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[TR] Dragontail - Gerber-Sink North Face 2/17/2008


scottgg

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Trip: Dragontail - Gerber-Sink North Face

 

Date: 2/17/2008

 

Trip Report:

 

Before I scrambled up its ridges or kicked steps up its couloirs, Dragontail Peak captivated my imagination through the pictures and descriptions in Nelson's Selected Climbs book. After seeing pictures of its northwest aspect from Colchuck Lake, a winter route instatntly jumped out to my novice eyes: an asthetic line starting at the face's lowest point and continuing through steep gullys and exposed snowfields all the way to the summit. Turns out this route had been climbed in August 1971, by Eric Gerber and Charles Sink. Somewhere along the line, someone figured their rock route would be pretty spectaular when seasoned with snow and ice, and while the route is not as popular a winter/spring objective as the neighboring Triple Couloirs, its still gets climbed occasionally. Such was the case during this past Presidents Day weekend...

Mark Bunker had a sailboat race on Saturday, and figured that would be the perfect warmup for a mid-winter romp in the Stuart Range on Sunday. He had climbed this route before, in both summer and spring, yet convincing him to climb it again proved easy. Hit the trailhead at 3:30am, stoked about the starry skies and crisp temps. Made good time up the road, then through the forest, and finally across Colchuck Lake. Started up the route at 9:45 and boy is it a fun one! Super stellar climbing led up thin gullys, exposed snowfields, and steep chimneys before joining the last of the "Triple Couloirs". Must do route for anyone enjoying long moderate mixed climbs!

 

IMG_pic.jpg

 

Marko starting the first pitch

Dtail1.jpg

 

Alpine Bliss:

dtail2.jpg

dtail3.jpg

 

Entering the 3rd Couloir:

dtail4.jpg

 

On Top:

dtail6.jpg

 

Headed down:

dtail7.jpg

 

Back to the car at 10:30pm, then off to McDonals for the requisite caffeine.

 

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gated at the road - excellent track in now all the way to the lake - it was slow putting in the track up to the lake as no matter how many goddamn times i go up there in winter i manage to find the stupidiest path possible (very happy to let those 2 young'ns do most of it :)

 

there were ski tracks going off towards stuart and one of the skiiers i met who'd come from there said they'd been to the lake and ran into somebody who said they were going up mountie creek, but that maybe they didn't?

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I was wondering the same thing, but think Scott answered it in his description.

 

Trip: Dragontail - Gerber-Sink North Face

 

Hit the trailhead at 3:30am, stoked about the starry skies and crisp temps. Made good time up the road, then through the forest, and finally across Colchuck Lake. Started up the route at 9:45 and boy is it a fun one!

 

I would interpret that to be 5 hours from the road closure (trailhead) to the correct side of Colchuck Lake.

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For those of you who have already done the triple couloirs and are contemplating this outing, you can finish the upper part of the Gerber-Sink route by following the top of the Hidden Couloir route up along the ledge at the bottom of the fin, across some ribs and and such, then up to the summit, making a completely separate outing rather than following the third couloir.

 

Nice to see this TR, way to seize the moment. :tup:

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Scottgg. Nice work on the climb and thanks for the trip report. How was the last pitch of climbing on the face before you got into the 3rd couloir?

 

A friend and I climbed it in lean conditions a number of years ago. The face seemed to funnel up into a narrow gully which eventually turned into pure rock. At the time I remembered thinking that this last pitch just before the 2nd Couloir was one of the spicier pitches I had lead in the mountains. One good stopper right off the belay, and then 40+ meters of slabby, unprotectable, crackless granite and silver-dollar size pieces of frozen turf to a snow seat belay. Did you find anything like that, or was this section fairly snowed/iced up?

 

Again well done!

 

Edited by Climzalot
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