[TR] Mt. Thompson - West Ridge, 5.6 8/24/2008

[OlympicMtnBoy]

Trip: Mt. Thompson - West Ridge, 5.6

 

Date: 8/24/2008

 

Trip Report:

The original plan was to climb the west ridge of Mt. Stuart and NB and I packed accordingly with light packs for a bivy, a tiny rack, and a 30m half rope. It all seemed well planned to show up Saturday late morning and climb till we felt like stopping and enjoy a pleasant alpine bivy before finishing and hiking back down for sunday dinner back home.

 

What we forgot to check was the status of the forest fire burning away nearby, so when we show up at the Teanaway trailhead we were met by a very friendly ranger who kindly informed us that all the trails were closed due to danger of the fire spreading. He showed us the fire map and went back to feeding peanuts to the squirrels (leave no trace) while we discussed our other options. *note There is a $150 fine for being on the trail when it's closed.

 

For some reason Mt. Thompson popped into my head as an easy alpine route that might be fine with our minimal gear and would be a good overnight given our now afternoon start. I had admired Thompson from a solo backpacking trip up Gold Creek to Joe and Alaska lakes a couple years ago. When I got back from that trip I looked up the route description. Now that was two years ago and I hadn't looked out the route since. All I remembered was that it was off the Pacific Crest Trail, and was like 5.4 or something. Thus equipped with my vague memories and no map or description we headed down the PCT.

 

It was quite pleasant but very crowded until we passed Ridge Lake. If you've been up to Thompson you'll remember to inobvious trail up to Bumblebee "Pass". I didn't remember that part of the description so we kept going to the obvious pass near Joe Lake. You can look up to Thompson from there, but it is not the easy way to go. Thickheaded we crashed down a faint trail which eventually led to a cliffy route down to Ed's Lake. There was a beautiful campsite, but we went about 1500 feet lower than we needed to on the normal approach. We admired Toppling Tower (5.5) and then worked our way around the lake and up a long scree gully towards the base of Thompson.

 

With the bushwhacking and extra travel we abandoned plans of finding a scenic bivy on the ridge and camped at a pleasant spot in the bowl on the approach. The last stragglers climbing that day came down by headlamp. At least we know where the 4th class descent route was. We figure the ridge route was obvious (and indeed it was).

 

We had some yummy bean soup with grilled skirt steak (thanks Nick!) for dinner and then a pleasant snooze. We woke at sunrise aware of the forecast for afternoon rain and headed up to the West Ridge notch. From the notch the actual climb only took us an hour and a half with on 30m pitch to start and then some simulclimbing. We were worried about the weather, watching a triple lenticular descend onto Rainier, but it stayed pleasant for us. The rock was shitty, but it reminded me of climbing in the Olympics so I was fine leading everything.

 

The descent was fairly easy to find, marked by many rap anchors which might have been useful, but not with a 30m rope, so we scrambled and did ok. We make it back to camp around 11AM, snacked, packed, and hiked out. We only had a tiny bit of rain on the trail a bit before the car so it all worked out well.

 

And thus ended another adventure. Fun time, cool location, crappy rock, but I still liked the climb.

 

Pictures are here: http://picasaweb.google.com/matthiesen/MtThompsonClimb

 

Gear Notes:

5 nuts, 5 cams, some slings, and a 30m half rope, helmets useful

 

Approach Notes:

Head left up the water gully above Alaska Lake to Bumblebee "pass". Not that hard to find if you are looking for it.

 

Check for fire closures before heading out too!

[zoroastr]

Great shots of the route...one o' my perennial local faves--relaxed, but nicely exposed.

thanx for sharing.

[olymand]

Nice TR and pix, nick. I really enjoyed that climb when we did it as a long one day in october (although the day was kind of short that time of year) we ended up coming back in dark and rain, but I was still wistful that we hadn't camped in that pretty little meadow. I think that is one of the nicest spots in the pass.

[Alpine_Tom]

Thanks for those photos. That was the first alpine rock climb I did, and I was also wishing we'd arranged to camp in that little meadow. Truly a shangri-la spot.

Edited September 10, 2008 by Alpine_Tom