robertm

I think that Serpentine Arete is a great climb to learn how to move efficiently over alpine terrain. You have awesome position above Colchuck lake and the views only get better as you go higher. It is not sustained but the rock is good by Cascades standards. Yes there are loose blocks and shit on ledges but as caveman says... its the mountains. Any newbie alpine climber hoping to do some longer routes should cut their teeth on this one... the other thing that makes this route attractive is the mellow descent... which can be done in the dark.. another plus for new alpine climbers.

As you are descending that bitch of a trail known as the Slesse Mountain trail down to Slesse creek what are the peaks you are looking at across Slesse creek to the West? (West of Slesse) There is one prominant pyramid looking one that looks like it would be a cool climb up one of the ridges. This cluster of peaks isn't in the BC select book nor can I make them out via Freds text descriptions.

still snow above the pass but the trail down asgard on the right side (as you are going down) is melted out. As long as you don't mind wet feet (assuming descent from Dragontail) you should be fine.

I wouldn't think it is "necessary" unless you are not comfortable on the 25 degree snow that descends to the north of witches tower (this is a safe glissade... watch for the lake at the bottom) or it is very hard (low freezing level). You will not need it on Asgard.

I would be surprised if there were any "fixed" rap stations on this route due to the lack of traffic. Bring some extra webbing and make your own and then you can be sure one rope is enough.

Pat, the route really doesn't exist anymore. What is left is loose and fairly dangerous. Super sharp blocks and large flakes everywhere. It looked like you might be able to forge a new E. Face route to the right of the Skoog route but it looked harder. We bailed from the jumble on a scary rappel into the south notch gully and climbed some loose stuff in a gully up to the notch. We then climbed some fantastic featured granite (albiet a bit licheny) up to the E. ridge (5.7/5.8) where the Skoog route joined. From there it is a awesome exposed 5.6 pitch to the summit of the main peak. There is other stuff to do back there but probably not worth the approach unless you do some linkups (Dome, Sinister, G-sight, Agnes)etc.

This trick seems fine in theory but inevitably it creates a cluster f(*@# with the rope. I suppose if you spend a lot of time with the tibloc placement and setup this can be reduced (but if you are spending minutes with each placement why simulclimb?) but if you wander to the left or right too far the tibloc wants to turn and then it jams. The other thing is that the second sometimes needs some slack to manuever around down below. So when the leader down climbs a bit the second still doesn't get any slack.

We had to climb 5.10 rock to get onto the buttress. The glacier is coming apart at the seams. I would opt to go from the toe if doing it again. A moat & serac blocks access to the bypass ramps. Conditions were excellent. There is no snow on the descent so fill up before the trail (running water). There was a small snow patch at the huge bivy ledge but most likely this will be gone in the next few days.

You lose too much elevation going around Boston.

NE Buttress of Mt. Si. I don't remember there being a glacier the last time I was up it. I did see some cougars Here are the pics: Pictures http://www.shutterfly.com/osi.jsp?i=67b0de21b3076f3f8497

Went up on Friday afternoon and climbed Sahale via the arm... great easy climb with good views. Camped in Sahale Boston Col. Next morning was raining off and on. We went over and climbed Boston Peak... rock isn't great but not as bad as it looks from a distance. We climbed the East ridge direct roughly following the rap stations. You can rap from the summit with a single 50m in 3 rappels. Plan on 1.5 hours from col to summit and 1 hour back. We then dropped down the Quien Sabe and over to Sharkfin tower for the regular route... the removable bolts were not installed on the Nelson route. Met Caveman & PMS as we were coming down... I tweaked my knee shortly after so I iced it and took some ibu. By the time my knee was feeling better it was around 2 pm so we decided to wait until the next day to climb anything else. It rained saturday night but dawned clear so we went up to climb the east ridge of Forbidden and downclimbed the West ridge. The couliour was in stellar shape and the the climbing was as fun as I remember it. We simuled the whole thing in around 3 hours. There was a party on the North Ridge coming up that I got some good pictures of... here is a link to the photos. Conditions were great... there are blowdowns on the Boston Basin trail which are a pain in the ass. I imagine the NPS will not be clearing them out and later in the year when the avalanche paths melt it might get to be more of a pain in the ass... who knows. Boston Basin Climbing pics

Mountain Man, see my previous post and you can also take a look at the pictures for yourself and see the couliour. It was straightforward as of Sunday.

Here is how you do it. Park at cascade pass... hike up and climb Sahale drop your shit at the col and climb Boston. Next day go and climb Buckner and return to Col... move camp down and below Forbidden... climb Sharkfin Tower on the way by. Next day climb East Ridge of Forbidden... down climb West ridge and carry on to Torment via traverse on ridge... return across Taboo and to camp below Forbidden. next day hike out. Take light packs and just do it. You would be amazed at what you can do when you go light.

It was the East Face of the main peak... big rockfall (like 1/4 of the face). We did this same trip last year and also didn't run into any crowds. Here are some pics from the area: Dome Peak Pictures

the climb was in great shape two weeks ago. you can bypass the climb back up to Hazard on the way back saving some time and avoiding some objective danger by making a 4th class 20 foot climb up the rock below Camp hazard. There is a fp for protection... you could also rappel from a fixed station here (red and blue slings) and avoid going directly under the ice cliff. We camped low at around 9300 ft. which worked out great since there is running water there (below the turtle). If you go high you will need to carry more fuel and melt snow which will negate any time you saved by climbing up there. It is quick going with summit packs up to hazard. Take some horsecock and cheese and you are good to go.

You can get to the Enchantments plateau no problem from the top of colchuck balanced. You could also approach the base of the W. face route by heading down to your climbers left from the enchantments plateau. You can easily see the balanced rock from Prussik peak. I was just looking at it this weekend. Oh... my favorite cascades classic would be East Ridge of forbidden peak.

With the questionable weather this past weekend a partner and I scaled back our plans in the North Cascades and headed over to Leavenworth for some crag climbing. We left seattle at 4:30 AM and as we pulled over Blewit pass the weather seemed to be holding with only some small sprinkles. We decided that we would head up the standard Colchuck route since neither of us had done it. We left the car at around 7:30 AM and and were on top around 11:00 AM. It was snowing a bit here and there but not too bad so we decided to traverse over to Dragontail up the West ridge past pandoras box. There was a gully that went up to the ridge crest and then we scrambled along the "dragonstail" on some superb scrambling rock. We continued along the crest until we hit the summit of Dragontail around 1pm. I realized I had forgotten my food so we had to ration the 4 gu packets and a handful of coffee nips that Mark had along. We tanked up on water and started looking towards Prussik peak which had just poked out of the clouds. We had brought about 120 feet of 8 mil rope and a set of stoppers, some shoulder lengths, yellow tcu, and a #1 camalot so we had plenty of gear for the west ridge. We left the summit of dragontail around 1:30 PM and glissaded into the enchantments and were at the base of Prussik around 3:30 PM. We simul climbed in our hiking boots up to the 5.7 slab and set up a belay... that was a bit tricky but found you could reach out and grab an arete on your right for balance and a semi-lieback. We finished up on the ridge crest avoiding the chimney finish and were on top at 4:30 PM. Rappeling with a short rope didn't turn out to be too big of a deal. We set up one extra rappel and did some downclimbing but in general it worked out OK. It took us about a hour to get down. We left Prussik Pass at 6PM and got to the car at 10PM. The crux of the day was the drive back over Stevens pass in a downpour and fog as thick as soup. All in all a great day in the mountains. I strongly reccomend the traverse from Colchuck over to Dragontail along the "spine"... fun and interesting 4th class scrambling. Here are the pictures from the climb: Colchuck_Dragontail_Prussik

National Park Service (NPS) - North Cascades office (NOCA)

Adamson, this guy should get this months chestbeater award.

Don't know why the images didn't show up? Here are the links: Back side of GS: web page Hydromatic Spire: web page

If you wanted to hump loads somewhere and do a bunch of stuff on clean granite you could head back to Gunsight. Just don't look to do the East Face as it appears to have met the same fate as Girth Pillar. Here is a shot of the back side of the peak just south of the Main peak of GS. Notice the huge cannon hole. Hydromatic spire over by Dome looks pretty cool too:

Thanks for the reply and the info KLAR...

has anyone tried the gunnslinger route (5.9) on this peak? If so what was your opinion of it. thx

Hidden to North Face up into the third should be good until 1st of July. This is a great route and one worth doing(Wickwire?). Wait for lower temps though. The connecting second is gone by now I am sure.