The infamous Rockie's 5.9 A2

[Dane]

Here is a tic list for the aspiring Alpinist

Terrain for the committed.

 

The "grand cour" routes of the Rockies.

 

5.9 and A2 has recently turned into M6 or M7 on many climbs. Typically Grade Vs that can easily run into a Grade VI. And "5.9?", a number that means nothing to anything in comparison to a sunny rock climb on good rock in shoes...any kind of good rock.

 

Fun to also note all but a couple of these were first done between '72 and '84.

 

Assinibone V 5.9 A2

Kitchener V 5.9 A2 or V W5 M6 VS

North Twin VI 5.10+ A1 or all the way to A4

Alberta VI 5.9 A3

Robson VI 5.9 A2

Storm V 5.9 A3

Fay V 5.8 W5 and for once no aid for once!

Temple V 5.9 A2 ( The Sphinx)

Chephren VI 5.9 A3 W4

Howse VI 5.9 A3

Andromeda V 5.9 A2 W4

Geike VI 5.10 A3

 

 

What impresses me is all the classic, hard alpine routes (like Cavell and all but one of the N. Face rotes on Temple) that are Grade IVs and nothing harder than 5.8, even if the rock is generally shitty

 

Go get'um lads!

 

Thanks to John Scurlock for the AWESOME photos he allowes us all access to!

 

Assinibone

 

Kitchener

 

North Twin

 

Alberta

 

Robson

 

Andromeda

 

 

 

 

 

 

[marc_leclerc]

The grand central on Kitchener and the 'andromeda strain' both look pretty sweet!

[Robert Howell]

Not to derail the thread... but do you have any more pictures of robson?

[Chad_A]

Again, Dane, inspirational! Here's pics from this fall; another 5.9 A2 IV (though not as long as the others), Asteroid Alley. My buddy, Keith, is ropegunning the crux pitch.

 

 

Me, following:

 

 

Looking down the fun upper part of the crux pitch:

 

The lower ice face and the route from afar:

 

My partner snapped this pic of me; he named it "Merry Screaming Barfies". The first ones of the year always suck.

 

I'll be the first one to say that the route was overwhelming for me, and that I don't throw these routes lightly as future plans anymore. I think I'd like to get some more craggin' done first.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Dane]

Chad, awesome pics and NICE route, congrads! I glanced up that way last winter while on Shooting Gallery. From what little I could see it looked cold and hard

 

 

You'll appreciate this. As I told a buddy the other day when asked what my favorite Rockies climb was, "Don't have one. They are all climbs I'd like to have done. It is the actual climbing part that I'd like to avoid "

 

 

Robert..more of John's pics of Alberta and the Rockies here:

 

http://www.pbase.com/nolock/cdnrockies&page=2

 

A favorite of John's:

 

Obviously nothing like Scurlock's but one of mine from a little closer in.

 

 

[letsroll]

Chad....that is SICK!!!! nice work. Some day.......

[Chad_A]

Chad....that is SICK!!!! nice work. Some day.......

Letsroll- neither one of us realized what we were in for on that route, but it all worked out for the best. The congrats really belong to Keith for leading that crux pitch, though It was a great experience I shall not forget!

 

Dane- the Shooting Gallery looked to be in good nick when we were there, but how did that water ice pitch turn out? we were wondering if it was real water ice or if it was unprotectable sn'ice. We didn't get a good look at it before heading up A.A. Congrats to you, as well

[Dane]

Dane- the Shooting Gallery looked to be in good nick when we were there, but how did that water ice pitch turn out? ....Congrats to you, as well

 

Thanks Chad! I was on SG first week of March in clear but fairly chilly weather. Only ice I actually saw was on the crux (WI3) and it gave great sticks. The rest was lots of snow plodding. In the shade and knee deep snow it was frightenly cold (and a little scary because of avi conditions) compared to waterfall cragging in the area earlier in the week. Did I mention it was cold?!...I was well prepared and been on the Ice fields a lot in winter but this day it was Alaska cold in the gully.

Looked pretty much like this but with a blue bird sky.

 

Esugi's picture from later in the month was pretty close to what I had, lots of snow plodding.

 

 

I had hoped for somemthing more like this

 

 

 

And thrilled it really wasn't something like this! (Funny what can be do with a camera isn't it?)

 

 

Esugi left a good TR and some pic here:

http://cascadeclimbers.com/forum/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=786421

 

And Andromeda Stain

 

 

[Dane]

Good slide show of Diadem N Face - Humble Horse here:

 

http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://lh5.ggpht.com/_eokdNyvGL8c/Ru8qqj_TQwI/AAAAAAAAAnQ/Dant_-j8-ss/foto%2B014.jpg&imgrefurl=http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/jGrHlC36q7V7I_qELBqt5A&h=480&w=640&sz=19&hl=en&start=2&um=1&usg=__2QMUm6W-mg6dZmVnfkWg1J3To_8=&tbnid=ew-bWe1upKKoiM:&tbnh=103&tbnw=137&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dhumble%2Bhorse%2Bclimb%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26rlz%3D1T4GWYE_enUS256US263%26sa%3DN

[giza]

Dane, you briefly mentioned North Twin above. A friend of mine shattered his elbow on an attempt of the North face of North Twin. Whenever I want to get scared I read this:

 

It is, hands down, the hardest face in the range. Five thousand feet of sheer, black, and north facing

limestone, steeper than the Eiger, one and a half times as high as El Cap, a great dark cape of a peak.

Hundred foot seracs calve thunderously and with violence from its belly, wisps of water ice hang from its

brow like icicles tacked to a ship’s prow, and rockfall darkened icefields foot its soaring pillars. Then there

is the loose rock and the falling rock ... at times it makes the Eiger look like a kiddies sandbox. Climbers

are familiar with almost every crack on El Cap, yet, after thirty years of attempts solely two routes have

been established up the shadowland of North Twin; mystery unmarred, aura enhanced by each and every

one of the vanquished.

 

The dog days of August, 1974, George Lowe and Chris Jones venture onto the Twin in full-on Eiger

Sanction mode: full shanked leather boots, wool knickers, and Dachstein mitts, nylon tops. They find

climbing similar to the hardest ground in the Dolomites (5.10, A4) yet their situation, in what local climbers

refer to as the “Black Hole” of the Canadian Rockies, is far more serious than any climb in the Dolomites.

They are a full day of mountainous travel from the nearest road, and once past the first quarter of the wall,

rescue--even given today’s techniques--is impossible; furthermore, the wall they are on is glaciated,

vertical to overhanging, and brazed with alpine ice. The Readers Digest version is that there is really

nothing comparable to North Twin in the Alps. George and Chris strive; wet blowing snow frequently

smears slush onto the holds. On the fifth day they are battered by hail and George “goofs-up” a hop step

while waiting for Chris to remove and send up a piton from the belay; George falls 30 feet and loses the

critical aid placement of the pitch. They are 4,000 feet up the wall. That night, their fifth on the wall, neither

man sleeps until 3 a.m.. When they admit to each other that they no longer have enough gear to retreat

and that there is no chance of a rescue, they agree that there are no options; if they are to survive they

have to climb.

 

The dawn of day six brings swirling clouds and snow. George leads an improbable and time consuming

traverse across a snow-peppered slab then escapes into an ice runnel that he gains by liebacking the

edge of a roof and pressing his knees into the remains of the winter’s snow/ice! Falling snow matures into

hail, avalanches run, George leads through the storm for 15 pitches on ice. They have all of three ice

screws. Chris and George summit and set-up their small tent right there and accumulating snow collapses

the tent twice in the night.

 

Writing in Ascent Chris stated that he and George had crossed an indefinable line and that on their eighth

day out, searching for their descent by compass atop the Columbia Icefield, the brief glimpse of helicopter

and warden Hans Fuhrer’s words, diced by the rotor, “ARE YOU OK?”

“We realized someone cared about us, that we were not alone ... tears ran down my face.”

 

I’ll suggest that, in 1974, the route that George and Chris opened on the North Face of North Twin was the

hardest alpine route in the world. I believe that nothing then accomplished in Patagonia, the Alps, Alaska

or the Himalaya measured up to what George and Chris accomplished with “a rope, a rack, and two

packs.” Further, I’ll assert that George Lowe has contributed every bit as much to the evolution of alpine

style climbing as Reinhold Messner ... and perhaps more.

 

THE NORTH FACE OF NORTH TWIN, TOUCHSTONE OF THE RANGE

By Barry Blanchard

COURTESY OF THE AMERICAN ALPINE JOURNAL, 2002 VOL. 44 FROM TEN CLIMBS TO REMEMBER - PAGE 29

[glassgowkiss]

a lot of these routes go free now, like Astrain or Temple. as far as i remember asteroid alley never had any aid on it.

[Dane]

A "lot"? More like a "few" of them, unless you are talking the recently dry tooled routes or did I miss something? All of these routes were originally done between '72 and '88 @ old school 5.9 and A2/3, 20 years ago now, which is my original point of the thread. There are a lot of new hard routes being done in the Rockies, many of them equal or harder than my original list.

 

I would still contend that the original Rockies North faces @ 5.9 A2s are the NA Classics. And those were done between '65 and '78.

 

 

* new "free" routes with hard M tooling .

 

'82 Assinibone V 5.9 A2

'75 Kitchener V 5.9 A2 or V W5 M6 VS (freed years ago)

'74 North Twin VI 5.10+ A1 or all the way to A4

'72 Alberta VI 5.9 A3 (* @ M8x and WI5+ by a new route)

'78 *Robson VI 5.9 A2 (* @ M5 or M8 by new routes)

'88 Storm V 5.9 A3

'82 Fay V 5.8 W5 and no aid for once! (free)

'88 *Temple V 5.9 A2 ( The Sphinx)

'87 Chephren VI 5.9 A3 W4 (* M6 via new route)

'88 Howse VI 5.9 A3 (*M7 WI6 via new route)

'83 *Andromeda V 5.9 A2 W4 (freed years ago)

'79 Geike VI 5.10 A3

 

Not like most worry about pullling on the odd peg or three while on these faces or even doing the same on some of the easier ones also mentioned in this thread.

 

A new picture from John Scurlock this mmorning.

 

 

Pics below from John Freih's recent trip north to Kitchener and his blog.

 

 

 

Or these pics from the ice strip variation on the same climb from Raphael Slawinski's web site.

 

 

 

[G-spotter]

The Sphinx went free and so did Geike...

[Dane]

Already made that comment on Sphinx. When did Geike?

[G-spotter]

Slawinski/Dumerac et al 04 or 05?

[Dane]

I obviously missed that one..thanks.

 

http://www.climbing.com/news/hotflashes/lowehannibal/

 

[trainwreck]

love the thread, Dane!

 

fyi, the NF of Geikie also went free in 06 when Dana Ruddy and Dave Marra did it in a two day push. two Brits also climbed it that year but no idea if they did it free.

 

Asteroid Alley never had any aid, it is a IV 5.9 route, and Shooting Gallery is actually a Grade III, (IV to the summit which NO ONE does).

 

the A-Strain was freed by Joe Mackay in the late 80's via the offwidth that Blanchard traversed around.

[Chad_A]

Asteroid Alley never had any aid, it is a IV 5.9 route, and Shooting Gallery is actually a Grade III, (IV to the summit which NO ONE does).

 

Classic me -always messin' up the details. My bad.

[glassgowkiss]

i know for fact team Slawinski did Geeke N face in the style 5.11+ 2xA0 (broken hold and we section)

Sphinx Face went free during the second ascent (FWA as well) at M something. As far as I remember E face of Assinibone was done as M something as well (might be wrong on that one).

There was a very strong attempt on N. Pillar on N Twin 3 or 4 years ago. The party went almost all the way to the top, freeing most of it. They bailed after one of the team members suffered bone fracture from rock fall.

As far as M6 on Chephren- I would think it's quite a bit harder. During the interview with Rafal he stated his partner took quite a whipper. Also there is a bit of aid on the last pitch (they were simply too tired to dry tool it). However there is a 5.9 done a few years back to the left of "Wild Things" during the summer of 2000.

[Dane]

I for one am not too concerned about these faces going free or on aid. Kinda like climbing the Salathe or the Regular route on Half Dome, ya both go free, most are just happy to get up them. And pull on lots of stuff.

 

Chephren? "Slawinski was at it again, this time with Swiss guide Pierre Darbellay, establishing The Dogleg Couloir (V/VI M7 A1, ca. 1300m) on Mt. Chephren (3307m)"

 

 

http://www.alpinist.com/doc/web08s/newswire-rockies-house-slawinski

 

Mt Temple Greenwood/Locke

 

Ben Firth at the top of Pitch 7 during the first winter ascent of the Greenwood-Locke (V 5.8 A2, 1200m, Greenwood-Locke, 1966) on the north face of Mount Temple. Firth and Raphael Slawinski eliminated the aid with modern mixed climbing techniques, freeing the route at 5.9 M6. Feb '04 [Photo]

 

 

 

 

 

[glassgowkiss]

wild things now M7

[Dane]

wild things now M7

 

Cool, hu?!

 

 

More here.... and a good video

 

http://www.climbing.com/news/hotflashes/canadas_wild_thing_gets_free_ascent/