Lowell_Skoog

My ski history website has brief summaries of two of the trips: http://www.alpenglow.org/ski-history/notes/ms/lds-journal.html#lds-journal-p400 http://www.alpenglow.org/ski-history/notes/ms/lds-journal.html#lds-journal-p1029 I wrote an article about the 1987 trip which appeared in the December 1987 issue of Climbing magazine. You could find the article in the Mountaineers library. The article was poorly edited, but includes a few mediocre photos and a sketch map. In June 1991, my brother and I skied the high route to Logan, encountered bad weather, then skied the low route back to Easy Pass. The 1996 route, finishing at Cascade Pass, is highly recommended. It may be the best ski traverse I've done in the range. A nice variant of the route would be to start at Rainy Pass and cross the south shoulder of Black Peak, like the 1970s parties did on foot. We didn't do that on our ski traverses, since we had skied Black before on weekend trips and wanted to get to the heart of the traverse quicker.

I suspect that Richard is aware of it, but casual readers of this thread should be aware that two routes are being described here. One, the "high route," goes from Silent Lakes across the south flank of Mt Arriva, then past the north side of Meulefire Peak, to "Spectacular Ridge" then down to Fisher Pass and over the N shoulder of Pk 7910 to the Douglas Glacier. This route could be reached from Easy Pass by descending from the pass, then walking up Fisher Creek basin. Originally (in the 1970s) it was reached by circling around Black Peak from Rainy Pass. When I skied it in 1987, we approached from the drainage east of Fisher Peak. The other, the "low route," goes down Fisher Creek valley from Easy Pass, then takes an unnamed spur valley toward the Douglas Glacier. That's the route described by Off White and Forrest.

I climbed Eldorado Peak last weekend to test a new camera and update my pictures of the Forbidden Glacier. Here's another composition, rendered in black & white this time:

Oh, one thing--the Douglas Glacier has been getting pretty broken in recent years. The glacier has been shrinking and there's a lot of exposed bedrock in that area now. My trips were in spring and we had no troubles. But, it could be more interesting in late season. I'd bring steel crampons and a few ice screws, just in case. Another thing--As of early July, the Thunder Creek footbridge was closed, forcing hikers to use Panther Creek and 4th of July Pass to get to Thunder Creek from highway 20. Maybe it's fixed by now, but you should check with the NPS if you're thinking of carrying over.

Hi Richard, I've done the Logan high route from Silent Lakes to Mt Logan three times. All on skis, so I may not have the beta you need. It's pretty country and far enough above treeline that I don't think you'll have much brush (except maybe at Fisher Pass). I don't recall any "blockers" on the route, but summer could be different from spring. If you've got time to drop by the Mountaineers Library this week, you could photocopy any of the following articles for accounts of pioneering summer trips over the Logan high route: Summit, Dec 1971: Duff, "Cascade Pass to Rainy Pass" Mountaineer Annual, 1972: Heathershaw, "Cascade Pass to Rainy Pass" Mountaineer Annual, 1993: Duff, "Looking Back at Logan" I believe the library is staffed by volunteers Tues and Thurs, 5-8:30 pm. See the following webpage for the current schedule: http://www.mountaineers.org/library/

I hiked up Eldorado Peak yesterday and saw a lot of smoke in Thunder Creek. I haven't read anything about these fires in the newspaper, but I think this Park Service press release talks about them: http://www.nps.gov/noca/news-release.htm#82 The smoke in Thunder Creek looked pretty thick, so I don't think it would be very pleasant hiking there right now. The NPS press release also says the Thunder Creek footbridge is out.

Thank goodness--I can sleep easier now. It's so good to see the experts on CC.com put those stupid scientists in their place. More seriously, a friend of mine is on his way to Chamonix for a climbing trip. Sounds like he's going to have to make some adjustments.

This certainly seems possible, but the question is how often people actually placed protection on snow/ice while moving together. (Perhaps I should have titled this thread "running belays" rather than "simulclimbing", since that's what I'm really talking about.) There's no doubt that simulclimbing is riskier, foot for foot, than climbing with fixed belays. But it does work. In late August 1978, I climbed the N ridge of Mt Stuart with my brother Carl. After completing the Gendarme rappel, we started simulclimbing up the easier ground toward the summit. There was new snow on the rock, and I placed a bomber hex before traversing a snow covered slab. There was a block on the slab, which looked solid enough, so I stepped on it. The block slipped away like a banana peel and I was suddenly watching the Stuart glacier come up toward me very fast. My brother saw me fall, yarded in the slack hand-over-hand, and caught me with his bare hands before I'd gone very far. I finished leading the climb and descended Ulrichs couloir with a painfully bruised hip. I still think about that hex, the only piece we had in at the time. It was probably the closest call I've had in the mountains.

Thanks Dan. Great anecdote. It confirms, perhaps, that I'm not imagining things, that simulclimbing was not "always present" in the Northwest (and U.S.) climbing scene. I also don't think it's a matter of the Northwest being a "conservative backwater." I've never been very fond of that theory, because there are so many contrary examples, and I become suspicious whenever anybody suggests it.

Thanks Dru. I'm not surprised that the technique goes waaay back. I'm still curious, though, how it migrated to the Northwest. My sense (and here I'm on pretty shakey ground as far as any formal research) is that the techniques taught in the Northwest after WWII were influenced more by climbing in California and the East Coast (and techniques taught by the 10th Mountain Division during the war) than by Europe. These other U.S. regions don't have the sort of alpine climbing environment we have in the Northwest. Long moderate climbs, perfect for simulclimbing, were perhaps not what most U.S. climbing schools focused on. The Northwest could have benefited from the European experience long ago, but my sense is that it didn't happen until fairly recently. I think simulclimbing spread in other parts of the U.S. around the same time it took hold here, as a technique for climbing fast on more technical rock climbs. ---- p.s. I should also clarify that I'm talking about something more specific than just "moving together". I'm talking about systematic, roped, protected climbing, where the leader places gear (normally on a shortened rope) and the second removes it. We called it running belays when we started doing it. Again, I'm sure it goes way back, but it's only been in recent years that it has become well accepted and described in U.S. climbing literature.

Forrest's helpful response about simulclimbing in the Newbies forum, http://www.cascadeclimbers.com/threadz/showthreaded.php?Cat=&Board=UBB18&Number=224268&page=0&view=collapsed&sb=5&o=&vc=1 reminded me of something I've wondered about for a while. How did roped simulclimbing on rock come to be a legitimate technique in the Northwest? When I started climbing in the early 1970s, I'm pretty sure The Mountaineers did not endorse simulclimbing or teach it in any way. (I'm not positive about this, since I never took their climbing course, but instead learned from friends and books.) Around 1977, my brother Gordy coached freestyle skiing in Zermatt for an school called Swiss Challenge. On his days off, he climbed with a British climber who introduced him to the concept of simulclimbing. Gordy brought the technique home, and we started using it in the Cascades in 1978. We were the first in our small group to use this technique, but we didn't talk about it much, feeling that it was sort of frowned upon. In "Climbing Ice" (1982), Yvon Chouinard describes simulclimbing in the Alps. Many years later, simulclimbing even appeared in The Mountaineers' "Freedom of the Hills." (Perhaps they even teach it now. I don't know.) I've always wondered when and where this technique got started and how it migrated to the Northwest to become recognized by an organization as cautious as The Mountaineers. This would be an interesting thread to trace, for someone with historical curiosity.

Thanks for the picture Phil. Boy, the glacier sure looks withered. I'm not sure which snow bench you're referring to, but I notice a little rock buttress to the right, which seems to show the snout in about the same place in both pictures. I have a shot from late June 2002, which looks very similar to my July 1996 shot. Some Cascade glaciers seem to be "surgey" over time. I've seen pictures from the 1950s of the Le Conte glacier (below Sentinel Peak), which ended well above the valley of Flat Creek. During the 1980s-90s, a narrow lobe of that glacier extended to the valley bottom. I believe the lobe is disintegrating now, but I haven't seen it for a couple of years. Also, thanks for the link to before-and-after photos. I notice that William A. Long is credited for some of the photos. Long wrote several articles about Cascade Glaciers in Summit magazine in the 1960s. He was a 10th Mountain veteran and Long's Pass (near Mt Stuart) is named for him. His widow still lives in Cashmere.

Here's another composition showing the opposite view, from Eldorado Peak. The edge of Moraine Lake is just out of the picture at the bottom. The dates are August 11, 1979 and July 2, 1996. Unfortunately, I don't have any late season pictures of the Forbidden Glacier snout from recent years, so it's a little harder to compare them. But the recession is pretty obvious.

Someone asked me what time of year the two pictures were taken. The left picture was taken July 15, 1979. The right picture was taken July 28, 1996. My brother Gordy is on the left; my brother Carl is on the right. Both shots were taken at the end of the Torment-Forbidden traverse.

Here's a photo composition showing the summit of Forbidden Peak in 1979 and 1996. Notice the retreat of the Inspiration Glacier snout. I have another picture, taken from a slightly different angle in 1986, which shows little change from 1979. So, the demise of the Inspiration snout occurred in less than ten years!

It's backpacking country, Jonathan. Very pretty alpine country. The view of Clark Mountain and such from High Pass is lovely.

I recently picked up a copy of CAG-2, 3rd Ed., Stevens Pass to Rainy Pass. I contributed some info for this edition, but some of it came out wrong or incomplete. This message contains corrected and additional information for the book. It would be great if other climbers could contribute other errata/addenda to this thread, both for future editions and to fill the void until the next edition comes out (probably over a decade away). p. 338, Thunder Peak, West Buttress This entry is badly garbled. The route should be the East Ridge and the date should be 1998, not 1988. No route description is included in the book. Here's a picture of the route: And here's my writeup from AAJ-1999, p. 215: p. 355, Kimtah Peak, East Face There are two entries for this route, one called a variation of the NE Ridge (should be deleted) and one properly called the East Face. Neither contains a very good description of the route. Here's my writeup from AAJ-1991, p. 166: p. 354, Katsuk Peak, North Face Couloir The route description says the couloir divides the left side of the face. It divides the right. This error was introduced by the AAJ editor, not in this book. Here's my writeup (corrected) from AAJ-1993, p. 146: p. 322, Mt Torment, Torment-Forbidden Ridge (North Spurs) These routes are more properly listed under Forbidden Peak, not Mt Torment. The first ascent party should list me instead of my brother Gordy. The route information is pretty brief. Here is a picture of the spurs (to the right of the NW face spur). Here's my writeup from AAJ-1991, p. 165:

Here's my writeup from the 1996 AAJ (p. 149): I thought the route was excellent. 5.8 at most. It's a nice way to enjoy the west ridge without climbing the gully and with somewhat more challenging climbing. You can leave boots and ice tools at the base and climb light. I climbed the south face, which is also fun, a couple years earlier and noticed this line during that climb. I'd say the SW buttress is as good as the south face, but they have different attractions. The south face is an amazingly improbable zig-zag line up a vertical face. The SW buttress is less steep in profile, but more consistent in difficulty, and probably has the better rock.

Here's a photo showing the south face of Inspiration (yellow line) and the route my brother and I climbed in 1995 ("SW buttress", blue line). The west ridge gully is shown by the pink arrow. The gully route reaches the west ridge about half way from the glacier to the summit. A friend told me he descended the west side of the south face last weekend and it went well--but required two ropes. He thought they were a little to the lookers' right of our 1995 ascent route.

Phil and Pete, What size are your feet? If I'm not able to find any TLT's in shops around here, could I try yours on sometime? I'd like to feel the flex and such. I'd be reluctant to order a pair from Lifelink without trying them on.

For a three-day traverse, if you want to climb peaks, it may be best to camp away from the lakes. For example, you could camp the first night at Spider-Formidable col after climbing one of the peaks near Cache col (e.g. Magic). The second night you could camp below Sentinel Peak on the edge of Le Conte glacier after climbing peaks such as Le Conte, Sentinel and Old Guard. The last day you could climb Spire Point on your way to the Bachelor Creek trail. This is a reasonable itinerary for an energetic party.

Oops. It's the TLT4 that I'm interested in, not the MLT4. Marmot had some MLT4's last time I checked, but not the TLT4.

Do any Seattle area stores carry these? I'd like to try on a pair. I checked Marmot a while ago and they didn't have them and don't intend to carry them, apparently.

Ome Daiber and Otto Trott would certainly make this list, if they were still living. My intention with this pre-war list was to raise awareness of the few elders who are still around. I agree that Otto Trott is best known for his skiing (Mt Baker ski patrol since 1930s) and mountain rescue work. But I consider his climb of the Hanging Glacier on Mt Shuksan with Andy Hennig in 1939 to be the most technically impressive climb made in the Cascades before the war.

This sounds like a great idea. My son is about to turn seven and enjoys going to the VC gym occasionally. He's not super into climbing though. He's usually swinging from the rope rather than climbing after about 20 minutes. I'll keep an eye on this thread and see if we can make it, whatever date you settle on.