[TR] Dorado Needle & Eldorado- SW Buttress & East Ridge 7/21/2004

[JoshK]

Climb: Dorado Needle & Eldorado-SW Buttress & East Ridge

 

Date of Climb: 7/21/2004

 

Trip Report:

I really have no particular passion for writing up route reports at nearly 2am but the can of redbull and the giant Jack in the Box "big ass cup" of coke have ruled out sleep for the next little while. So, anyway, David K and I climbed the southwest buttress on Dorado needle today (well, technically yesterday now...). We also climbed eldorado's east ridge(yet again...), but that was pretty much out of sheer boredom. Details below...

 

Day 1(Monday): After a *very* lesiurly departure we arrive at the eldorado parking lot. We are surprised to find a decent amount of cars for midweek. Damnit...no fair...we expect solitude! I can't remember what time we left but it was probably 2 or so. The weather was cloudy with sunbreaks and the forecast called for showers tappering off and clearing by mid day on tuesday. Up we climb...yet another eldorado creek approach...joy! Fog sets in heavy just about at the top of the eldorado glacier. We get a 15 second break, pick out the bivy and head straight in that direction across the inspiration glacier football field in a total whiteout. We soon arrive at the bivy. 4 hours with 3 day packs and climbing gear..pretty decent I thought. We set up the megalight and get to cooking, etc. The whiteout limits visibility to all of 20 feet up eldorado's east ridge and the wind picks up. No worries, the unfallable NWS says clearing tomorrow.

 

Day 2(tuesday):

6:00amWe wake up to rain...back to bed.

8:00am...raining, harder now.

10:00am...yup, still raining, getting very bored now.

12:00pm...raining off and on, really really bored now. So bored, in fact, I suggest we play the "what object am I?" game.

1:00pm...ok, this sucks. we came here to climb and we are bored senseless in the tent. I would have paid good money to be able to watch some paint dry or grass grow. We make the call to head up eldorado at 2pm rain or not so we can use the cell phone to call for a weather report. If shit weather is supposed to stay...we bail.

2:00pmGeared up with the latest in high tech climbing gear (the top part of a whipet) we head for the top of Eldorado.

2:50pmWe summit the mighty Eldorado. The phone comes out and I call my roommate for weather. Mostly sunny tomorrow? OK...we stay. Then I call Wayne to get the scoop on which col works best from getting from the inspiration glacier to the marble creek cirque. Beta on demand...the joys of modern technology.

3:15pmWith the excitment of the cell phone calls done with we head back to camp for another exciting 5 hours of tent-sitting.

5:00pmHey, check it out, sucker hole! Wait, nevermind, there it goes...

5:45pmI think it's clearing up over there...[/b]

7:00pmHmm...still a whiteout, and still bored senseless. Nap time.

8:00pmDinner time.

9:00pmBed time.

12:00amPiss time...cool, I can see some stars!

 

Day 3(wednesday]:

Despite sitting around nearly all day and going to bed early, getting up at 4am still sucks. We had originally planed on walking out on Thursday, but we figured an early start would give us a good chance to just walk out Wednesday night. By 5:30 or so we are packed up and ready to head out over the Inspiration glacier towards Dorado needle. We quickly reach the Inspiration-McAllister Glacier Col and head down the McAllister. From the McAllister glacier, the Marble Creek Glacier is easily gained by skree surfing down a 30 foot gully. We head down the glacier to the base of what we think the southwest buttress of dorado needle is. The only problem is there are several areas that match the description of the "clean white slasbs (easy)" in the book. After a bunch of time spent practicing our cramponing skills up and down the glacier we pick what we are pretty certain is the route.

 

The slabs are fun and easy and the rock is painfully cold. I climb this part with gloves on because I am a little sissy girl. For the next pitch Dave says he wants to climb the face to our left rather than the pitch described in the book. I hem and haw because I basically just want to finish the route and walk home. In all fairness, it turns out to be a stellar pitch on steep slabs and knobby face sections. Maybe 5.8?

 

From here on up we basically followed the route description the best we could but since the route isn't done too often, the beta is pretty general. For all I know we were right on the first ascentionists' route, but we were just as likely climbing something totally different. It will go down as a mystery of the ages for sure. The reason I think we have been off route is we encountered a lot of 5th interspersed with 5.7 or so where the beta mentions 4th and low 5th.

 

We climb on the crest for a whie and eventually peel off to the left as we get forced around a gendarme. There is a short traverse here followed by what I thought were two of the coolest pitches I've climbed on an alpine rock route. None of it was harder than 5.7, but it was really fun climbing.

 

Several more pitches lead to a final traverse and a gully signaling the merging with the "standard" route. This is the first place (aside from the 1st pitch) where I can say for certain we were exactly on the route as described. The final 2 pitches to the summit are about as fun 5.4 as you'll find.

 

From the summit we downclimb two pitches until we can sling a horn to rap down to a flat section on the snow. We are pleased to find perfect plunge stepping snow on the way down. Soon we are back up to the col and back at camp. We manage to pack up in 10 minute and whip out the deproach in a shade under 2 1/2 hours, arriving to the car at just about dark. Cold Fosters are cracked open and we embark on our final test...driving the 3 hours home without falling asleep. Of course, that is where the redbull and coke, and this resulting TR come in.

 

In summary:

This was a very enjoyable route! There is definitely some loose stuff, but it doesn't detract from the climbing. You just have to check blocks in a few places. Overall I found the rock to be very sound and enjoyable. It is also quite clean. There are lots of those nice "hand walk" aretes too...I like those.

 

It took us a damn bit longer than mentioned in the book, but I am still fairly certain we climbed some altogether different stuff on the way up. We probably could have shaved off 2 hours alone by not continuously checking the route beta and just continue climbing. The peak is definitely out there, but once you've done the Eldorado approach to the 7600 bivy, you are pretty much there. To get to the base of the climb is about 2 hours from there, and to get from the top back is about 1 hour. The Marble Creek cirque is really beautiful. A very remote yet peaceful place I thought. Interestingly enough we saw a tent down below the glacier???? We figured it was other climbers but they never came up on any route and we later saw their footprints coming up the col from Marble Creek onto the McAllister glacier. Anybody here?

 

If anybody here has climbed the route, get a hold of me 'cause I'd like to compare notes.

 

Gear Notes:

1 set of nuts

.5,.75,1,2,3 BD cams, with a few doubles

A few tricams and 2 big hexes

 

We could have gotten away with a smaller rack but there were definitely parts where it was nice to be able to sew it up. The large BD #3 cam came in handy several times.

 

Approach Notes:

Standard Eldorado Peak approach. Since it's pretty close to the climb, the standard Eldorado bivy makes the logical camp site.

[Kyle_Flick]

We did it as two rope teams of two last year and each did the lower section differently. Didn't really compare to the books we'd read. But once we reached the gendarme, the rest matched the guidebooks and was very enjoyable 5.7 on sound rock.

[JoshK]

We did it as two rope teams of two last year and each did the lower section differently. Didn't really compare to the books we'd read. But once we reached the gendarme, the rest matched the guidebooks and was very enjoyable 5.7 on sound rock.

 

 

Hi Kyle, I'm glad to know we weren't the only ones that didn't find much in similar with the lower part of the route. Overall, a great route in my opinion!

[JoshK]

I've been too lazy to DL my pics, but here are a few from Dave's camera.

 

 

 

 

[AJScott]

great photos joshk...insperational

[ivan]

josh, my man, the supplies you need to carry to make the best of your stormy mondays don't add but a 1/4 ounce or so to your hardman, light'n'fast teknek pack! the alphabet game is lite too.

[JoshK]

josh, my man, the supplies you need to carry to make the best of your stormy mondays don't add but a 1/4 ounce or so to your hardman, light'n'fast teknek pack! the alphabet game is lite too.

 

Shit...you are telling me! Man, what I wouldn't have given for the rasta bivy kit, a good book and a working MP3 player. The fucking snaffles chewed up my headphones the night before!

[mtngrrrl]

Thanks for the TR and the photos, JoshK.

 

I'm looking at the CAG, though, and it sounds to me like you did the Northwest Ridge route. The Southwest Buttress doesn't call for crossing over to the McAllister. The Northwest Ridge does call for crossing over the col.

 

I'm trying to figure this out by reading your TR, the CAG description and looking at the photos. No map handy, and I haven't been up in the area yet. Am I reading this backwards? Would you mind clarifying?

[JoshK]

Yes, we didn't do the approach as noted in most of the books. I believe the easier way is to approach via the standard eldorado approach, then go through the inspiration-mcallister col, then drop down to the marble creek glacier. I think most parties now choose this route as it makes use of the well traveled eldorado approach which is good trail all the way. The northwest ridge route is the descent route for this climb, however.

[mtngrrrl]

Thanks for the clarification.