wanting to climb Mt Jefferson

[pierceadams]

Hi, I was thinking about trying to climb Mt Jefferson this July. Asides from climbing Baker via the Easton Glacier route on a mountaineering course with AAI, I haven't climbed a mountain like this (i.e; glaciated), but I figure it would be a good start. I was wondering if anybody agrees. I was thinking about doing one of the route in Alan Kearney's Classic Climbs book, I forget the name. It seems like a pretty moderate route, but I wondering about the conditions and about the summit pinnacle. Is it just easy rock climbing, is it sometimes plastered w/ ice? I know it was a heavy winter in Oregon, but I left in March. Any info is much appreciated.

Thanks, Pierce Adams

Edited June 5, 2008 by pierceadams

[billcoe]

What route? West face couilar ya might (probably) get killed or beaned by a rock coming straight down from the pinnacle. It's a great route to climb if you're not getting nailed by rocks and July will be warm. North Ridge may be do-able safely in July yet. I've only done it in winter rimmed over or snowed in and it's awesome. I heard if your on the bare rock there, that the rock is a bit loose, but only class 4. The crevasse up there might be real fun that time of year too.

 

That's my thoughts anyway: what route ya talkin?

[pierceadams]

I was thinking the Jefferson Park Glacier route, that ridge looks awesome. It is on the north side though, right? Is that going to be too prone to rock fall in July?

Also, how many days, like hike in, setup camp, get up early climb descend and pack up and leave, or stay another night. And gear, pickets a few screws, slings and stoppers?

thanks again, Pierce Adams

 

 

Edited June 5, 2008 by pierceadams

[sweatinoutliquor]

I know more than one individual that's almost been toasted by rockfall coming from the gully next to the molar tooth. Just use your judgement, be careful, and get passed the bergschrund by a reasonable hour.

 

Yes the JPG is on the north side. I reccomend decending the russel glacier if you choose that route.

[pierceadams]

Thanks liquor, that is the type of info I am looking for.

[billcoe]

Yeah, the north ridge is the one called Jeff park Glacier? Great route. I stopped climbing Mt's 20 years ago and forget a lot of this stuff. I'll never forget popping out of my tent on Jeff Park Glacier in @1972 to cock my leg and seeing what were the largest stars I've ever seen, before or since. I woke my bro up and said - come look at this....we both marveled for some time in silence looking at the sky.

 

Almost 30 years later, at 18,000 feet in the Himalayas, we're standing there in the dark, again, and bro mentions it. "Remember the stars from JPG that night?" Damn, pretty magical place.

 

One more thing, and please do not think I am dissing you here, cause I can be pretty caustic even when I feel my intentions are good: the North Side route may be one of the knarliest on the Mt, please, I don't know your experience level, but please...please....focus on the climbing, and not on the goal of summiting, which is, after all, merely a side benefit of being in the Mts with your bros. If it doesn't feel right, back off and do another route, or do it some other day.

 

No hits no runs no errors but ya live for another day and had an experience. Be PROCESS oriented, not GOAL oriented.

[Alpinsanity]

A friend and I climbed the JPG Route in late July, and there was a ton of rockfall coming off the summit. We left early, but as soon as the sun came out it was on. Always looking up the whole time to avoid rocks. Thankfully nothing too large. We had to climb down into the bergschrund and back up the other side in order to access the summit block. Very interesting. I would suggest getting past the bergschrund just as the sun comes up. We descended via the Whitewater Glacier, and it was really straightforward. I can't compare it to any other descent route, since it's the only one I've taken. It took us 3 days in and out, and that was plenty of time.

Hope this helps some.

[billcoe]

Good report Alpinsanity. To clarify it for Pierce, how warm was it when you were there? Also, how high up the mt were you - that is, I mean, where the rockfall started? Were you pretty high up before you'd be in the rockfall zone and have to be concerned? I've never been on Jeff in July, and Pierce is gonna need that info more than anything I'd suspect.

 

If ya have to be there in July Pierce, bet this July will be as good as any given the incredible amount of snow in Detroit/Idana area which probably hit Jeff head on this winter. The National guard was called out to help shovel people out of their homes just 2/3 months ago over there when it snowed so hard everyone got trapped inside their homes in Idana. Thats never happened before. Jeff park glacier is one of the best spots to just hang out and relax too.

 

BTW, I'd do it in a day if I were you, just start early, it will still be a long day, but as you'll be on top of the snow you should be fine (bring headlamps) unless you're intent on hanging out and want a high camp, which would be awesome, (mostly cause I'd be too lazy to carry the extra gear up there), it's pretty long

steep.

[Alpinsanity]

We were about 2/3 of the way up JPG, when the rock showers commenced. I think it topped out at somewhere around 80 degrees

that day. Personally, I would not want to cram the entire outing

into a one day push. Jefferson Park itself is absolutely gorgeous,

and has great spots to camp, if you don't want to haul all you gear up onto the moraine. Might as well give yourself some time to relax and enjoy the scenery. You could wake around 2:30am and easily get to the summit block around dawn. No problem.

Awesome photo ops from Jefferson Park of the entire mountain.

 

[dougd]

Closest I've ever come to getting beaned by a rock was on the North side of Jefferson Nov 07. Was about 7000ft heading for high camp at 7500ft when I just happened to look up and saw this boulder about the size of a cantelope silently booking down the snow slope. I took off running on a diagonal and it missed me by only 30ft or so. scared the shit out of me. It was 3:30pm or so. I knew I was late but wtf ya gonna do I wanted to get to camp for a summit attempt the next day.

 

The wind came up big later and blew me off the mountain anyway. I got a good look at the schrund, glacier et al and it looks like a great route but I figure on a trip to the south side pretty soon via pamilia lake. S ridge looks like a nice walk for an old man... I won't be late up high again...

 

good luck

 

d

 

 

[billcoe]

alpineinsanity: I totally agree on the relax and enjoy comment. It's soo frikkan nice up there. Doug: I don't forget the closet I came. South side of Hood! Imagine that. We were going to camp on the Illumantion saddle and do a couple of routes. We were up early afternoon and all set up tents and sleeping bags, so I thought I'd simply walk over to the crater and peek in cause I was bored (but still tired from carrying all the shit up and was planning on sleep early).

 

Whhhysssssmmm! Rock! I was still below and west of Crater rock. It came off the summit, not the Crater which was still

east of me. I heard it, but only caught a glimpse. As it went past so fast, in the air, head height just 20 feet from my head, I turned my head downhill to see a head sized rock that was still airborne and going so fast it was making a whistling noise. It hits the soft snow and bounced back into the air, contnuing it's journey. I'm way below the summit, on nearly flat ground, in summer, in the afternoon, with the soft afternoon snow not doing it's job and cushioning and stopping or slowing the rock at all. Thats what really shocked me.

 

I moseyed back and got my helmet. Not that it would have helped this thing was moving so fast. It was surprising to me given how low angle the slope was, how high to the summit rock band it was, and how soft the deep snow was.

[Alpinsanity]

My closet call was just after crossing an ice bridge to gain the base of the entrance chute to Mt. Stuart's North Ridge.

I was on steep, hard but crumbly rock, and could not move fast at all. Fortunately, I heard it before it got to me. A super loud whizzing sound (like a UFO in bad sci-fi), really strange. All I could do was duck and hang on. It went right over my head, about 6' up. About the size of a basketball at least. Could have taken my head off. Scared the hell outta me! Needless to say, gaining the ridge was a relief. Out of harms way for the duration of the climb.

Why do we do this? Sorry for steering away from the topic, but uncontrolled hazards are always fun to talk about.

[dougd]

The rocks whizzing down glaciers are pretty quiet. I didn't hear that one until it crashed into the rocks below me. If I didn't look up at that particular time to further assess the headwall I was about to climb, well, doesn't do any good to revisit the possibilities now does it. This one was the size of a large canteloupe... Big enough. A buddy of mine got his femur broke by one of those quite ones high up on Mt Rainier some years back, necessitating an evac.

 

Why do we do this? Ha. That's an individual thing of course. My personal motivations have evolved over the years but ultimately I figure the rewards outweigh the potential consequences. I've always just loved being in the high mountains.

 

Pierce, finish your day early, and keep your eye on the horizon.

 

d

[billcoe]

Sorry for steering away from the topic, but uncontrolled hazards are always fun to talk about.

 

I know. Now Pierce is probably gonna stay home and watch tv instead! Sorry Pierce.

 

One of the most impressive things I've ever seen was on the North side of Mt. Hood. I was up there by myself sans camera (back before these great digital cameras unfortunately), perhaps July or August. I'd just gone walkabout to get out of the heat in the valley, don't remember the month to tell you the truth but it was hotter than hell. I was on top of Barret Spur at like 8900" looking down (I'm guessing the elevation, if any of you geeks want to look it up go ahead, I was on top of it just chillin') I hear a huge noise, look over and down and see this entire ice cliff tottering over on the Coe Glacier. Holy friggan crap. This thing must have been 200' high and had blocks the size of houses, it swept the entire lower slopes like a psylocybin crazed janitor with a broom. Had anyone been heading up Sunshine and been lower down, no way they could have lived. I was the only visible person up there to see it, luckily I suppose. Breathtaking.

 

Listen to Doug's advice though - it's good: "finish your day early, and keep your eye on the horizon."

 

Hey Doug, did we guide together? Mt Hood, huge lighting storm, just missed it? International Climbing Expeditions through Portland Parks and Recreation? You that Doug?

[sweatinoutliquor]

I think the problem with rockfall on the JPG is that in order to skirt around some of the glacier's upper crevasses you generally tend to go to climbers left, which exposes you to the rockfall from the molar tooth gully. The glacier/snowfield is usually pretty littered with rocks, so it's easy to see where the danger zone is. Perhaps my buddy will chip in with his story, but from what I recollect he mentioned traversing below the gully a little later than he would like and just got one of those bad feelings about "where he was at" and decided to start heading down quick. I believe he said that 15 minutes later a major rockslide kicked off literally filling up one or two of the crevasses with debris and obliterating his tracks.

 

 

The gully I'm talking about is a little left of the molar tooth (middle pinnacle in picture).

 

 

As for decending the russel glacier, if you decide to go that way, here's a little tip. In the picture below, you can make out the rock band that forms the knife edge ridge. Start down the milk creek gully but sorta aim for the base (kinda not shown in the lower left of the pic) of the rock formation that makes the knife edge ridge. Once there continue to traverse on the contour back to the north and you will pop out on top of the russel glacier route.

 

 

Bill I appreciated your comment about being process oriented instead of goal oriented. That's an elegant way to describe something i've fumbled around explaining before.

[dougd]

"Hey Doug, did we guide together? Mt Hood, huge lighting storm, just missed it? International Climbing Expeditions through Portland Parks and Recreation? You that Doug?"

 

Nah bill, only guiding I've done would be for family and friends over the years. You sound like a person I would have enjoyed climbing with tho.

 

Oh man lightning storm stories? Do we want to start that!? haha

 

d

[billcoe]

That Doug really had his shit together, you sort of sound like him. I think he'd damn near lived on Mt Baker for a few years when he was a kid, he really had saavy. I think I might have guided Hood maybe 3 or 4 times with him. Wish I'd climbed with him more. My regular climbing partner, who was a kickassed tele- boarder himself said Doug was an amazing backcountry skier. I Can't remember his last name, but I remember his face and what a good dude he was.

 

The lighting strike story goes like this: From the summit of Hood, we saw a cloud coming over our way from about the Mt St Helens area, it was pretty dark looking and lower than the upper clouds: and since you never know, despite what the weather dudes are saying, we shortened out summit stay then hightailed it with our group. We passed a group of very experienced folks we sort of knew who they were and they were still going up and close to the summit, said hi as we passed - some Portland Mountain Rescue folks - Rocky Henderson and some others. Just about the Hogsback it got foggy to the point of maybe 30' visablity. Doug caught on to the emergency about to happen, maybe by a 3rd sense, cause he caught the feeling first. With a few flakes coming down, I was bent over helping a woman struggle to get her rain pants over her boots when Doug yells at me "Cut them with your knife lets keep this group tight together and get the F* off NOW!" I whipped out the knife sliced the Goretex just that quick- then we yanked and cranked. We had them all up and hustling and were herding the group just like good sheep dawgs working sheep. Clapping our hands and yelling like cowboys getting the herd to move: imparting the urgency needed to get off. Within 10 min, and we hadn't gone far, it started to sleet followed thereafter by an amazingly loud BOOM that shook the ground. Later in the bar after the dust (so to speak) had settled Doug described the experience as what it must be like to stand inside of a light bulb when someone clicks it on ad off, while a cannon is fired from behind your ear. Now the urgency was felt by the group and the hardest part was to keep them from stampeding and together. The lightbulb experience repeats a couple of more times and then o more booms as sleet continues while we descend. We got down to the top of the Palmer out of the wind, and turns out that all that shit was happening under a cloudcap. We can now see way down there, miles away and it looks clear to the southern mountains. Looking up, nothing still: just fog. No lightning. We discuss a plan of action, figure it was probably bad for the PMR folks, leave 1 guide with the group at the relative safety from the wind of the lee of the hut, then Doug and I start back up to the top again to help those dudes still up there and help co-ordinate a rescue, wondering if the lightning strike might had nailed them all.

 

We'd gone no more than a 1/2 mile as the fog was lifting and viability getting better when we bump right into those folks coming off as we are both following our herds earlier descent tracks. I can't describe how overjoyed we were after a quick nosecount showed them all healthy. They had the incredible version, on the very summit with their ice axes stuck in the snow and the axes just started humming, they looked at each other and went OMG! Then hair starts standing on end, they nevously grab their axes anyway and just start rushing off when the first strike hits.......damn. Must have been something. Ask Rocky. Bet his version is pretty interesting still even after 20 years or whatever it's been.

 

Bet he's got some good stories.

 

But I digress, have a good trip to the mountains Pierce, when it's good, it's very very good, when it's bad: well, it's still pretty good:-) Once you get down anyway.

[Alpinsanity]

 

Here's my shot of upper JPG in late July 1998.

Check the bergschrund/crevasse at the top.

We climbed down into it, then up the other side.

Which was quite a bit taller, and almost vertical on the left . Overhanging on the right. Sweet.

Sorry for the poor quality. Scanned it from a standard photo.

 

 

 

 

 

[Alpinsanity]

I see my pic is too large. My apologies.

First time posting one on here.

What is the ideal size for this site?

[pierceadams]

hey thanks all, great beta. seeing as the topic went from beta to close calls to close calls with lightning, here is my bit. When I was first learning how to climb I did some tech. mountaineering courses with AAI, all three in a row. It was a great month or so when I was nineteen. Anyway, the third part I went up into the Bugaboos with Matt Anderson who was a guide with AAI. We climbed the NE Ridge of Bugaboo spire, topped out and started descending the Kain route when this storm from hell came in. We were about three raps with some down climbing down from the top, on this hand-railish ridge when it started to hail and thunder. I am on a ledge with the rope flaked out, Matt is looking for the next anchors when our ice axes start buzzing. Matt hustles back over saying he thought he was about to get it and we promptly remove all our metals and put em in a pile and sit down in the lightning position. We proceeded to get buzzed three times though the rock, once in my right knee, once in my left elbow and the third was big enough to knock my helmet into the rock and put me on my ass. REAL scary, like no delay between the lighting, the crack and the jolts. I had a real interesting time contemplating all the possibilities, you know like dying Anyway, the storm passes and we hear this rumbling and we are all like, Sh!t, what now? big rock fall beneath us, got to see the debris on the glacier after we finished descending. My scare story at least.

Thanks for the sage wisdom of knowing when to back off, climb early and keep my eyes on the horizon. And fat chance about stayin home and watching the boobtube, where the heck is the fun in that?

[pierceadams]

oh yeah, one other question. Technical ice tool at all? like one technical and one glacier for the bergshrund?

Thanks for the input,

Pierce Adams

[dougd]

Looks like your pic was taken from meadows above Jeff Park proper on approach to the glacier. That snow patch in foreground with ridge above is where I was nearly taken out by a boulder.

 

Anyway, fyi just over that ridge at 7500ft is a nice camp site. Rock wall needs work... It can be a rather windy spot as it is on a knob and exposed but is nice and flat and big enough for a tent.

 

d

[dougd]

From what I saw late last year an ice axe would be enough. I'd probably carry an extra axe if I were to solo the North side tho. The schrund is easy enough to get around, you don't have to go through it. Especially this year with all the snow that should be up there...

 

Lightning story:

 

I had attempted the Grand Teton once and got stormed off at the moraine camp. On the second attempt in June 84 we reached the upper saddle early from the moraine camp again and saw an awful looking solid black system to the West. It was quite some distance away. My little brother and I had trained very hard for this climb and were in really fine shape and we decided to make a run for it. In doing this, I violated one of my basic rules of not climbing into weather... We had traveled a long way to get there and wanted this summit really bad. This, was of course a mistake. This storm moved pretty fast to us, and caught us at approximately 12,500 ft, I knew we had to find cover and saw a hole in the mountain above and made a bee line for it. This small cave, at just under 13,000ft, was just enough for my brother and I to fit in, in a sitting position with our knees up to our chins literally touching each other. We should have sat on our rope to insulate us from ground, but did not have sense enough to do this and the storm just got to roaring outside. It was horrendous. Huge explosions and flashes for about an hour. One of the strikes conducted through the wet rock and I was indirectly hit. It felt like I'd been hit with a baseball bat in the head. It hailed three to four inches deep before it was done. When it was over we retreated of course, very shaken by the experience. I have been through some serious storms in the mountains before, and since, but nothing like that one. We were very lucky to survive it and learned from it. Basically the lesson get's back to the process thing bill elluded to earlier. Back in the day, when I was stormed off a mountain I got more determined and would accept more risk on return trips. The third time was a charm and I summited solo a year later.

 

I have another lightning story but, it happened on the back nine of a golf course in Spokane. I caught on with three guys that were drinking whiskey the whole way and when the storm hit they ran under a big tree and I'll never forget them motioning with their hands for me to come join them under that tree like grim reapers saying "come to us"... I elected to stay in the open, crouching away from my metal golf clubs until, thoroughly soaked to the bone I said fuck it and decided to just walk it in to the clubhouse. Thought I was gonna die that day too.

 

d