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Everything posted by dberdinka
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Sterling Marathon Pro 10.1 dualpattern
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first ascent [TR] Vesper Peak - The Ragged Edge 8/18/2013
dberdinka replied to dberdinka's topic in North Cascades
If any of you get on it this year I'll be real curious to see if I'm not just full of shit. Just one more pic of a real beautiful nook in the Cascades. -
first ascent [TR] Vesper Peak - The Ragged Edge 8/18/2013
dberdinka posted a topic in North Cascades
Trip: Vesper Peak - The Ragged Edge Date: 8/18/2013 Trip Report: Back in August Gene Pires and I wandered up to the north face of Vesper Peak to check out the steeper and much neglected eastern half of the face. We managed to climb the obvious exposed edge along its right-hand side. The position and the underlying rock quality were generally fantastic but the climbing itself was horrible due to a thick layer of lichen, heather and dirt that covered the face. Rock cruxes were protected by beaks, belays tended to be marginal and the actual crux involved mantling across a series of quivering hummocks. A good time was had by all (I think) but it sure as hell wasn’t anything you’d recommend to a friend. So when I finally finagled two days to myself rather than hang out with friends, or go somewhere new or actually get in some pitches I carried a 70 pound pack of bolting, cleaning and bivi gear back to the summit of Vesper Peak. A dozen retro-bolts and fifteen hours of scrubbing later the end result is a potentially enjoyable six-pitch 5.6 or 5.7 rock climb in a stellar setting. The rock is excellent, the climbing is sustained at a very moderate grade, the position is spectacular and the protection and belays are solid and well situated. It’s pretty easy to overestimate the quality of your own routes but this has to be one of the better moderate and accessible alpine rock climbs on the west side of the Cascades. I should point out that what we did was essentially a series of major variations to the “Center Route” established in 1969. The fourth pitch was shared in common and probably the first pitch of the original start otherwise we had stayed further right near the edge. Pretty bold climbing they did back in the day. Until nature gives it a solid pressure washing the grit left behind from cleaning will inevitably collect in some of the cracks and edges I scrubbed. If someone heads up there this year consider bringing a small stiff bristled brush or at least a nut tool to clean off some holds. Would be psyched to hear feedback if anyone climbs it. Click image for larger version Approach Description The trail fades out as you enter the basin between Vesper and Sperry Peaks. Cross the outlet of the lake and follow an obvious talus ridgeline up to a col between the peaks. The climb is accessed by a ledge system that cuts across the north face of Vesper at about 5800’ elevation and begins at a small notch overlooking the Vesper Glacier. Allow 3+ hours for the approach. Walk out the ledge on steep exposed heather (snow until mid-late summer?). When you can’t walk any further either (A) scramble up over an obvious chockstone formed by a large, thin flake to a belay ledge or (B) as a variation backtrack a bit and figure out an exposed 3rd class traverse down and around the toe of a buttress before scrambling back up to an obvious and clean 5.6 layback crack (better start). The 3rd class slabs at mid-height on the first pitch could easily be accessed after climbing the lower half of the north face as well. Route Description: The ratings below are potentially soft. Bring a full set of nuts small to large and a single set of cams from #0 TCU to #3 Camalot with extra #0.75 and #1. Original Start - Red Line P1) Climb approximately 60’ of low-5th terrain to 3rd class slabs. Continue up the obvious flaky gully and arrange a gear belay just below a short overhanging wall (low-5th 170’). P2) Traverse right on a long, thin ledge then a short gully to a fixed belay on the skyline (4th 60’). Slightly contrived variation start with better climbing - Blue Line P1) Climb a nice layback flake then a low-angle groove to 3rd class slabs. Traverse hard right then follow the highest grassy ledge system approximately 40’ to a gear belay below a faint white dyke splitting a slab (5.6 160’). Note that you can also reach this belay from the original start as well. P2) Climb the dyke past three bolts to a thin ledge. Traverse right and up a short gully to a fixed anchor on the skyline (5.7 90’). P3) Step right then traverse back left on positive edges towards the skyline. Find a bolt then continue up a nice arête protected by fixed pins. Arrange a gear belay atop a heather ledge (5.7 95’). P4) Step right and climb steep, stacked blocks. Easy zig-zag cracks above lead to a fixed anchor. I aggressively trundled loose and semi-loose blocks off this pitch but some caution is still advised (5.7 95’). P5) Step right again and climb straight up in an exposed position. At the second bolt traverse right 50’ to a fixed anchor on the skyline (5.7 80’). P6) Follow the nice arête to a final touch of heather and the summit. (5.5 130’). Walk off to the southeast. A lot of the greenery in the following three photos is now gone. Never heard good things about the lower wall. Maybe a direct starts needs a scrub-down next year. -
Peace and love to all those who were close to the man. His passion for the walls of Darrington will remain evident for generations to come.
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4th class vs V4 - Gym climbers stranded in NCNP
dberdinka replied to dberdinka's topic in Climber's Board
Huge credit to you for posting an account of the climb. Some might disagree or add to the lessons learned but you have certainly put a lot of thought into it. Definitely sounds like everyone kept their composure and kept a poentially bad situation from getting worse. -
[TR] Cinderella Peak (Twin Sisters Range) - East Buttrress 8/23/2013
dberdinka replied to curtveld's topic in North Cascades
Having had just climbed some truly great routes on Little Sister and Skookum I was disappointed. That said the bad 4th class scrambling is still much better than most 4th class terrain in the cascades and it definitely is big, surprisingly big I thought. Moving fast I still think it took me almost 2 hours to climb. Agree with the Grade III. So probably a good route to do if you like the Twin Sisters. What I find interesting is how the structure of the dunite that the Twins are composed of dictates where good alpine rock is found. Along the Crest of the range from Skookum to Cinderella there is a strong planar structure oriented north to south (tilted up to the south). Such that great climbing is found on NW to NE exposures formed by the slab surface. South faces are choss as you quickly cut down across these stacked slabs. W and E facing exposures (like the ridge line in question). Are blocky and slightly loose as you cut into them. Why this sort of bedding plane type structure even exists is beyond me as the rock us plutonic. Maybe it has something to do with when the rock was thrust upward through the crust? Interesting this structure seems totally missing on the S Twin and definitely less prevalent on the N Twin. where the rock is generally a bit worse. Maybe a geology grad student do a project mapping and explaining what's going on here. -
Amazing the trust you guys can put into highly tensioned 1" webbing. Clearly it works but I could never do it.
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4th class vs V4 - Gym climbers stranded in NCNP
dberdinka replied to dberdinka's topic in Climber's Board
To much heartfelt analysis. Need more facepalm. -
Pulled this off the North Cascades National Park Facebook page. Helicopter rescue, no injuries. Seems to be exactly what everyones been predicting for a long time. "Taking a quick break from the coverage of the landslides, this recent SAR indicates the importance of preparedness when mountaineering in unfamiliar conditions: On July 28, 2013 a party of four mountaineers from the Seattle area attempted the Northeast Ridge of 8,970’ Black Peak. The party split into two rope teams and quickly found that the first rope team was ascending at a faster pace. Along the Northeast Ridge the rope teams became separated, with one summiting the peak, and then descending the south face route back to their camp, having lost contact with the other two climbers. The party that summited could see their friends about midway up the ascent route, and observed them stationary for hours, well into the night. The two stranded climbers began flashing headlamps, presumably to alert their friends. The climbers at camp asked other visitors who were leaving the area to call 911 when they got into cell phone range and request assistance. NPS rangers received this call for assistance at 2:00 am on July 29, 2013 with it unclear if the party was injured or not. Early on July 29, 2013 rangers made a recon flight to Black Peak, making visual contact with the stranded climbers but unable to rule out injuries to these climbers who had been stranded at the same location for almost 24 hours, just before a steep pitch on the most technical part of the route. A ranger team, using the Park’s contracted HiLine Helicopters MD500D, evacuated both 30 year old climbers individually by short-haul to their basecamp. The rescued climbers appeared to be shaken up by the experience but not injured. All parties agreed that steep technical mountaineering routes with thousands of feet of exposure above massive glaciers are much more difficult than the same level of climbing difficulty in a gym which they were more accustomed to."
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Copied from nwhikers.net Message from WSDOT 2pm Monday (check out some of the photos in the flickr link - that's a lot of mud) The North Cascades Highway closed Saturday night (officially) at 9:30 p.m. (even though, it was probably closed an hour or so earlier - it just took that long for news of 2 mud slides to get from the drivers to the WSP to us from that area that has no cell phone coverage). The slides happened a few miles west of Rainy Pass. Yes, there were a couple vehicles trapped between the slides, but no one got hurt and both parties got out safely, (sorry, I don't have the details yet about the VW or the pickup and camper they were driving.) Anyway, by mid day on Sunday, instead of two slides, We were dealing with 8 of them. The largest (at the time was a quarter mile long and 25 feet deep- could be bigger, now.) It's going to take days, if not longer to reopen. We know that we're going to have to have help in the form of private contractors with the larger equipment and the people it's going to take to get this job done. Despite the difficulties in communication (even a satellite phone doesn't work in a lightning storm up there), and the distances involved, The maintenance supervisor (Don Becker who also oversees the spring reopenings) took some pictures that we now have posted on FlickR: http://www.flickr.com/photos/wsdot/sets/72157635037166187/with/9496492120/ Until the hillsides stabilize and our environmental, geotechnical and maintenance experts can put together a clean up plan (They're working to do that right now), don't plan on using the North Cascades to get between the Skagit and Methow Valleys. I guess if there's any good news, it's that we put in those extra closure gates two years ago, so from the east side, you can drive all the way to Rainy Pass, accessing any of the campgrounds, trailheads, etc. before encountering a barricade across the roadway. Pass this along to whomever you'd like, so any help you can provide to get the word to folks who planned to use SR 20 is appreciated. Thanks!"
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Whoa! Ken4ord. Thats a blast from the CC.com past.
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Fortunately this isn't the federally run forest service. And your state government is still functional enough to actually meet some of the minimum requirements a citizenry might have of it, like fixing roads. Give it a couple days....
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J$s%s you had to watch that? I'm so sorry. The sound a falling body makes is definitive and hard to ever forget.
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[TR] Nooksack Tower - Beckey-Schmidtke/Upper North Face 7/22/2013
dberdinka replied to JasonG's topic in North Cascades
Personally as long as I'm alive I never want my kids getting anywhere near Nooksack Tower. Backpacking, backpacking is nice. -
[TR] Nooksack Tower - Beckey-Schmidtke/Upper North Face 7/22/2013
dberdinka replied to JasonG's topic in North Cascades
Don't be so hard on yourself. That's not exactly daddy climbing up there. Amazing pics as usual. -
Yes that would be the standard rap route off North Early. So nice point
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The continued comfortization of Washington Pass is weak sauce. Bolts added to 4th class climbs, top-down power-drilled sport climbs on the east faces of Liberty Bell and South Early. Now convenience rap stations where 1000's managed without. Yeah sure it's next to a highway blah-blah-blah. But they are still some of our more outstanding mountains and the continual need to keep dumbing down the climbing experience in the alpine is sad. All the more so in that it's being done for a profit motive (So what Sol said!). So y'all have fun with their handy work! I'm super glad you're all going to be able to get home now 5 minutes quicker.
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[TR] Desperate Country: Seven Days On The Fence
dberdinka replied to JensHolsten's topic in North Cascades
I stopped by the top of Sauk Mountain this morning on the way to work and noticed that both the Northern and Southern Pickets were perfectly lined up on the horizon. Apologies for the low-quality image from my phone. Main Summit of Challenger is the 4th prominent bump from the left I believe. Mcmillans on the right flanked by Triumph. Fury just left of center. -
[TR] Bear Mountain - Beckey/Fielding North Buttress 7/18/2013
dberdinka replied to dberdinka's topic in North Cascades
Good eye Sol. I was curious if someone would notice those circleheads in the photo. So yes we had big plans but a completely unreasonable itinerary in which to complete it. Basically the energy reserves one needs to push a wall were burned up in the fourteen hours of travel it took to get to the base of it. As Fred Beckey wrote "The approach problems seemed too formidable with heavy loads." We climbed a couple pitches to the start of the real difficulties before pulling the plug. I can completely understand why Doorish took as long as he did to pull off that route. A lot was learned. Whether we ever return or not is highly questionable. -
[TR] Desperate Country: Seven Days On The Fence
dberdinka replied to JensHolsten's topic in North Cascades
Difference between great climbers and the rest of us is they can stick to plan on committing routes even when the inevitable little hickups and unforeseen events start cropping up. If shit isn't going 100% perfect I always find myself back in the parking lot. Nice work! -
Good to know. I've always struggled to hitchhike out there as well. Maybe the correctional center (prison) based out there freaks people out.
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[TR] Bear Mountain - Beckey/Fielding North Buttress 7/18/2013
dberdinka replied to dberdinka's topic in North Cascades
To climb the summit block by the ridgeline alongside the north face is class 4. However we downclimbed a south facing ridgeline that was exposed class 3. Skip the weight if you can. Even by a scramble route this mountain will be a wickedly good wilderness experience. -
Trip: Bear Mountain - Beckey/Fielding North Buttress Date: 7/18/2013 Trip Report: I had the opportunity to spend four magnificent days climbing Bear Mountain with my good friend Owen. We ended up climbing the original Beckey/Fielding North Buttress Route in a very relaxed style over two days with a long enjoyable bivouac high on the mountain. Due to its scale, position, wilderness setting, history and high quality climbing the route stood out as an absolute classic even with the dangerous and loose approach gulley and ledges. Certainly the Direct North Buttress must be as a good a route as you will find in the range. The approach up the Chilliwack Valley is at least as bad as reputation holds. On either side of the border the trail is rapidly disintegrating back into brush and blow downs. Yet it has its rewards offering up some of the most extensive and massive old growth forest I’ve experienced. With heavy packs and several route finding mistakes it took us over six hours to reach Bear Camp. From here we blasted straight up into the alpine gaining over 4000’ through steep forest, more thick brush and finally heather meadows reaching a beautiful high camp eleven hours from the car. Based on the summit register the mountain receives only one or two ascents a year. The last entry via a north side route was by Steph Abegg and Aaron Clifford in 2010. The last entry for the DNB was by Mark Pratt and Robert Meschew in 2007! Fred Beckey’s trip report in the 1968 AAJ is a classic tale of climbing in the North Cascades and captures the essence of mountain perfectly. Steph Abeggs blog post from 2010 offers all the modern beta one might need. Various misdirections about the approach can be found here. The Approach Plenty of this But lots of this as well The Climb Approaching the DNB Upper North Buttress The Diamond Heart of the Gulley We got to climb through all that Phenomenal Position high on the ridge Sunset on Redoubt The offwidth corner Take what the world offers you