Redoubt Northeast Face

[Der_Wanderer]

Can anyone comment on the current conditions? With the low snow year, is the glacier already busted up?

[Der_Wanderer]

NO! The glacier is passable and the entire route is in.

 

Date of Climb: 7/17/05

 

Trip Report:

 

MVS, RobertM, and I went in and tackled the face over the usual three days. We hiked all the way to Ouzel Lake on day 1 arriving in about 5.5 hours...pretty stiff approach! We crossed the Depot Glacier from the west about two thirds of the way up. Crossing was fine...looked even more crevasse free higher. Down low (which is clearly visible from the valley below) is very broken. There were some short steep sections of icy snow to reach the base of the ice apron. There are good belays in 'shrunds along the way. The conditions were a bit sloppy in places; we ended up going straight up the middle and hugging the ice on the right for periodic ice screw placements, pickets were useless in long sections, but good at belays. The traverse above the apron was tedious and slow, crossing from snow to rock and back. The final steep snow face was pretty easy - more deep kick stepping with better snow conditions up high.

 

The final scramble is pretty exposed but solid. We lounged on the summit for a while (30-45 minutes). The descent wasn't all that bad, mostly just slipping on scree and talus and plunge stepping. We returned via the Redoubt Glacier which was easy. We were back at camp about 14 hours after leaving (5am).

 

Go 'n get it soon.

 

Gear Notes:

light rack: 3 ice screws, 3 pickets, 3 hexes, set of nuts, 3-4 cams varied widths, lots of slings.

 

Approach Notes:

Depot Creek was overflowing in spots and we got sprayed good on the slabs in front of the falls. The wet slaps were slick as ice in places (I wore plastic boots) but the holds were all there - kinda hard to take your time while getting pelted by cold water though. The ascent up the falls is steep and tiring. When arriving at the campsites in the bogs at the top of the falls, cut directly across in a beeline to get to the opposite side of the valley to avoid the marshes. There's a nice trail (hard to follow in spots) right on the edge that will take you to a long moraine slog up to the lake. We thought about camping under the face but didn't want to fool with crossing numerous streams and the West Depot Glacier looked broken.