W. Ridge Forbidden, June 15

[PackOnMyBack]

My partner and I left the Eldorado TH at 1:30 a.m. as the CR road is gated here (MP 20). It’s about 2.5-mile walk up the road to the Boston Basin TH. The road to the gate at MP 21 has only a few downed trees and it made no sense to us why this mile hasn’t opened yet. Our Forest Pass dollars at rest! The rest of the road had considerably more trees down as well as a major slide at the Midas Creek crossing.

The trail up to the basin was in fair condition until just after re-crossing Midas creek. There was a faint snow-bridge over the creek (hard to see how faint by headlamp), and then the trail disappeared. We then found ourselves in major slide debris. Instead of trying to cross it to the west, we decided to head up into the basin. By the time we cleared the trees at about 5200’, we had ascended into the clouds so we decided to sit it out, get a little sleep, and see if the sun would burn off the clouds. We slept? for about an hour and at 6:15 we could only see slightly higher so we figured we’d climb up a few hundred feet and if we had no relief, we’d head out. Sure enough, a few hundred feet up, BLUEBIRD! We were slightly east in the basin so we traversed west toward W. Ridge couloir, reaching the base at about 8 a.m. On the way we encountered another party of 4 just below us and let them pass and break trail for a while. Snow in the basin was soft but we were still able to make pretty good time. At the base of the couloir the party ahead of us let us pass since we were only 2 and would not be protecting the couloir.

The bergschrund was wide open but offered slight passage on the left. As we climbed just above it I spotted an eerie sight. Below us lay a climbing rope, with one end disappearing into the schrund! There was no way to get down to it and we finally determined that it might have been dropped after it had been pulled on a rappel. Still, not the kind of thing that inspires confidence. The climb to the base of the ridge went better than expected, the snow still being in pretty good shape. At 9 a.m. we roped up at the base of the ridge and in excellent weather (blue skies and no wind!), climbed the most enjoyable ridge I’ve ever been on. The route was not difficult but the exposure and views were phenomenal.

A couple of photos on top and we rapped and down-climbed back to the top of the couloir, passing the party behind us. We then rapped the couloir and were glad to not have to down-climb it as it had softened considerably. We then traversed SE across the basin and descended what we thought would be a shortcut (they never are!) back to the trail and had to cross the debris field west-to-east, a major pain in the ass. Now seeing it in daylight this debris was actually mass destruction, the largest we had ever encountered. Large trees had not only been toppled but also pulverized. In order to re-cross Midas Creek we figured we’d have to find that slight snow-brige that we had crossed on the approach. We had noted that it was at 4400’ and we traversed at that contour. My partner finally spotted the trail on the other side of the creek but when we got to the creek, the bridge was gone. We debated whether to build a bridge with downed debris but opted for the jump onto the other side.

Once back on trail, the trip out went smoothly with visions of large heaping plates of food in our heads. We passed a couple car-camping about .8 mile inside the Eldo TH gate. I guess the gate opens if you know somebody. We finally hit the car just after 8 p.m. and were sitting in the Buffalo Run by 9. This was my 1st summit of Forbidden after 2 previous attempts and will remain as a highlight in my climbing history.