[TR] Johannesburg mountain - Northeast buttress ‘51 rib 07/26/2025

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Trip: Johannesburg mountain - Northeast buttress ‘51 rib

Trip Date: 07/26/2025

Trip Report:

I drove to the parking lot Friday night, threw my sleeping bag in the back of the truck, and fell asleep staring at Johannesburg. About an hour after sunrise I locked the truck and started walking down the road with just a hipbelt loaded with microspikes, ul rain jacket, ice axe, garmin, work gloves, 6 gu’s, and 500 ml of water. Getting to the snow was quite straight forward. I stayed on talus, just climbers left of the moraine for as long as I could, and then traversed straight across the moraine to where I could step onto the initial slabs to gain the rib. Figuring out these initial first pitches before the brush was slightly tricky, perhaps requiring the most thoughtful climbing of the whole route. Just above the slabs was a large patch of snow. I drank some water and filled up here and then started tree climbing. I was elated to not have a pack on for this section. The work gloves and trailspikes also made life much easier through this part of the route. Once I made it to the steep heather section I was able to mostly stay on the ridge crest with semi decent rock. I did not end up joining the 1957 route near the top like I’ve read in some trip reports, and instead continued up the 51 rib. This section contained the highest quality rock and climbing of the entire route. The crux of this section was probably a bomber near vertical handcrack(5.6) that lasted a couple body lengths. Suddenly, I was on snow. The glacier and snow conditions were nearly perfect, firm but not icy. I transitioned to rock close to the top of the glacier where it became too steep for 1 axe and microspikes. Moments later I was on the summit, 3h 40m from the car. I snapped some photos, and then started down the east ridge. The cairns were quite nice to have for encouragement. Less than an hour later I was at the C-J col. The heather up to Mixup was quite unstable, frustrating, and exhausting, but it was over soon enough. Meeting up to the Ptarmigan “trail” was mostly straight forward. I feel I could have found a slightly better way, but what I did worked just fine. Just above Cascade Pass, I emptied the rocks from my shoes, downed the rest of my water and a GU, and battened down the hatches before running down to the lot. The parade of hikers were true obstacles, but it was pretty fun blasting past them. Made it to the lot 6h 49m after leaving the truck. A very good day.

Gear Notes:
Work gloves, microspikes, axe

Approach Notes:
Short and sweet