tbyrnestl

During the climbing season Denali's summit has the same pressure as being at about 22k on Everest during its climbing season, about 1,300' of elevation between isobaric levels on the tow mountains. Gravity has little to do with it. The colder polar atmosphere is denser and thus thinner and fixed points protruding into it like summits exist further up in the atmosphere and thus at lower pressures. But since Denali is typically climbed during its summer when the polar atmosphere is warmer, the effect is at it's minimum.

Oh, and I wrote a song while up there - revised a bit since The tooth is much cooler than Everest 'Cause you don't need no oxygen mask No camping for weeks with Ed Viestur's smelly feet You just dash up to Pineapple Pass No jumars, no fixed lines, no trudging all day With well healed clients quaking in fear You just climb free and gay with you friends on belay And then toss back some vino and beer The tooth is much cooler than Everest 'Cause you don't need no sherpa or yak You can eat what you want and drink what you will You can summit with a 40 lb pack No kumbu, no ladders no Hillary step, Just cracks, flakes, jugs and big blocks There's even third class, so get drunk off your beer Then bivvy passed out right up on the top.

Trip: Tooth - S Face and bivvy (w/ drink) Date: 7/18/2009 Trip Report: After a year of talking about it we (Phil and Tim) finally got around to a bivvy-jam-drink night on the Tooth. We left Seattle at 3:00pm, started out on the Snow Lake Trail at 4:00 and were on top by about 8:30. (Tim has been dieting and didn't eat enough for lunch, hence a rather slow approach). We climbed in 35lb packs, each tricked out with Martin Backpacker guitar. Climbing with the packs was realtively hassle free, even on the 5.6 direct option on the last pitch. There aren't any out of balance moves on the route. There were a couple of moves up through grooves that I (Tim) avoided on lead by making thinner face moves around them. Phil was able move through them following though, so maybe the standard route is entirely pack friendly. Up top we had a nice dinner of wine, cheese, olives and fried tofu washed down with a bottle of Las Vals Vin de Pays de Hauterive and a bottle of Unibroue Trois Pistoles. Then we broke out the guitars and played for a few hours by headlamp. We opted for the summit block for our bivvy, and since it was a bit angled we tied in. We didn't get much sleep. The park service might have done a better job with the summit block. If it were just a bit more level it would be better for all-night partying. We (actually Tim left it out) discovered that packrats are not really big fans of derby-sage cheese. They are however quite fond of baguette, though they left even a piece of that behind after their raid. No insects though, only a light wind, nice temperatures: all in all a very nice night to be up das toof. All in all the tooth is pretty nice bivvy-picnic location. There are about 4 comfortable bivy spots below the summit block, another two that would work for passing out while sitting up, and the summit block would probably hold 6 on the section that is reasonably flat. Everyone on the summit block would want to tie-in for the night (if you use a Munter Mule you can adjust your location more easily than if you simply clove hitch in). Gear Notes: Martin Backpacker guitar, beer and wine to 2". About 35lbs works nicely for the summit pack. It holds plenty of wine, water, food etc. along with bivvy gear, and it provides a nice platform to strap a guitar to. I had a CCW Chaos (3800 cu in), and Phil had a CCW Valdez (2400 cu in). The Valdez was really to small for a proper drinking/jamming bivvy climb. The Chaos was a bit large. 3200 cu. in. is probably about perfect. Oh, and you'll want nice daisy chains for lashing down the guitar. Approach Notes: It can be tricky carrying a 35 lb pack with a guitar strapped to it through the trees on the approach trail, but only in a couple of spots. The approach is mostly melted out, all exposed talus and trail until you get past the big erratic bands at the base of the hanging valley. You can climb the valley on snow until maybe 500' before the approach gully, then talus again. Snow is firm and wet. Ice axe worth carrying. Glissading a pain the rear with all the suncups, wet snow and crud.

Trip: Three Queens - Cooper Pass - SE Shoulder Date: 9/1/2008 Trip Report: The Three Queens is the toothy ridge across the canyon NE of Hibox. These rocks are probably best enjoyed from that distance. The brief description in Beckey seemed to indicate a walk up until the final summit block so I thought it would be a good target for a late start. Not so much. It's pretty much third class for maybe 600 to 800 feet toward the ridge top, and a crappy third class at that. That and long sections of scree toward the top of the talus field make for some slow travel. The Mineral Creek Trail approach is in good shape. One blow-down, quite a bit of brush and some mud were the only negatives there. At about 3,500 you emerge from the forest with views of the peaks and of Alta and Hibox across the valley. Then about 100' of mild bushwhacking along a climbers' boot track puts you on the talus. From there you head up toward the notch to the right of the main peak following the path of least resistance. The first 1,000' are easy going over stable talus. The next 1,200' are a mix of not so stable talus and occasional third class gullies. The last 600' to the ridge is mostly up third class rock gullies. Once over the ridge you drop down 50' and contour around the back of the main peak to an obvious vegetated third-class ramp which gains the rige to the summit. The rock quality in general is poor. The gullies are loaded with choss with a lot of rotten rock besides. The rock is almost Olympics-bad. In fact the main peaks look a lot like the rock out in the Olympics when you get up close. It's all pretty harmless though with no big exposure. The biggest danger is getting hoarse from yelling *rock*. There's nothing like a day scrambling shifting talus and chossy third class gullies to make one appreciate better rock. Round trip from the car without pushing a pace was about 9 hours. Gear Notes: Nada - it's third class. Leather gloves could come in handy for the inevitable scree arrests on the descent. Approach Notes: Kudos to the Forest Service for the excellent shape of Cooper Pass Road. It sure looks like an easy walk-up from this angle. I think that's Stuart in the distance, from topside. The last climber drops out of the ascent gully. A closeup of the notch gully as we scramble back down. It's all easy third class with 15-20' of exposure here or there.