pdawg Posted July 27, 2007 Share Posted July 27, 2007 (edited) Trip: Prusik Peak - Burgner-Stanley South Face Date: 7/21/2007 Trip Report: With the weather forecast predicting rain for Sunday, Fearful Leader and I boldly decided to make a long day of it on Saturday. Boldly leaving the Snow Creek Wall trailhead at five am, we were were boldly huddled behind boulders at Lake Vivian by ten, watching a mass of dark clouds brood boldly over Aasgard Pass. Fortunately, we were too tired to boldly retreat immediately. As we had been foolish enough to carry double ropes, we opted to hike to the base of Prusik, figuring a retreat from the route would prove more honorable than simply chucking and running from the lake. This must have pleased the gods of goats and stone because as soon as we roped up, the clouds shrank back and didn't return until we got back to our packs. Fearful Leader (whose name, by the way, is completely inaccurate) compressed the first four pitches into two. He swarmed up the first offwidth section so quickly I assumed it was 5.6 handcrack. After that, he handed me the rack - and our progress quickly slowed. Whereas Fearful Leader climbs with a daunting amount of grace and precision, I climb like a longhaul trucker taking a dump. There's a lot of grunting and the results aren't pretty. At any rate, the chockstone pitch went quickly, but I went into the squeeze above it facing the wrong way and thrutched horribly to a senseless hang. Once the right direction was faced, however, the 5.9 grade seemed reasonable. Fearful Leader climbed both the chockstone and the squeeze trailing the pack. He commented on their difficulty but, really, the guy's so gracious you can't trust him on stuff like that at all. Anyway, the final pitch of Burgner Stanley is probably sensational. I wouldn't know as I ran out of steam on it. What I remember is regretting placing the bulk of my thin hands gear down low. Though there are offwidth moves on it, they protect well with small gear- just save a .75 camalot or two for the top. In the end, I whimpered my way onto the summit, so blown out that I actually clipped into a panicked placement with my nut tool. The ever proficient Fearful Leader joined me scant minutes later and we enjoyed an unremarkable rappel down the North Face. This is when things got strange. Stuffing our faces back at our packs, I was positive my watch read five thirty. We started hiking down, confident that we would make Gustav's by closing. There was talk of what ales would be quaffed and what fried delectables would be shovelled. I personally devoted a half mile of thought to waitresses in general and Bavarian lingerie specifically- but I digress. A light rain fell until sundown whereupon night fell on us darkly and I realized I had misread my watch by two hours. And so the Death March of July Ought Seven began. Actually, it wasn't that bad. It was just that some idiot had decided a head lamp wasn't as important as sunglasses and sunblock, so Fearful Leader had to walk slowly so Hellen Keller's lovechild could keep up. Just past midnight, we winced our way past the Snow Creek Wall. Two headlamps were dancing around the middle of the wall- or maybe the descent. Watching those lights wink in the black night, we toasted them with the last of the water and left our self-pity in a pile for them by the trail. Twenty miles and nineteen and a half hours after starting, we crossed back over Icicle Creek to find that Fearful Leader's car had been burgled. The thieves took his prescription glasses and his toiletry case. What they hadn't taken was the water, the ibprofen and the cheezits. That's what we had for dinner in the time it took us to drive a few miles to overflow parking. We slept in gravel, awoke to sun and got six pitches in Sunday, including Heart of Gold. It was a good weekend. Fearful Leader rehydrating with a mile to go... FL snakes past the chockstone. Pdawg experiencing brief summit-induced euphoria before consigning his knees to the oblivion of the walkout. Gear Notes: Double up to #2 Camalots, one #3 and one #4. Double ropes aren't necessary: headlamps are. Edited July 27, 2007 by pdawg Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
matt_warfield Posted July 27, 2007 Share Posted July 27, 2007 Thanks for the TR and great writing! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kevbone Posted July 27, 2007 Share Posted July 27, 2007 Holy crap....nice TR! Man....car to car on Prusik....that is burly dude. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DPS Posted July 27, 2007 Share Posted July 27, 2007 That was a bold climb, bold trip report, and might I add, boldly written. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dbconlin Posted July 27, 2007 Share Posted July 27, 2007 Nice write-up! Now about those photos... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alpinfox Posted July 27, 2007 Share Posted July 27, 2007 BOLD! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jclark Posted July 28, 2007 Share Posted July 28, 2007 Nicely done. Awesome photo's. I bet you slept well in the gravel. See you Saturday. Save me a camping spot! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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