NE Butttress of Johannesberg.

[Tom_Sjolseth]

Looking for a solid partner for the NE Buttress of Johannesberg Sat-Mon (9/6-9/8). Must be comfortable soloing 4th class, following to 5.8.

[ivan]

if you can't find one, i'd recommend soloing the route - the only sketch part is the shitty chimney, but you'll need to have a rope for the raps on the escape anyhow, and you can just skip the chimney by rapping into the gully nearby it

 

wish i could go - it's a climb worth repeating every year, no doubt! don't miss the fantastic bivy on the slabs just beside the glacier, just above the chimney!

[mvs]

Haha! Never thought I'd hear anyone talk about repeating that route every year. Ivan you are a true Cascadian!

[mattp]

I wouldn't recommend soling it unless you are pretty comfortable with soling big routes. I soloed it, without a rope, at a time when I was regularly soling mountain climbs throughout the region. This one felt like more than I should have bitten off. A friend of mine, who was doing many of the same climbs solo, felt the same way.

[jhamaker]

I can leave Seattle Sat afternoon.

James: 206 (cell) 8i9 556l

[ivan]

I wouldn't recommend soling it unless you are pretty comfortable with soling big routes. I soloed it, without a rope, at a time when I was regularly soling mountain climbs throughout the region. This one felt like more than I should have bitten off. A friend of mine, who was doing many of the same climbs solo, felt the same way.

which part did you find the most spooky matt?

[Tom_Sjolseth]

Partner found leaving Saturday AM, sorry James.

[ivan]

good luck - don't forget the tr! or doug's direct, for that matter...

[mattp]

There were lots of things I found scary about it, but mostly it was just the fact that there seemed to come one after another something where I told myself I didn't want to downclimb what I just did. Right off the ground I stepped over a moat onto some sandy rock where a slip wouldda sent me a hundred feet under the snowpack, somewhere higher up I climbed heather using an ice axe like an ice tool for a couple hundred feet, I remember some rock climbing that seemed damn scary for 4th class to me. It was a relief to get to the snow arete!

 

I don't think the east route was then "standard." My plan had been to traverse over the west summit and then down, but instead I descended the south face more or less directly from the summit. That was quite a shattered mess, and then I circled around the west side of the peak and descended the steepest woods I've ever seen -- there were copious chances to kill myself right until I stumbled upon the River.

[ivan]

nice!

 

that east side route seems pretty well-traveled now, but i wouldnt' want to go down it w/o a rope though - i'd feel damn scared not having the ability to bail back down the route too...

[Stefan]

dude, what happened to you this past weekend?

 

We thought you and your dad might be freezing up there...? What happened?

[Tom_Sjolseth]

What happened with what?

 

I was up hiking Big Chiwaukum this weekend, a week on your heels. The original plan was Johannesberg, but I didn't want to be up there in crappy weather. It turns out that was a great decision, because we encountered rhime ice on Big Chi on Monday.

[ivan]

so how was it? awesome weather, it would seem!

[Tom_Sjolseth]

We summitted, but not by the route we wanted to. We had very wet brush coming down from the berm into Cascade River, and the ground was saturated, so we opted to climb the CJ Couloir to the E Ridge. Johannesberg gets a bad reputation, probably because it's intimidating to look at from the CP parking lot, but in all actuality it's really not that bad. I was able to ascend and descend the E Ridge without a rope. Routefinding was not that bad, just stay in exposed class 3 gulleys systems until the false summit, then stay below the crest on climber's left (class 3 with short sections of class 4).

 

Rob turned out to be a great partner on this outing. He should have a TR up soon.