[TR] Attempt-Chair Peak- N.E. Buttress/N. Face 2/10/2006

[AlpinistAndrew]

Climb: Attempt-Chair Peak-N.E. Buttress/N. Face

 

Date of Climb: 2/10/2006

 

Trip Report:

It's always something. Perfectly clear, beautiful weather, reasonably firm snow conditions and a bootpath all theway to the base of the route. Only one problem. WIND. On thursday two friends of mine from Bellingham climbed the North Face of Chair and had a great time. I met my buddy Ian at the Alpental parking lot on Thursday afternoon. Several other parties had done the North Face ad N.E. Buttress that day, so we were stoked for some good conditions the next morning. How wrong we were. We started at about 4am and hiked the boot pack easily all the way to the jumping off point for routes up Chair. It was dark, cold and windy as fuck. We waited a bit for the sun to come up and to see if the wind would die down. It didnt. First we began ascending towards the N. Face. We could see the wind whipping about on the peak, throwing chunks of ice through the air like a damn tornado. Sharp crystals of ice careened through the air and pelted our faces as we approached the face. We turned around to some wind protection and made another go, but once again were forced to return to some protection due to high winds and snow/ice flying everywhere. We hunkered down for a bit and opted for the N.E. Buttress. We tried going up but literally couldnt. Winds were excess of 60mph, probably higher. At one point in time I raised my left arm to plant one of my tools and I was blown off balance a foot or two. We couldn't move. If you tried to ascend it took all your effort to not get air born. We tried several times, but the winds were crazy. We aborted, a little annoyed since avy conditins, snow conditions and weather conditions were so nice. Oh well, still had fun.

 

Gear Notes:

Maybe a few screws for the N.E. Buttress, my friend who did the N. Face said he only used pickets

 

Approach Notes:

Highway all the way to the mountain.

[Weekend_Climberz]

Yeah, those winds really suck when the high pressure systems move to the otherside of the mountains.

 

Did you guys use snowshoes up the boot path, or is it packed enough for just boots? TIA

[Wild_Bill]

Dude, what happend with the Tooth? I talked to Ian in the parking lot when we came off Chair, and he was all, "nah, fuck chair, the tooth is more technical!" I still have all weekend, so I was hoping for a Tooth TR. By the way, I still have two of your screws.

[acceber]

Hey, I saw "AlpinistAndrew" and wondered if it was you. Good to see that your multiple jobs are not getting in the way of your climbing, as if they could. I got to go up to Lillooet with the OC a couple weeks ago (see Wild Bill's post). It was awesome.

 

Becca