freefall Posted January 3, 2007 Posted January 3, 2007 Not much into typing TR's quick stats then a link to a youtube video: Time of departure 0600, 3 hr snowshoe approach lots of fresh powder even with snowshoes, ankle to knee deep. We ditched snowshoes at the final headwall (minimize backtracking from descent). 1 hour postholing uphill to Col then to base of climb. Snow conditions seemed super stable. We dug no pits but no sign or sound of collapsing snow pack, we witnessed no slides of any size while out there, no sign of unstability while moving through it. Roped up at 10:00 a.m.; 4 pitches to summit toped out at 4:00 p.m.. No drama on the route. I've never been to Chair before but the route seemed "in" Gear was small screws, pins, small to med. Cams, light nut rack. Climbing was interesting not a whole lot of gear but if your comfortable on that kind of climb then definiately a star route in my book. Lastly 2 hours from summit (2 rappels plus some down climbing) back to the car by 6:00 p.m. Any specific questions on the route hit me with a PM. Not much into giving a blow by blow anaylisis. Link to video. Quote
BirdDog Posted January 3, 2007 Posted January 3, 2007 Nice TR - awesome day. Saw your tracks heading up the rockfall. Snow was great. I had my two boys (6 & 11) with me "Dad, can we follow them." Gorgeous day. Nice climb guys. Quote
dbconlin Posted January 4, 2007 Posted January 4, 2007 Oh, and the approach was heinous. Every time I've gone there, the depth of snowpack has slowed progress even with snowshoes, but this time seemed especially bad. Felt like it took foreeeeeeeeeevveeerrrr to get to the mountain. Freefall/Andrew thanks for a great day out! And for taking the photos/video! Quote
brian_m Posted January 4, 2007 Posted January 4, 2007 Dave & Andrew... Nice job! Great video. Weather and conditions on the climb look great. Dave, you are totally right about the snowpack slowing travel... I was in the valley on the 31st and found the thin layer of wind blown snow over bottomless fluffy white powder to be very hard to move through. The skiers looked like they liked it though :-) Quote
freefall Posted January 5, 2007 Author Posted January 5, 2007 Well I guess the approach was heinous now that I think about it. The mind kind of wants to forget sucky things right after there over. Without a doubt the final 300+ vertical feet of postholing took forever, five minutes of struggling uphill against waist to chest powder resulted in only a few vertical feet of gain. It pains me to recall. Man, I was happy to finally rope up and get climbing! Great climb Dave! Looking forward to the next one. Quote
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