lazzara

Copy Jason thanks for update. Did the mutineers think trail ski/walk was better than skiing down Grouse and some off trail travel?

JG - is there enough snow to go straight up Grouse or did you stick to summer trail?

All the trailheads around the Chuckanuts are notorious for this less awesome kind of smash and grab. Pretty commonplace around here these days . . . I had an empty, 20 year old, 28L BD backpack stolen out of car via broken window at North Chuckanut TH - can't leave anything in sight. TNF bag or green army duffel no difference - thievery is equal opportunity up here.

Some more photos from the summer and a feeble attempt at some wit here: http://leelazzara.blogspot.com/

Trip: Bernese Oberland - Eiger - Mittellegi Date: 8/6/2015 Trip Report: Life is full of trade-offs . . . you don't get something for nothing . . . insert some other droll cliché here. Alpine climbing in Europe is no different. The camping gear you don't carry is sometimes offset by some random dude snoring in your face at the hut. The food you don't have to buy and pack is sometimes replaced by marginal soup, unidentifiable meat and a worthless breakfast. If you don't eat dairy you are kind of hosed. No gluten or carbs? Fully hosed! That approach you float over in the tram, gondola, chairlift or train (or all four in the same trip)? - probably more expensive than driving your Honda Civic to the Valley from Portland, OR. Oh yeah, and everybody over here climbs too so the idea of having some uber-classic, historical route all to yourself is as likely as . . something else that is not very likely. That being said sometimes the hut is beautiful, modern and empty, the food awesome and the climbing fully inspiring and worth it - crowd or no crowd. After five weeks of work in the Alps peppered with some climbing for fun here and there, I had two days to kill before my flight from Geneva. Two days of good weather were in the forecast and the Mittellegi was reputed to only take an afternoon and a morning (plus a two hour train ride on either side). Having made climbs of the Mont Blanc (White Mountain for the literal) and the Hornli on the Matterhorn (Meadow Mountain) in the proceeding weeks, the Alps Trilogy was within reach! But only if we could navigate our way to start of the climb . . . Eiger, Monch and Jungfrau from Kliene Scheidegg Step #1 - Get fully bitched out by the hotel desk attendant where my partners were staying because I didn’t say good morning to her – not kidding. Classic Swiss . . . but I will always say "Guten Morgen" from now on Step #2 – Train from Interlaken Ost to Eismeer Station literally inside the South Ridge of the Eiger Interlaken Ost Eismeer Station chaos Step #3 – Find and descend tunnel to glacier. Feel for a moment like you are in some documentary style horror flick. [video:vimeo] Tunnel exit and downclimb to glacier Step #4 – Cross glacier, don’t get crushed by seracs Step #5 – Climb a few pitches of 5.7 limestone with wet boots with 4 other teams at the same time 4 rope teams, 1 ring bolt anchor, no problem Step #6 – Traverse ledges of uber choss to Mittellegi Hut Step #7 – Eat soup, buy multiple ½ liter bottles of water at 5 francs a pop, force down rice with meat in gravy Home is where the hut is Evening cloud play Step #8 – Sleep, kind of. Wake up in middle of night to take a leak off the ridge and realize that you could fall thousands of feet off the mountain wearing only boxers and socks. Step #9 – Fake your way through 4am breakfast with instant coffee. Step out of hut, onto ridge and realize you will be climbing with thousands of feet of exposure from now through the rest of the day. Follow trail of crampon scratch marks and fixed ropes to summit. Most of the route was non-descript limestone climbing by headlamp - anything over 5.6 has a fat fixed boat rope pinned to the rock with metal stanchions Route finding clues for those who have problems following the obvious ridge Crowd control is achieved by the fact the hut only sleeps 36 - or 40 in a pinch when folks with no reservation show up as we found out. The local Grindelwald guides have right of way, then the visiting guided teams, then everybody else. We got totally smoked by the local guides but found a nice pace about in the middle of the visiting guide peloton. Though this system seems beyond comprehension by North American standards, it actually works pretty well. The local guides are going to cruise the route since they've done it countless times and they want to get home early. On the other hand some of the unguided teams were hours behind - probably because they were trying to place gear where there was none and simul-climb through terrain that was more swiftly managed with short pitches and terrain belays. The managed departure from the hut kind of sorts folks out before they get on route. It aids in preventing some of the on route bottlenecks and some frustrations as well. Another team rapping from mid-ridge tower It's kind of scenic up there We reached the top in a about 4 hours through swirling clouds. Descent was by the South Ridge to the col between the Eiger and the Monch - followed by some glacier to the Jungfraujoch and the train back to the valley. Easy, right? After and hour or so of downclimbing and about 5 raps we realized that the rest of the descent was actually a climb of the lower NE Ridge of the Monch. The descent involved climbing the ridge past the last snowfield in the middle of the photo to reach glacier traverse Pitched out climbing on the descent After a few more hours of climbing we reached a spot to unrope - a snowcat packed tourist trail that lead across more glacier back to the Jungfraujoch. Oddly enough this trail passed within meters of large open crevasses and under some not insignificant seracs. Foot prints wandered to the edges of the big cracks - so as to get better deep hole photos we suspected. Maybe the alpine version of putting your child on a bison at Yellowstone? Full tourist action in the shadow of 4000m peaks The Junk-frau-jock - "The Top of Europe" - has got to be the craziest spectacle of alpine tourism out there. The Midi's got nothing on this place. Tubbing, ziplines and a Disney style walking loop inside the mountain called "Alpine Splendor." There's also a hotel, an observatory and probably some duty free shopping as well. We had to ask for directions 3 times to find the train outta there. Tuckered out from a big day in hills Though definitely not memorable by virtue of the climbing itself, Alps objectives like the Mittellegi not only put a new spin on climbing but also put one in touch with the roots of Alpine history. And banging out a reasonably big climb in a wild setting without touching a foot to dirt or trail is an interesting departure from our North American climbing paradigm. It's also just cool to climb a peak called the Eiger. Gear Notes: 50m rope (the most needed for descent raps) Few finger to thin hands cams 4-5 quickdraws to simul climb fixed rope sections A few big lockers like the Petzl Williams are nice - they can clip on to any of the massive fixed ropes or stanchions around the Alps Steel pons, axe, etc. $$$$ Approach Notes: Train: Interlaken Ost > Eismeer Station tunnel + Jungfraujoch > Interlaken Ost - through Grindelwald is shorter I think Total trip cost for train and hut + water ~225CHF

So is the goulotte the actual C-B finish up the right side of the Fin (?) or is it the line more to the right that hooks up with the Serp?

That's the motherlode for sure . . . Thanks for linking

The orange ones - a pair or four. I'll pay the shipping and whatever it takes to make it worth your while to send them. Thanks!

Quick conditions note from ascent on 3/8: - Still awesome climbing. Kind of like climbing the ice pitches between the 1st and 2nd Couloirs on the TC's over and over. - Last pitch to gain the 3rd Couloir is way melted out compared to the OP's photo. Blebs of ice, moss sticks (bomber) and a few hooks get you up that last 30'. A Sceptre was nice to have for frozen moss pro. - Rock gear/anchors are there but take a sharp eye and some poking around. Had three stubbies and could've used one or two more. We ended up cleaning a fair bit of snow, dirt and micro choss out of poor looking cracks and ended up with some good gear placements. - Recent snow/spindrift on upper snowfield makes for some trailbreaking but pretty trivial overall.

Conditions are too good to pass up but partner pool is dry for these days. Looking at routes like the Geber-Sink or the mixed line between Backbone and Serpentine, something on the west side, etc. Open to other ideas too . . . cheers

The Bahnhoff (yes, it's right across from the train station) has hostel style bunk rooms and a well equipped kitchen. Probably still spendy but at least you don't have to eat out. In the summer it was 40-ish CHF a night but probably more in the winter. I've been told all the Co-op's (the Swiss grocery chain) are obliged to sell food at the same cost at all locations in Switzerland. So that stick of sausage in Zermatt costs the same as it would in Geneva - not that it's affordable in either locale. Still making your own food is reasonable even in Zermatt . . In Cham the recommended place in town is the Ski Station. Hostel with breakfast I think. France feels downright cheap after you've been in Switzerland for awhile . . Another logistical aspect is getting all your shit from Chamonix to Zermatt if you are going to stay in Zermatt for a bit. It's way less of a hassle to get from Zermatt to Geneva than to go from Zermatt to Chamonix to Geneva. I think there are taxi services that can transport your kit after you blast off on the Haute Route. Hope this helps you some

Maybe . . . on the other hand I think there might actually be a fair bit of snow up high. We have gotten some pretty significant precip events this winter with a freezing/snow level hovering around 6k (though sometimes going much higher than that). Just because we've got jack shit for snow at low elevations doesn't necessarily mean there's no snow anywhere in the mountains . . . Skiing around up on the Coleman Gl. it doesn't seems any less filled in this year than last. And climbing the TC's the other day the gullies were surprisingly filled in compared with photos I've seen from years that registered much lower on the 'oh shit there is no snow' meter. Thoughts from the community at large?

I think belonging to the group camped above the west side of the lake on Friday/Saturday (you were the only folks we saw up there with skis). I probably won't see a pm on this board so email me at: lee.lazzara yahoo.com I can get them to you one way or another

Got transport figured out - thanks for the ride offers . .

I'm in B'ham but could meet in SEA or PDX via the bus on another ride. Split gas of course . . . I need to be there by the afternoon of Oct 5th. Shoot me an email at lee.lazzara at yahoo if you have space. Thanks!

Mine is dying after years of use. Best layer I've owned yet with hundreds of days in field skiing, ice/mixed, walking very slowly uphill in the dark . . . Is there a legit soft-shell out there in the same style of the Ascensionist? - Very light and packable, not a bulky, too-warm soft shell that's more like an insulating layer - Fits like a hardshell without being one - Actually weather-resistant to some degree Most of the softshells that seems to come close the Ascensionist are a bit lightweight in comparison (i.e. OR Ferrosi).

Side note on Pan Dome - Baker Pro Patroller yesterday said they are restricting access to the top of the climb through their rope lines. Climbing, leading - no problem. He made it sound like they just don't want people walking around above the climb. If you have questions about this you should direct them to the Baker patrol or Duncan @ (360)300-7070

Good enough. 10-30cms over the variable crust over wet snow from early in the last storm. Hand shears showing just enough reactivity to think twice about steeper windloaded pockets with consequences. Skiing decent - some surprise crust where scoured. Sun definitely out and working the snow a little on solar aspects, but any thin MF crust would most likely losen up with continued solar in the coming day. Any day the sun is out in the Baker Zone seems worthy enough . .

I've got the Coast ice book but still not sure how far past Bridal Veil this climb is located. The approach notes make it sound like 10k but . . . ?

Last I heard it snowed about a foot up there (9/23-24). With sun the south side of the ridge might melt out but the north side will hold snow (unless we get rain up high?) Another consideration is the 2nd pitch corner of the approach pitches might be wet and mungy for sometime. On my last trip up there (9/19 - with about 3" on the north side)it seemed like you can climb large portions of the ridge directly on the crest or on the south side - maybe just a bit harder than the line most folks take that veers off to easier climbing on the north side of the ridge much of the way. Or crampons might help . . . We gained the rock island on the west side about midway between the toe of the rock island and the top of the snowfield. Did a short rap in to the moat to a ledge below the gully. Picked up anchor at the end of the day. I'm sure a bollard would work too . . .

+1 for the FF Vireo Rated 25F for the lower and 45F(?) for the upper - it's made to use with a big puffy in cold conditions and sans when it's warmer. Opposed to a 1/2 bag, it actually comes up and slightly over my shoulders (if you get it long enough - check dimensions) so I sleep better than in other minimalist bags. I think 1.0lbs and it only takes up 1/2 of an OR dry stuff sack - puffy, etc goes in other half. A better visualization would be to imagine your sleeping bag packed down to the size of a large grapefruit. I actually use this bag on winter multi day ski trips with a phat puffy - just eat lots of butter before you nod off and sleep in a snow shelter . . Only downfall is no zipper - when it's truly warm out (like 60F nights in Boston Basin) you can't unzip and drape it over you. It's in or out.

Though I can also attest to good times climbing and hanging out in MT, I'd have to say that climbing ridiculously steep limestone between tropical swim sessions, $0.50 Pad Thai and spending time with non-North American women is probably a bit more awesome than Bozeman.

Thinking Bulletheads East and some other 5.10/11a pitches in that area. Mid-morning to sundown. It's 1:45 from my house to the chief with no issues at the border and minor traffic on the 1 (getting on that road at Canada Way). I'll drive. You have no issues crossing the border. Sushi on the way home. If you live up there would gladly meet you along the way.

Are the East Ledges rap's still in? Word has the NPS axed the well established rap line west of the West Ridge gully. The rap line on Torment got the chop too it sounds like. Sounds like a mess up there. Have fun!

I just climbed that route on Friday and compared to last year (and the year before) there is way, way less snow over the ice in the upper portion of the chute. If you look at the MORA blog for the Kautz it actually shows ice in the upper chute in early May. Before our climb it looked snow covered from a distance but ended up being only 12" or less of weak snice over better ice. I would try to sink pickets but they bottomed out 1/2 way. Some excavation revealed decent ice underneath. Long screws were hard to sink for the last few cm's and seemed very strong. Would the weight of a couple of slightly longer screws really prevent you from climbing the route? There's plenty of other places in one's kit to shave weight . . .