to raise water from 0 to 100 degC as it does to melt the snow or ice in the first place (depending on the snow or ice temperature)? I'm assuming, of course, that you're not carrying a filter. I'm also assuming that you're actually interested in treating water for common disease-causing microorganisms to a reasonably safe level (as opposed to folks who just sip from the creek like Grizzly Adams did).

Here's another one with free downloadable USGS maps of the whole country. Searchable database, too! Libre Map project

Here's the south side from Sparks Lake as of Tuesday morning, July 10th. It's losing snow fast, but there's still a bit up there...

Pretty simple. Make a post that says lets go drink at xx:xx PM at such and such location, and maybe the bend contingency will represent. I'm down for a revival of the original pube club. Uh... what exactly is a pube club? I'm not sure I really want to know...

I did throw in a few pieces of pro along the knife edge ridge, probably about 8 or 10 of them altogether (a few nuts, a couple of hexes, a tri-cam, and a few slung blocks). The ridge was longer than I had expected, and we ended up breaking it into about 4 or 5 shorter pitches, averaging probably 2 pieces of pro per pitch. If I would have led much further on any of the pitches, communication would have been more difficult, rope drag would have increased, but most importantly, there wouldn't have been as many photo opps! As for the pro, it wasn't too bad if you looked around a bit, but next time I will probably just leave the rack at home and bring several long slings to save weight. I had 3 or 4 of them, but felt like I should probably place some gear since I hauled all that metal up there. So it wasn't psychological pro, it was mostly obligatory pro. I think you could actually protect the whole ridge fairly well with just slings and have it be pretty effective if you did manage to fall. I think it would be tough to fall there when it's dry, though, unless something broke loose or popped off, which is definitely a real possibility. I also ended up going back and forth across the knife edge (left and right) a few times, which acted like putting in another piece of pro each time I crossed the top of the ridge. So all in all, a walk in the park. As long as you don't mind crumbling rock, extreme exposure and strong winds, all combined with high altitude. Oh, and the sun in your eyes, too.

Best of luck and enjoy your trip! Be careful up there. Post some pics and a report if you can (or at least let us know what conditions are like on this post). Thanks!

Yeah, the rock in that photo actually looks pretty good. But it's not. Most of the knife edge ridge is held together by... I'm not sure what. Desire?

Thought I'd post a few more photos for y'all. This route really is a gem, I highly recommend it for anyone who is up for the challenge. It has a nice mix of many disciplines; glacier, rock, snow, ice, ridges, routefinding, mellow, intense, remote... nice. Doing the circumnavigation of the mountain was a great way to see all sides of it, and not terribly tiring. It would have taken much more mental effort to descend the route, I think, and we found all kinds of unique things on the east side. We didn't see a soul on the mountain in three days. I recommend it. Brent working his way over to the snow bridge in the middle of the berg. Brent high on the Jefferson Park Glacier, nearing the col. A good view of the right side of the bergshrund. The snow bridge over there should be there for a little while longer, although it's definitely steeper over there! We crossed probably just off the bottom of the photo. Not sure how long our spot will last... North ridge looking at summit pinnacle. Looking straight down the east side from the summit to the Whitewater Glacier. Easy walking once you're down there. Rock tracks on the Whitewater Glacier. Cool. Looking up at Smith Rock (right side of Jeff Park Glacier) Enjoying the sunset over the western Cascades...

Great trip report, Dino. I was laughing out loud to myself kinda like someone who laughs out loud to themselves while watching TV alone. My friend was the guy leading the group of 8 that you ran into. I talked to him tonight and he said that all 8 summited, which is pretty impressive, kinda like 8 people summitting North Sister in so-so conditions.

One time, we actually caught a few zzz's in the ticket area by the climber's register. We were in there cooking up some grub (precip outside) and noticed that the floor is heated. Never been so comfortable on a cement slab...