Jeff Woodward

Here are a couple pics of Colchuck. The first one's a zoom from the routes overview shot. It gives the best sense of the steepness, etc. These next two are closer up, but the steepness of the glacier is way out of whack. It's not as steep as it looks. Enjoy!

Trip: Dragontail - Serpentine Arete, Attempt on Colchuck Date: 8/20/2007 Trip Report: [font:Verdana]James (lostboy) and I climbed Serpentine Arete on Dragontail and made an attempt at the NE Buttress of Colchuck back in late August. James and I met via the Cascade Climbers partner forum! I'm stoked that it worked. This trip was been christened "The Good Luck/Bad Luck trip." Here’s why: The Approach: With almost no knowledge of the permit process, James and I showed up at the Ranger Station at 7:44 AM. Good Luck: The permit lottery is at 7:45 AM, and we won a permit! Bad Luck: About 3 miles from the trailhead James' VW Passat broke down. Luckily, the car made it back into town but the mechanic couldn't look at it until that afternoon. Good Luck: It took us approximately 2 seconds to hitch a ride to Castle Crag so that we could at least get some climbing in. Bad Luck: It started raining. Back in Leavenworth, the mechanic said it was going to take a couple days to fix. Naturally, it would cost a lot more money than originally quoted, leaving us in Leavenworth without a car or a place to crash at 5pm. While James talked to the mechanic, I got to know the ladies at the Natural Food Store next door (Sage Mountain Natural Foods). The woman behind the counter heard about our predicament, and called her friend who lives past the end of Icicle Creek Road. He was in town, and was kind enough to pick us up, drive us up Icicle Creek Road, and drive an extra 4-5 miles down a dirt road to the Colchuck Lake trailhead. He's great, and he has a really cute kid. Climbing: Day 1 We woke up at 6am to find some folks already headed to our intended route for the day, Serpentine Arete. However, the NE Buttress of Colchuck is also right there, and we wanted to climb that, too. The routes we climbed. The N face of Dragontail is on the L, Colchuck on the R. The part of the NE Buttress that we climbed is in red, Serpentine Arete (roughly) is in blue. James looking intimidated in the morning. Bad Luck (or bad routefinding): We started heading for the Buttress that's one left of the NE Buttress. Good Luck: James is much smarter than I am, and we found the right one before we got badly off track. Colchuck in the morning. We almost headed for the low buttress on the middle-left. After crossing the glacier and surmounting the bergschrund (strenuous 5.8 where we did it), I decided to try and link the first two pitches. The 2nd pitch which I linked went up a pretty corner which was much harder than I thought. I was also more tired than I thought. (Upon further reflection, the corner is described as a 5.9 variation in the Beckey guide). The offending corner. The climbing is good, just harder than I thought. As James followed, an ice axe fell off his pack and onto the glacier. Then his camera fell off the pack and onto the glacier. When he finally got up to the belay, it was 11am. James, rather tired at the end of the linked pitch. We know an epic when we see one (we were overly tired, hard routefinding, surprisingly hard climbing, unknown glacier descent, down one ice axe, and threatening weather). So we bailed. We did recover the ice axe and the camera, and the camera still takes pictures! Bad Luck: At 4pm, it started raining. Good Luck: We were playing cards in the tent. Climbing: Day 2 There have been a lot of trip reports written about Serpentine, so I'm going to relate our trip up it in pictures. Evening clouds on Dragontail. More pretty clouds. James hiking up the approach the next morning. We got an earlier start. James on a lower pitch, just as the rock started to get good. Me with the Colchuck-Dragontail col in the background. Had we kept going up Colchuck, our descent would have gone down the glacier behind me (it's not as steep as it looks, but still). Sounds fun with one ice ax and no crampons in the dark. Me at the start of the fun crux pitch. Climbing higher on that pitch. The little handcrack above me and to my left was great fun. James loves his self-portraits. Slapping for a hold on the last 20 feet of 5.7 before the top. James styling higher up on the last tricky bit. James has conquered the mountain. Stuart from the summit of Dragontail. The North Ridge is outlined pretty well. James showing off on the summit. I bet him a 6-pack that he couldn't do a handstand. He claims this is a handstand. I still haven't bought him the 6-pack. The descent down the back of Dragontail. We found some great glissading here. Ice axe nice, crampons definitely not necessary for us. The next day, we got a ride out before we even left out campsite. Hitchhiking in that area is too easy. James' car now runs again. Serpentine is a ton of fun - a few full 5.7/5.8 pitches and a bunch of 4th-easy 5th pitches with 15 foot sections of 5.7. Lots of simul-climbing if you do it right. NE Buttress of Colchuck is probably also a bunch of fun, but I can only speak for 1-2 pitches.[/font] Gear Notes: We carried a decently heavy rack. We didn't need it. Don't bring a #3. Ice axe very handy. Crampons would have been handy, but not necessary. They might be necessary for the descent off Colchuck. Approach Notes: Don't have your car break down. For Serpentine, once you're ~1000 feet above the lake, make sure to gain the moraine crest (it's really obvious). Colchuck glacier looks very ugly up towards the col - lots of blue ice.

Trip: Matthes Crest - South to North Traverse Date: 8/29/2007 Trip Report: Robin Batha and I climbed *most* of the full Matthes Crest South to North traverse yesterday... The route. Our route is in red, the proper finish in yellow. The climb is absolutely amazing. To get there, we walked a very mellow, 6 mile approach. Some of the meadows inspired Robin to frolic. To start, we climbed up a couple hundred feet of mid fifth (5.5 or 5.6) cracks and face. I LOOOOOOVE Tuolumne knobs. After that, there's a long fantastic horizontal section over towers up to the South Summit. The climbing on this section ranged from sidewalks to mid-fifth boulder problems on fantabulous rock. Pictures help explain the ecstasy. The ridge at the start of the horizontal bit. Totally strange awesome flakes! Robin on a sidewalk section. She's holding the coil because she's walking too quickly for me to belay. Lunch #1. Coconut curry lentils and rice. Beautiful mountains. Fun climbing. Yummy. Robin heading towards the South Summit. Occasionally, a steep bit required a diversion to one side or the other... Or a fun boulder problem... Almost at the South Summit. All is well... we think. From the South Summit, we descended down a 5.3ish ramp on the E side to the Notch between the S and the N summit. One of the cruxes is climbing out of the Notch. Robin styles a fun variation of it. Around here, a soloist passed us (he was the only other person we saw on the climb). He made some comment about it being "an hour til it dumps on us." We responded by hurrying onward. The climbing stayed spectacular. We hurried. Note the dark shadow. Over the next pitch or two, the cloud above us got a lot darker. Then it grumbled, sounding distinctly like thunder. Robin said "shoot." We hauled ass. The rock, Robin's hair and our rope started buzzing from the static in the air. Our hearts started buzzing from the thought of being hit by lightning. Robin (ever the genius) found a way to downclimb a pitch from crest to a rap station. From there, two single rope raps (we had to reinforce both stations) and some 4th to easy 5th class scrambling brought us down the West side. Our descent route. The sky's mood lightened as we headed down, only raining on us for a few minutes. A larger thunderstorm passed North of us (near Cathedral Peak), but we didn't see anything in the area actually get hit by lightning. That being said, we learned a few things... Don't trust the weather forecast. NOAA said clear, but we hadn't been there for several days to get a feel for the weather. Alpine starts are the way to go. We drove most of the way up from Sacramento the day before and camped about an hour and a half from the trailhead. We got up at 5, left the trailhead at 7:10, were climbing by 10:00 (we're lazy approachers), and bailed around 1:50. 45 minutes earlier and we would have been off the climb when the storm hit. If you're gonna get a late start, bring two ropes. We brought one because we wanted to go light and simul-climb the whole route. Two would have made the bail much quicker, which would have been all the more important had the storm really nailed us. Slightly dark clouds=bad. There were no towering, evil thunderheads to warn us, just the usual puffies. This route kicks ass. It's got great contrast between carefree strolling along the ridge and super crazy exposure and views on all sides. Even with the thunderstorm, it was a blast. Our feelings on the route: Gear Notes: Go light. (We had a medium rack to #2, and it could have been much lighter). Approach Notes: Yay! The traverse around Echo Peaks is awesome.

Trip: Tieton - Goose Egg Mountain - Diirty Sanchez Date: 8/18/2007 Trip Report: [font:Comic Sans MS]I love adventure climbing. A couple weeks ago, my girlfriend Sarah and I headed up to Tieton to check out a couple routes on Goose Egg Mountain. Sarah's been learning multipitch trad climbing over the last year, so we were looking for a route that was a bit of a step up from Beacon Rock and Ingalls Peak, while still reasonably close to Portland. (As usual, Sarah's a trooper - she's learning trad on adventury routes with loose rock and interesting descents instead of nice clean granite slabs.) We planned on climbing Ride the Lightning (III 5.9), but after meeting another party at the base, we traded them rights to the climb in exchange for a peek at their guidebook. Dirty Sanchez (III 5.8) was fun, similar to what the name implies. There were a few too many sections of loose rock for our liking (Sarah pulled a few handholds off and we pulled off two good sized rocks on the descent, one of which clonked me in the helmet). However, the climbing was still pretty fun. As usual, I'll let pictures tell the story: The route follows the left hand skyline in this picture. The top of pitch one is the base of the large pine tree. Sarah low on the route. Me leading pitch two - fun stemming! Looking east along the face. The Ride the Lightning corner is the long corner capped by a roof. If you look really closely, you can see the party above the roof. Sarah climbing through a notch. The little knife edge bit - yay! The rock got looser and we got colder after this. The next day, we had some awesome cragging at Royal Columns. Mmmmm... basalt! NOTE: As per other CC trip report discussions of the area, I think that the walkoff is a better idea than the Gangsta Rap rappels. The rock is a bit loose on the rappels - we knocked off two softball sized stones, and there are several rope-eating flakes. Walking would probably be faster too.[/font] Gear Notes: Helmet! Approach Notes: Flipflops worked fine. The start was a bit tricky to climb (We accidentally climbed up a 4th class bit and arrived half way up pitch 2 before finding the correct way). The tree at the top of Pitch 1 is BIG and OBVIOUS, the tree at the start of Pitch 1 is small and non-so-obvious.

No, the rope's not fixed. There's a fixed anchor on the close end and a horn on the far tower. First, lasso the horn (it took us 3-4 tries - we paid out about 30 feet of slack from either side of a loop and threw it). Once you've got the horn, you want to tie the rope into a really tight loop that goes through the fixed anchor on your end and around the horn on the other end. Leave the knot near the fixed anchor end. You both traverse across on this loop, and then pull the loop around so the knot is not on the far end, where you are. Untie the knot, pull the rope through, catch your breath, and keep going.

partner bailed on a bugs trip, so i've got a free week. i'll be in pdx, ready to climb most anything that's in good condition (sport, trad, alpine). i've just gotten back from the sierras, so i'm in decent shape. PM me. I'll be offline till friday (back in the mountains for a bit), but i'll get back to you then.

Trip: Temple Crag - Venusian Blind Arete and Sun Ribbon Arete Date: 8/8/2007 Trip Report: [font:Comic Sans MS]We were worried at the start of this trip. We're both good backcountry climbers. Robin, a climbing whiz since she was 13, climbed through youth competitions in California, then learned to trad and adventure climb. Me (Jeff), a bit of a late bloomer, dove into climbing in college and haven't come out since. We work exceptionally well together in the mountains and have climbed together on many trips, from the crags of New Hampshire to the wilderness of the Wind Rivers. But sometime these things get harder. I've spent the last year pouring my heart and soul into political activism in Portland Oregon - great fun, but 75 hours a week doesn't lend one to climbing much. Robin, working outdoor education in Marin, California, had been beset by an upsetting number of injuries - pulled tendons, busted knees, killer poison oak; they make it hard to get in good climbing shape. The routes we chose - big, long, committing. 13 and 19 pitches respectively. Rappels that were part of the climbing route. A tyrolean traverse. Altitude. Retreats that kept going up to the top before heading down. Great fun - stunning climbing, intense exposure, a full experience. But we worried that it might be a better experience for us when we were actually in shape. Worrying hasn't ever gotten anyone up a mountain, however, so with a great weather forecast and a good warmup in Tuolumne we decided to head in. Temple Crag is near the Palisades in the Sierras - one of the most alpine parts of the range. Its main feature is the big, hulking Northeast face. It dominates the view from the lakes in the valley, shooting up three thousand feet to a 12,999 ft. summit. Its long, sweeping aretes are home to a number of fantastic climbs, all long and commiting. The routes we climbed are shown below. Venusian Blind on the left, Sun Ribbon on the right.[/font] [font:Comic Sans MS]The approach wasn't as bad as we thought it was going to be. The trail up the North Fork of Big Pine Creek smoothly cruises up 6 miles to Third Lake. We made a pleasant camp on an outcrop above the lake. To warm up we climbed Venusian Blind (IV, 5.7, 13 pitches). It was a bit tricky to follow the guidebook instructions at the start - it's much easier to just head up and left towards the first tower. The rest of the climb was crazy fun - good climbing on decent rock along a sharp, exposed ridge. It was our first real ridge climb together, so we had fun with all the downclimbing and ridge walking. We simulclimbed the whole thing. Pictures will give a better sense of it. Hitting the ridge crest. Robin on a fun downclimby section. Me at the top, reading the summit register. After a rest day (and some great fishing), we headed up Sun Ribbon Arete. We were worried about its length. We'd never climbed climbs quite this long, or with lots of rappels and a tyrolean traverse. After sleeping through our alarm and waking up half an hour late, we stumbled up. The route breaks down into three major sections - it starts with several pitches of easier climbing (up to 5.7) gaining the ridge and up the lower section of the ridge to a tower, then traverses along the ridge with a tyrolean traverse, several towers which you climb up and rappel down, and the 10a crux pitch. It finishes with many pitches of generally easier climbing up, over, around and down the towers on the upper ridge. The crux pitch was well protected and quite fun. I'll let pictures tell the story. The first pitch to gain the ridge. In our nervous states, it felt a lot harder than 5.6. Awesome climbing on the lower ridge. Much of the rock is like this! The tyrolean traverse! AIIIIIEEEEEEEEEE! Phew... Me, starting to enjoy myself. One of the many towers. Climb up, rap down. A party behind us on the ridge. One of the last pitches... almost there! Yay! We made it up (and we're really tired). Robin on the descent. We made it back to camp by 8pm, half an hour before dark. These are both awesome climbs, and we were glad to be able to climb there. The ridge climbing is unlike any I've ever done before, and the tyrolean was waay cool. Combined with great Sierra weather, Temple Crag is definitely a great place to climb.[/font] Gear Notes: Medium light rack to #2. You don't need a #3 on the crux pitch on Sun Ribbon. Approach Notes: Not too bad. On the descent: It's generally pretty easy. We downclimbed the rappel (5.4 chimneyish). When you drop down to the flat area below the pass, go far right for the final drop to the base of the climb. Any further left puts you on very unstable glacial moraine. Easy to scout from the start of the climb.

I've got the weekend free and am itching to get out. I'd love Smith, Vantage, Trout Creek, or any mountaineery or alpine stuff if the weather permits (or any other ideas you want to float). I live in pdx, can sport, trad and easy ice lead (11ish sport right now and easy 10s trad), but I ain't got no car. So you'll have to either be in pdx with a car, or want to swing through pdx to grab me. I've got a decent rack to. (No, not that sort, I'm a dude). PM me. Jeff