Steph_Abegg

Wow, thanks for sharing your experience on the Booker-Buckner col approach. As in the photo below, we did have a fairly thick bridge. I stopped below it and asked Brian to come up to the right and take a look before I actually crossed it, to make sure it was thick and strong enough. I remember thinking that it would probably be within the week that the bridges on that crack would melt out and make access more difficult....looks like you guys were there to see it happen. Glad you weren't hurt! Sounds like you had a successful trip too. Did you bivy on Goode? I know you mentioned it was not in your plans.... -Steph

Yep, still at a rate of 1 party per year. Except last year when there were 2.....

Trip: Thunder Slam: - Goode NE Buttress, Storm King, Booker, Logan Date: 7/29-8/3/2012 Trip Report: Camping on the highest point in North Cascades National Park, the summit of Mt. Goode. For six days (July 29-Aug 3), Brian Walkenhauer and I traversed through some of the highest and most rugged and beautiful terrain in the North Cascades, carrying our full packs over two of the highest summits in the Park and scrambling up two others. We included in our itinerary one of the most spectacular camp spots in the North Cascades: on the summit of Mt. Goode, the highest point in NCNP. We occasionally hit a trail, but only briefly before we scampered back into the wilder cross-country terrain. Besides for the first few miles on either end of the trip, we did not encounter a single human being the entire time. I've posted a full trip report on my website with maps, route overlays, about 100 photos, commentary, and the adventures of a particular tiny stuffed mountain goat. http://www.stephabegg.com/home/tripreports/washington/northcascades/thunderslam Map of our daily GPS tracks: Goode NE Buttress to SW Couloir carryover: Storm King SW Basin Route: Booker NW Route: Logan Fremont Glacier to Banded Glacier carryover: Again, the link to the full TR and many more photos on my website... http://www.stephabegg.com/home/tripreports/washington/northcascades/thunderslam

Trip: Snowfield, Pyramid, Pinnacle, Stump, Colonial - Date: 7/23-25/2012 Trip Report: = Snowfield from the summit of Colonial. From July 23-25, my sister and I enjoyed a fabulous climbing, glacier traversing, and high camping adventure in the Snowfield area. We climbed Snowfield, Pyramid, Pinnacle, Paul Bunyan's Stump, and Colonial. The weather looked a bit questionable, but NOAA promised sun for the second and third day. Sure enough, after arriving at camp in a chilly white out the first day, we woke up surrounded by mountains gleaming under the cloudless and calm skies. The Cascades at its best. Full Trip Report: I've posted a full trip report (maps, route overlays, about 50 photos, commentary, and the adventures of a tiny stuffed mountain goat) on my website. Unfortunately, because of the way I have formatted it, I cannot directly copy and paste my html into nwhikers, so you'll have to go to my website to see the photos. http://www.stephabegg.com/home/tripreports/washington/northcascades/snowfieldslam Map of Travels: = GPS Route Lines. Day 1: From Pyramid Lake trailhead (1150 ft) on HWY 20, we hiked 2.1 miles to Pyramid Lake (2600 ft), then followed a climbers' trail steeply south to the ridge crest and then along the ridge to the base of Pyramid Peak. Here, we set up the tent and weathered out inclement weather for a few hours, then packed up, descended to the Colonial Glacier, traversed/ascended to the Colonial-Neve Glacier col (6840 ft), set up camp, and did logic puzzles for the rest of the evening. (6.6 miles, 7130' gain, 1640' loss, 7 hours) = Summer in the Cascades. = We took a compass heading and followed it to our camp at the Colonial-Neve Glacier Col. = Weather patterns in the Cascades never cease to amaze me. A starry clear night. Day 2: Climbed Snowfield Peak (8347 ft) via its standard West Ridge route. Attempted to climb the Horseman but decided against it when we encountered slippery black lichen. We proceeded to scramble up a couple of small spires along the ridge to the west before we descended the Neve Glacier back to the Colonial-Neve Glacier col. Climbed Pyramid Peak (7182 ft) via its standard South Slope route. Then climbed Pinnacle Peak (7360 ft) via its North Ridge and descended via its SW Route. Then climbed Paul Bunyan's Stump (7480 ft) via its SW Route. Returned to camp at the Colonial-Neve Glacier col. (9.7 miles, 6230' gain/loss, 13 hours) = Route up Snowfield. = Heading for the west ridge (right skyline). = Class 3 scramble to summit. = On the summit of Snowfield. = We spent the afternoon on a Pyramid-Pinnacle-Stump tour. = The easy ascent of Pyramid. = Some exposed 4th class on the North Ridge of Pinnacle. = A lone snowball. = We couldn't resist making a snowman. = The pretty green SW route on Paul Bunyan's Stump. = Our camp at the Colonial-Neve Glacier col was worth the extra effort to get there. Day 3: Packed up camp and descended to the Colonial Glacier. Climbed Colonial Peak (7771 ft) via its standard West Ridge route. Hiked out to the car the same way we came in. (7.2 miles, 2320' gain, 7880' loss, 9 hours) = The standard route up Colonial. = Steep snow on Colonial. = At the notch just below the summit. From here, an off route adventure ensued for us. = Pretty rocks in the Colonial basin. A great trip!

Trip: Chilliwack Slam - Spickard, Rahm, Custer, Redoubt, SE Mox Date: 7/4/2012 Trip Report: =Happy 4th of July! From July 4-8, Brian Walkenhauer and I enjoyed 5 days in the Chilliwack Group. We climbed five Top 100 summits in five days: Spickard, Rahm, Custer, Redoubt, and SE Mox. Full Trip Report: I've posted a full trip report (maps, route overlays, about 100 photos, commentary, and the adventures of a tiny stuffed mountain goat) on my website. Unfortunately, because of the way I have formatted it, I cannot directly copy and paste my html into cascadeclimbers, so you'll have to go to my website to see the photos. http://www.stephabegg.com/home/tripreports/washington/northcascades/chilliwackslam Map of Travels: Day 1: Depot Creek TH (2300 ft) to Lake Ouzel (5700 ft), climb Spickard (8879 ft, #16, via South Slope) 6580+ ft elev. gain, 6:15 Car to Lake, 2:30 Lake to Summit, 1:10 Summit to Lake Day 2: Climb Rahm (8478 ft, #60, via SW Route) and Custer (8630 ft, #39, traverse from Rahm, descend South Ridge) 4150+ ft elev. gain/loss, 3:20 Lake to Rahm, 2:45 Rahm to Custer, 2:00 Custer to Lake Day 3: Move camp to head of Redoubt Glacier (7200 ft), climb Redoubt (8969 ft, #18, via South Route) 4300+ ft elev. gain/loss, 2:00 Lake Ouzel to Redoubt Glacier Camp, 2:30 Camp to Summit, 1:35 Summit to Camp Day 4: Climb SE Mox (8509 ft, #56, from West) 4000+ ft elev. gain/loss, 5:30 Camp to Summit, 3:00 Summit to Camp, (6:00 r.t. from Col of the Wild) Day 5: Hike Out 9.1 miles, 5720+ ft elev. loss, 5:50 Camp to Car A great trip!

Yes you can drive to the trailhead, and the trail is pretty easy to follow even when it hits the snow. the conditions on the Col-Dem route were good, it's an easy snow climb right now. A bit post-holey on the way down though a the day warms up, but only for about an hour so I wouldn't have carted snowshoes up there just for that. going up in the early AM it should be nice and firm.

You're welcome. Nice to find out who the other parties were on the route, especially with that great photo Scurlock captured of all of us on the route that day. His flight around the mountain really did have perfect timing, with all of us on the ice step like that. Now, who's the 3rd party....?

Trip: Mount Baker - North Ridge Date: 6/27/2012 Trip Report: On Wednesday, June 27, Tom Sjolseth, Daniel Jeffrey, and I took advantage of a 1-day weather window in late June to climb the North Ridge of Baker. This route is often regarded as one of the best technical snow-and-ice climbs on a Cascades volcano. We had great early summer conditions, and even with a spicy ice pitch variation, a party of three, and a scenic forested detour on the descent, we climbed the route car-to-car in 14 hours. Car-to-trip-report: 30.5 hours. As usual, I've posted a full trip report on my website: http://www.stephabegg.com/home/tripreports/washington/northcascades/bakernridge John Scurlock flyby: Friend and aerial photographer John Scurlock knew I was climbing the north ridge of Baker, so he made a brief Baker detour on a fueling flight to Arlington. When I got home, sure enough, there was an email and a bunch of photos from John. Pretty cool to see yourselves climbing from this perspective! Map/Route: Route overlay on aerial photo. Route overlay on photo from climb. GPS track. Photos: Due to the technical and car-to-car nature of this climb, I decided to just bring a point-and-shoot camera rather than my shoots-much-better-photos-but-not-when-you've-got-only-one-hand-free SLR. It was a stellar day in the mountains, so I still got some fairly decent photos nonetheless. =Tom traversing the Coleman Glacier towards the North Ridge. Fairweather early morning clouds over the summit of Baker. This photo was taken shortly before we started encountering bigger crevasses and roped up accordingly. =Lincoln Peak shrouded in early morning mist. =Sunlit seracs on the upper Coleman Glacier, with Colfax Peak still in shadow behind. =There are some giant cracks on the Coleman Glacier. =A watch-me-here snow bridge. =Looking back at the Coleman Glacier we just crossed. =What a nice day! We headed up the slope just to the right above Tom's head in this photo. This is the "higher start" in Nelson and Potterfield's guidebook. In later season, icy conditions and/or rockfall and/or the bergschrund might prevent easy access to the ridge this way, and an alternative is to go around the toe of the ridge ("lower start") on the left. =Sunlight and shadow. =Another snowbridge on the Coleman Glacier. =Ascending the slope ("higher start") to gain the North Ridge proper. =Easy travel on the 35-40° slopes of the lower North Ridge. =At 9,600', things get interesting. Here there is an obvious steep step. There are several possible route variations here. We chose to go left, while a couple of other parties on the route chose to go right. If we had gone left around the toe of the ridge, it would actually have been pretty mellow, but we got suckered into a 70-80° ice cliff (just to the right of Daniel in this photo)..... =Tom leading the 70-80° ice cliff pitch, perhaps 50' or so. This is definitely past my leading comfort zone. But in retrospect it was a fun pitch and added a bit of spice to the route. =Daniel at the screw and tool belay at the base of our ice cliff pitch. =Daniel topping out on the crest of the ice cliff at the top of the first pitch. That splitboard might be heavy and clunky here, but it will be worth it for the 30 minute descent and impressive car-to-car time! =Looking up the second ice pitch, along the crest of the ice cliff. This was easier than the first pitch but still required a few screws along the way. The nice part about climbing the left side of the ice step is that it feels like you are staying more on the ridge crest. =Above the 2-pitch ice step, the ridge opens up onto broader snow-and-ice slopes. A slip here would be difficult to stop and you'd find yourself back below the ice step you just ascended and probably not in any shape to reascend it, so we stayed roped up and set a couple of pickets as we continued upward. As the photo shows, it was a bit windy and the anchors often had to be dug out from a fresh layer of spindrift. =Eventually the rope and pickets got annoying and the terrain kicked back enough that we decided to unrope and slog to the summit. There were a few steep and icy sections on the final section, but the conditions made for good crampon point and axe tip purchase. (I had thought that this final section would pose some serac and crack issues, but perhaps these were chocked in with early-season snowcover.) =Daniel ascending the final slope to the summit plateau. =Tom on the summit plateau. The true summit (called Grant Peak) is the highest point in the middle of the photo. =On the summit! Always bring a pen and alphabet cookies to the summit—then, if the register lacks a pen, you've got one, and if the register is buried, just sign the summit, take a photo, and eat the register. =Descending the Coleman-Deming route. =There are some large crevasses on the Coleman Glacier, so Tom and I stayed roped up for most of the descent. Daniel had brought his snowboard, which I suppose in theory would make it easier to coast right over thin snowbridges and jump larger cracks that you cannot avoid in time. =A sun halo above Colfax Peak. A sign of weather to come.... =We enjoyed a few 300 ft/min glissades. In fact, we enjoyed our final glissade so much that we ended up taking it nearly to trailhead elevation in the wrong drainage....a scenic detour through the forest ensues.... =Found on the lower Coleman Glacier. Seems rather odd that you could lose such an item, as a bag of droppings in your backpack would certainly be something I would want to keep tabs on at all times. Especially if it's anywhere near those alphabet cookies you can eat after you get to the summit.

Trip: Grand Canadian Mountain Aerial Tour, May 2012 - Date: 5/17/2012 Trip Report: From May 13-16, John Scurlock and I flew a 2,103-mile circuit over and amongst some of the most spectacular mountainous terrain in North America. We photographed renowned summits and ranges such as Mt. Sir Donald, Mt. Sir Sandford, the Adamants, a vast stretch of Canadian Rockies from Jasper National Park to Mt. Assiniboine, the Bugaboos, Leaning Towers, the Valhallas, and more. My list of summits I want to climb now certainly exceeds a single lifetime. Map of our grand Canadian mountain tour: On my website, I posted a trip report with about 100 of my favorite photographs from this grand Canadian mountain tour. Since words fall far short of describing our experiences over the 4 days, I hope that the photographs give a sense of the awesome mountain grandeur John and I experienced. http://www.stephabegg.com/home/tripreports/britishcolumbia/rockiesairplanecamping2 Here's a selection of photos:

Aid Photography, coined a new term. I like it. =)

Trip: Mt. Waddington and back in 10 hours - Date: 3/24/2012 Trip Report: saturday, waddington flight?? weather forecast promising.... (Email from John Scurlock, 8:40 AM on Thursday, March 22, 2012) a one-day early morning departure thing? (Email reply from Steph (me), 8:43 AM) yes. go big....! try and be in Campbell river by 0800 to 0830, prob leave concrete at about 0630 or a little later. forecast beyond Sat not looking so great. sat image this moment is clear for 500 miles.... I'll fuel the plane tomorrow. (John, 8:46 AM) okay! (Steph, 8:48 AM) And that is how a trip of a lifetime comes into being. Eight email minutes and a few months of behind-the-scenes planning, weather-watching, and missed opportunities due to schedule conflicts. Within a 10-hour span on the third day of spring, John Scurlock and I flew a circuit of 833 miles to the incredibly rugged terrain of the British Columbia Coast Mountains and back. Our primary intent, which we executed to the fullest, was photographing Mt. Waddington. With clear skies and manageable winds, we circled around Waddington several times, and also around the nearby Combatant, Tiedemann, Asperity, Serras, and Mt. Bell, all of which are amazing summits in themselves. On the route back to Campbell River, we detoured about 30 miles to the southeast to the snowy expanse of the Homathko Icefield, where we photographed Queen Bess, Grenville, Bute, and several summit islands rising out of the ice. Now I know for certain I've got to climb in the Waddington area someday, and the Homathko Icefield inspires me all the more so to get into skiing. Words can't describe how spectacular and unique this experience was. The best I can do it show some photos from this amazing aerial adventure. I've posted a trip report on my website (which gives more photos and more detail): http://www.stephabegg.com/home/tripreports/britishcolumbia/waddingtonaerial Also, a small selection of photos below. Enjoy and be inspired! Go to my website to see more!

Every year my standard Christmas present to friends/family is a calendar comprised of photos from my favorite summer adventure(s). This year, I am making a Canadian Rockies Aerial Photography 2012 Calendar. I make my calendars in iPhoto and order through Apple. The downside of using Apple to do the printing is that the calendars are pricy (roughly $27 once I include shipping); but the major upside is the beautiful product and large format images, not the cheap 8.5x11 calendars that are offered by most outfits online. If anyone is interested in one of these calendars, please contact me, and I can add calendar(s) to my order list. Only comes out to a couple dollars per photo in the end.... =) sabegg@gmail.com if interested.

John took one as we flew around the north side. Nothing from the standard view from the south side, besides in the distance when photographing Gimli. However, that north side is rarely seen, so it's a cool perspective!

And if you look closely there is a hanging glacier in a rather cool circular form. If unnamed, I would name it Pimple Glacier. =) I do not know the climbing history. Bivouac.com does not name any routes, only a first ascent in 1929. But I'd be very curious to find out what has and what hasn't been climbed.

Maybe someday, but it's a bit of a commute! Any chance you would come up to Seattle for my night photography workshop? =)

Yeah, those walls look like climbs where it would be difficult to pick out any particular route line that would not vary by year and fluctuations in condition. Makes it a challenge when every attempt is a quasi first attempt..... How about the NF of North Twin, now that's another rugged wall!

We flew by the N and W sides of Mt. Alberta, so I got some shots of the W side as well (see below). And some close-ups. Were you interested in a particular aspect?

Oh yeah, now I want to climb more than ever...starting with Mt. Robson, next summer hopefully (you interested?). Sounds like this summer wasn't such a good one for Robson anyway—-only one party summited the entire season! Send me a photo of a 20Ker if you ever get a chance to take a photo out the window. I'd like to see what the terrain is like over there. Hope the leg's doing good these days.... -Steph

The S Ridge of Gimli is one of my favorite rock climbs. It's 5.8, 7 pitches, easy descent, easy approach, can be done car-to-car in a day. Just don't let the secret out...

Trip: Robson to Bugaboos in 6 days: - Airplane Camping and Aerial Photography Date: 9/19-24/2011 Trip Report: Last week I joined aerial photographer and pilot John Scurlock on a 6-day aerial adventure in the Canadian Rockies. Over the course of a week and a total of 16 hours in the air, we traveled from Mt. Robson and the northern Rockies in Kakwa Provincial Park down along the west side of Jasper National Park, visiting the Tonquin Valley, the Hooker, Clemenceau, and Columbia Icefields, and then flew around the Valhallas, the Bugaboos, and Mt. Assiniboine. The flying conditions were great, the mountains basked in the late summer light, and the trip in general was just so unique and epic that at times it was hard to believe that we were swooping at eye-level past snow-dusted monoliths of the remote Canadian Rockies. And not just one or two, but hundreds. Needless to say, it was a mountain trip of a lifetime. Maps / Route Overlays • Map of our flight path. • Our flight line around Mt. Robson, with photo locations designated. Pretty cool. Trip Report I've posted a trip report and photos on my website: http://www.stephabegg.com/home/tripreports/britishcolumbia/rockiesairplanecamping Here are a few photos.... To see more, go to my trip report on my website: http://www.stephabegg.com/home/tripreports/britishcolumbia/rockiesairplanecamping

Chockstone Rappel, West Twin Needle Rappeling off a nut, Mt. Stuart Skyhook on 3rd pitch of Liberty Crack Old Pins on North Buttress of Bear Mtn Pile of old slings (found in Marblemount ranger station) taken of NE Ridge of Mt. Triumph Built in anchors

Problem is, a parking pass costs more than a decent recumbent bike of my own. And I'll probably want to hog the machine for hours....=)

Thanks, but I am hoping to find one in the Seattle area if possible....

More like almost 5.....

I suffered a severe broken leg back in September during a climbing accident. (It's been a tough recovery so far, I have posted a "recovery trip report" on my website: https://sites.google.com/site/stephabegg/home/tripreports/recovery) Anyway, I've just been cleared to start using a recumbant exercise bike. Money is pretty tight for me these days, so I was wondering if anyone had an old recumbant exercise bike lying around that I could borrow for 3-4 months?? I would be willing to pay for it too. Please contact me at sabegg@gmail.com or respond to this post, thanks so much. UPDATE FEB 10: I got a bike, thanks everyone for your kind words and help. Pedal, pedal, pedal... -Steph With this atrophy, I'll be riding that bike every chance I get.