Ian Lauder

I found an old lost summit register on Luna last year that was a film canister from the 70s. Most of the pages were crumbled and faded beyond recognition.

I don''t do well in heat either. Its surfing weather

Be safe out there. With these temps we scrapped our Sinister climb for this weekend. Not sure what to do, but we're going to sit out anything big or that has stream fording.

One thing to maybe note is on our way in the 1st crossing 1.5 miles in from the trailhead was fine. But by 5pm on our way out it was raging and not crossable. We went about 500ft downstream to where there are a handful of fallen logs that are over half the stream where its split into 2 steams. We dropped some branches between 2 rocks that otherwise would have been a jump across, then au chevalled another log. If the water was raging on the way in the au cheval would work fine but if those branches we dropped are swept away that could be a bitch to figure out how to get across.

I'd say snow started consistent a bit higher like 4200ish in the trees. No postholing and we didn't punch through any bridges. Once you get out of the trees in the upper slopes the snow is probably 3-4 feet deep still. Biggest issue are how high the streams are running. The normal crossings are covered and even the one 500ft upstream on Terror Creek the normal log was a waterfall. Still found 2 smaller logs to zig zag across.

We did that Eiley Wiley Ridge in and out last year to Challenger. As much as I'd like to pull out the good camera gear and do the fantastic milky way shots I'm seeing more and more. After an approach like that I just want to sleep.

Trip: Mount Terror - West Ridge Trip Date: 06/20/2021 Trip Report: YouTube video: https://youtu.be/xpHcQ5-uq5g 3 day trip, early season. Crux of the trip were the raging stream crossings. Getting in during the morning was okay. But had to work to find a crossing on the way back with the streams rising. Went aways downstream on the last crossing and hopped a big rock to an island then climbed up to a pair of fallen logs and au chevaled one to get across. We saw more bear crap on the trail this trip than the last 10 years combined. Literally about every couple hundred feet was a pile of bear poo. Heard some crashing through the brush on the way out pretty close to the trailhead. The poo thinned out once we got to Terror Creek but still saw some up on the climbers trail on the ridge. Other than that its tough to follow the climbers trail in without constantly losing it. If you lose it don't venture too far, find it as soon as possible. From Terror creek it was almost 4000ft gain before we saw any running water for as much snow as there is up there. The campsite at the col is under a giant 10ft mound of snow with just the edge visible. We carved out a tent platform in a whiteout just next to the rocks of the ridge. Next morning had great weather and snow all the way from camp to within 10ft of the notch up the gully. Great conditions going up, didn't rope up, no moats forming yet. Then a short steep snow section up to the base of the rock climb. Not sure why there are reports of 2 pitches of low 5th class. We did a 30 meter pitch of low 5th then it was easy scrambling from there. We went to the false summit first (in hindsight should have gone into the right gully below the face further down. This meant a 4th class downclimb a hundred feet or so. There were some rap slings but we just downclimbed. It looked intimidating from further back but once on the left side of the face it was great 3rd class (some have said 4th class) scrambling with solid rock. Steep enough we did 3 rappels back down from existing slings. The rap stations were all looking pretty ratty so we left behind a couple slings to back them up. The step across to the true summit is exposed but easy on solid rock. The summit register is in a crack right at the summit block. If you step up to the summit block, look down and its in a little white PVC tube in a crack. The snow coming down the gully was a couple inches of soft mush over hardpack and we had to facein downclimb about 2/3 of it. Gear Notes: 60m skinny rope, light rack to #1, a few small nuts, ice axe, crampons Approach Notes: Its the Pickets, it sucks. Like the TR before us. If you loose the climbers trail, find it. Crux of the trip were the raging stream crossings.

There weren't any other entries in the register after yours for 2020. We just signed it a couple days ago. FYI, the little PVC tube is soaking wet inside. Good thing its waterproof paper.

That was a great trip. We did it the weekend before you. Fun ridge weaving through the cornices.

We've done West Mac a couple times. I think I overheard my wife mention something about wanting to traverse over there. She does most of the planning and I just try to keep up.

LOL, yea, we did the Eiley Wiley ridge route in and out for Challenger last month. Got a taste of that already. Next trip there next season we may shoot for both Furys. We've planned a full traverse multiple times last year but weather kept us out every time.

Only our 2nd trip into the Northern Pickets so I couldn't speak to early season vs late. But the travel was relatively easy considering other late season approaches we've done where we would want snow. We could have just missed someone along the way who may have camped off the trail, but we didn't come across any other pairs on the way in and when we asked the pair was saw it wasn't them. So who knows, and that's just the word from one of the resort boat drivers. And I'm counting "success" in this context against hitting the high point where the summit register is if you are logging them on Peakbagger or something like that.

No kidding, must have been 4 parties trying to camp at Luna col as we were heading back down to Access Creek basin. One guy out on Fury and us and that other pair going down. Not sure how many people try for the true summit though, didn't see much in the way of a lot of recent entries in the summit register. Looks like most people stop at the false summit. Not sure if that counts as a "success" though. If you just want the views though, that's all you need.

Thanks, we've had quite a few long hauls the last month or so (Luna, Logan, Bacon, Challenger, Fortress/Chiwawa). They pulled 2 guys out one at a time (father/son duo), and they flew in and out a couple times beforehand presumably scoping out how they wanted to do it. We stopped and chatted with them before the heli came and they were in good shape otherwise and didn't need any other help. Luna I think was one of the easier and more relaxed trips we've done lately.

Trip: Luna Peak - Standard Route - True Summit Trip Date: 09/05/2020 Trip Report: With it being Labor Day weekend, we sent someone ahead the night before to get a ticket at the ranger station for the next morning since we had a 9am boat taxi scheduled on Friday. Luckily, we got our permit within a half hour or so of them opening and got to the boat pickup on time. YouTube Video With pleasant weather we made quick work of the first 10 miles to the Luna Camp signpost. Sitting around taking a lunch break a solo guy came by on his way to do Fury. A couple people in our party had thought the Luna signpost was for a trail split to where you head off to Luna and told the guy he was taking the wrong path. He seemed to have that response that sounds like he knew where he was going and was wondering if we knew where we were going. A couple people had gps tracks though that did show someone went to Luna from the Luna Camp split. Never caught up to him to say sorry about that. We did eventually spot him just topping out on Fury as we were on top of Luna the next day. One mile later we got to the cairn that marked the spot to head up to Luna Peak. There really isn’t any kind of trail to follow so unless you know just where to find the log crossings it could get really tricky getting through the first mile. The boat driver mentioned he had dropped of a couple the day before who had gotten lost the week before trying to get to Luna who were trying it again. But we never ran across a couple ahead of us all the way to Luna so not sure where they went. We all wondered if there was a couple still lost in the brush somewhere on their 2nd try. We found the log crossing we were aiming for without any problem and found climbers trail on and off the rest of the way into the basin. We found a lot more of the trail on the way out but still managed to do a fair amount of bushwhacking both ways. Took us about 7.5 hours to do the 15 miles into Access Creek basin where we setup camp. Figured shooting for Luna Col would have had us there in the dark so Access Creek was a good spot to stop with views of Luna and the boulder field we needed to go up in the morning. Next morning, we took off up the narrow rocky gully, but going wider right and up and then across through the trees works too (probably a bit easier too). Knocked out the first 2000ft gain then rounded the corner for the first view of the col and Luna. Another easy 1000ft up to the col put us at the base of Luna Peak in just a few hours. Just a bit up the scramble to the false summit we past a pair of climbers coming back who had stopped at the false summit. Another hour (about 4 hours from camp) put us at the false summit where the fun really starts. Beta we had said you could run the entire ridge (harder) or take ledges across but requires a bit of a 4th class downclimb. After shimmying down most of the chimney the last move or two just felt too sketchy with the drop-off into nothing below and it feels like there were not solid holds for the amount of exposure. So, we split the difference and ran the first 30 feet of the ridge which is exposed but felt more solid and that took us to a ramp down to the ledges. Once there it was easy scrambling across picking our way across then switch backing at the end to get under the summit block. Once under the summit block, we wrapped around the backside and found a few easy moves up to the summit block. Just as most of our party were down to the ledges a group of three guys came up behind us who were pretty chill about hanging out waiting for us to get over and back since they were camped at the col and it was only about 11:30am. The summit register was full, and we wound up signing the back cover. If anyone goes up anytime soon it could use a new register. On the way down from the summit instead of heading straight over I had gone down a couple ledges and wound up finding an old rusty metal film canister. I thought there might be a film roll inside but instead there were a few loose pages of an old summit register. Most of the pages were faded too much to read or disintegrated but some were clearly dated from 1971, 77 and 78 which was a cool find. I brought the canister back out since it had been sitting there for so many decades. Not sure how long It had been dropped down on the ledges. I found a trip report from CascadeOriginals where someone had mentioned signing a register in a film canister back in 2003. Mailing it over to the Mountaineers to archive it. On the way back everyone else retraced their steps to go back up to the ridge then to the false summit. I went up the chimney which was a little awkward but went up fine. The party of 3 waiting for us then took off for the true summit while we took a lunch break before heading back. On the way back to the rocky gully above the basin we passed a couple trail runners who mentioned a pair in the gulley that had an accident and appeared on of them broke an ankle. On our way down we stopped by and chatted for a moment. It turned out to be the pair we had passed and chatted with a moment on the scramble up to the false summit in the morning. They had everything handled and were waiting for a heli rescue that was on the way and didn’t need anything. Props to them for getting hundreds of feet down the upper gulley to a flat area and props to SAR for pulling them out hours later. Next morning had a leisurely hike out and found more of the climbers trail going out than we found on the way in. Still got off track a few times and took a bit of navigating to find the log crossing. Fantastic trip overall with good weather and good company. Gear Notes: None Approach Notes: Bushwacky from the trail to Access Creek basin in places.