[TR] Mt. Washington- West Ridge 7/25/2004

[ivan]

Climb: Mt. Washington-West Ridge

 

Date of Climb: 7/25/2004

 

Trip Report:

rbw1966 and i, accompanied by his faithful wife n' dog, made the leisurely stroll up the pct to the base of washington y-day morning. after an annoying scree traverse and a bit of a steep bushwack uphill, we arrived at the w ridge amidst a million shards of broken mountain. we climbed from the lowest portion of the west ridge, only to discover after the first full pitch (no pro available) that we could have walked around the ridge and skipped the first portion and started strait into the 5.8 pitch. rob lead the 5.8 bit, which has a fixed pin at the crux, and appeared to enjoy it immeasurably. the rock quality was good enough here. the next pitch is interesting, w/ tons of rotten plates, but the occasional good foothold pokes through. the 5.6 pitch was long and fun, with a couple of variations possible to keep it entertaining (2 fixed pins here too). we pitched out the 2 technical pitches and simuled everything else. ran into a swarm of mazamas at the summit and followed their fixed line down to the rap station (1 60 meter roped enough to reach the bottom). lots of environmentally sensitive scree sliding lead us back to the fam and after a long hot walk we arrived back at the cars we'd left 8 hours earlier.

 

overall, a fun enough mountain, but i'd never bother with it if i was cool and lived in northern washington. a great way to escape the heat of portland and a good person to climb with and randomly scream the muthafucka word at.

 

Gear Notes:

6 slings

handful of nuts and hexes, mostly smalls used

60 meter half rope

 

Approach Notes:

easy and flat, but no water. don't take the wrong turn and end up at patjens lake.

[b-rock]

[rbw1966]

Yeah, I enjoyed that 5.8 pitch so much I even pulled on gear to get through it. Less than solid rock was not inspiring me to be terribly bold, in spite of having solid rock when you needed it.

 

All in all, I would recommend this route as fun and aesthetic.

[Ireneo_Funes]

What did you guys think of the belay stations on this route - solid enough?

[iain]

You build your own stations so that's up to you. The opportunities are there for good pro on the west ridge, in this oregonian's opinion.

 

Bring the usual grip of double-length slings, set of mid-size nuts, maybe some cams/hexes in the 0.5-2 camalot range, and you should be good to go.

[Ireneo_Funes]

You build your own stations so that's up to you

 

You mean there aren't big shiny bolts up there? And no chalk marking all the holds?

 

Thanks for the beta, Iain.

[rbw1966]

All the belays are on solid ledges. Its a great climb. I recommend starting at the toe of the ridge rather than taking any of the easier by-passes. The first pitch (if you do it this way) is a little run out at first but you are on solid, easy rock. You have good pro where ya need it.

[Fejas]

Pimp!!! You guys get any pics? I've been wanting to do this route for a wile... call me superstious, but I will wait till next year to get on Washy wash.

[ivan]

got some digital video, but the best pic i've seen of the route is iain's helicopter pic from the recent rescue, as it looks right up the ridge.

[CraigA]

Fejas, I did the North Face of the West Ridge a couple of years ago with FunGuy (actually we dissagreed about what route we did, but after a couple of people looked at the pictures I feel confident in saying this was the route we did).

 

This is looking up the second pitch, FunGuy is standing on the West Ridge.

 

This is the view looking down from the top of the second pitch. We gained the ridge near the big rock on the right where the ridge makes the bend.

 

This is the start of the third pitch. Very fun climbing and quite easy as I remember.

 

This is looking up at the last "technical" portion of the climb, from where FunGuy is standing it was a very short scramble to the summit.

 

I don't know if any of these will help, but thats what I have to offer on this one.

 

Craig

[ivan]

 

yum, mt washington shit rock at its finest...i think the guide book calls this area the "cascade dinner plates"