[TR] Valhalla Range, BC - Mt Gimli, South Ridge 7/28/2012

[LostCamKenny]

Trip: Valhalla Range, BC - Mt Gimli, South Ridge

 

Date: 7/28/2012

 

Trip Report:

Four years ago Adam had the opportunity to hike up to, and camp below, the awesome south face of Mt Gimli with his hottie, Canadian, yoga instructor friend. At this time Adam was not a climber and had no interest in such pointless ventures as reaching the deserted top of one slag heap after another. Then, in February 2011 during his yearly visit to P-town to snowboard with me I asked him if he had any interest in rappelling simply for the sake of getting some cheap thrills. It was raining up at Mt Hood Meadows so we decided that snowboarding was out, and I convinced him to put on some raingear and a harness and accompany me and Tappet#1 down a jungly rappel route. Months pass and in July Adam made his way out west to God’s country to fulfill his plan to move from the least coast to the best Coast. Finally, in September, during a trip to Smith Rock, Adam fit his skinny arse into one of my harnesses and started climbing. I’d say the rest is history, but we’re really just getting started. I had been wanting him to move out here so we could do this stuff together because who else better to share such exciting moments in climbing than with a friend whom you share so much in common already?

Fast forward to 2012: Adam had been getting out climbing with just about everyone he could after his first trip to Smith and getting as much time in at Beacon as the weather would allow. Then, of course, our training ground became a falcon orgy site again and we had to climb elsewhere. Nevertheless, we worked together and practiced together and got our game honed decently enough to convince ourselves that we could do some big climbs.

So after we’d been climbing together for a few months Adam brings up the idea of going and climbing this peak in Canada that he backpacked to once upon a time, and at the same time he tells me that he applied for an AAC grant to go and do it. Adam’s inspiration, aside from the fact that he had already been to this place before as a touron, was that the peak had a route on it that Fred Beckey, himself, had described in his new book as one of his 100 favorite climbs, and if such was the case it must be absolutely classic and therefore a must do. We were planning to go to Yosemite in June and Adam had heard back around April that the grant had been awarded to him for this trip to Mt Gimli. Our trip to the valley would be “training” for the big climb up north of the border – (even though we got much higher off the ground in the ditch – ha, the irony!)

The valley trip turned into a big kaputchnik, with my acquisition of a quarter-sized blister I on my left heel on day 1, and the terrible news I received about a friend on day 3. Of all the long routes we wanted to do we only did Arches, but over 5 days we managed 29 pitches, so we called it a good trip since we had climbed just about the same number of pitches as were on The Nose. We felt pretty good and figured that when we got back we would have a few weeks to workout on the Beacon sudwand, when it opened, before going to beautiful BC for our pilgrimage to alpine heaven. But then, after we’d been back from the valley for a few days and my blister had finally healed, I rolled my right ankle while bouldering in a gym on a rainy day…. Ahhhhhhhhhhh!!!! What kind of terrible luck is that? With the countdown at less than four weeks until blast-off for Mt Gimli I had to get better fast. Fortunately I am in relatively decent shape and had been running a lot, so my ankle was strong enough to recover with only minimal therapy and no climbing. I did more yoga during this recovery period than I ever have before.

Anyway, my ankle had healed itself in about 12 days, but I was hiking Ruckel Ridge on it after 10 days and climbing after 14. Adam had been busy with his own schedule for a couple weeks and we were only able to climb together once or twice. We climbed at Beacon once together, after its July 13th opening, and then we each got out separately with other partners at different times. On the eve of our departure Adam called me to report that our rental car was reserved and that he would see me at 1pm the next day (26th) and we would drive through until we crossed the border 8 hours later. After I finished working on the 26th Adam and I met in the parking lot of my employer and we loaded up the mobile command center for the drive.

July 26th:

We made it from the Gorge to Stewert Creek Rest Area, just shy of Nelson, BC, in just about 10 hours with stops… and our slight deviation (wrong turn)from the highway outside of Spokane, and again north of Spokane (this was, perhaps, foreshadowing). Adam had driven the entire way thus far and was in need of a break, and with it being 11pm anyway we decided to throw down at this rest area for the night and head to Nelson in the morning. To put ourselves down we each had a beer, and within minutes of zipping ourselves in our bags we were sawing logs.

July 27th:

After waking late, we drove into Nelson so that Adam could get his morning fix. After getting served by the hippie in the coffee shop we got on the road toward Slocan, where we would turn off the main Highway 6 onto Gravel Pit Rd and follow it 26 kilometers into Valhalla Provincial Park. After passing our turn we continued into the small town of Slocan where we surveyed our options for services, should we need them following our climb and descent. When we had satisfactorily made a loop through part of town we drove back in the direction of Gravel Pit Rd and started the drive into the park.

We arrived shortly before 11am and could see that there were already two other cars parked in the spaces. One car was from Utah and looked like it was dressed to repel the zee Germans, but the chicken wire cage which surrounded the access to the underside of the car was meant to keep the snafflehounds from feasting on brake lines and other soft hoses and car parts (It certainly would suck to do a great climb only to drive back to town down the winding mountain road with no brakes!). The other car was not equipped as such, and surprisingly it was from British Columbia. Never the less, we gathered up materials (which were kindly left at the trailhead by our hosts for our use since we had not brought our own) to construct a similar barrier to the rodents and when we had it together we laid out our tarp on the ground next to the car and began to rack up. Above us, and kilometers away in the distance, rose the sharp peak of Mt Gimli, standing to remind us of the challenge that we were soon going to face. It swept up from the ridge to the clouds which encircled its summit, touching the sky, and drawing us in like moths to a flame. It was a majestic and motivating sight, and it served to tell us that we were not in the lowlands anymore.

Adam had his kit together pretty quickly, and soon after he was making a soup for us to eat before we left. Me? I took a bit more time to put myself together and pack my ruck. After all, the hike in wasn’t going to take the whole day and we were not planning to climb today, so I favored a leisurely pace. Usually this irritates Adam like one couldn’t believe, but today he said nothing to me about my casual rate of movement and this helped because it meant that I didn’t have to stop to explain why I was taking my time (which then takes more time). We hadn’t packed or organized anything prior to our arrival, so this was necessary to the process of getting to high camp. Not that I was trying to go slowly, but I knew that if I didn’t I would leave out something important or take something that I really didn’t need to take. We were setting up a high camp, so we were already taking quite a bit with us, and I didn’t want to carry anymore than we already had planned to carry. The approach didn’t need to be made any longer by a heavier pack.

As we were getting packed a third car pulled into the parking area and four folks got out. They were also from BC and were going for a day hike. One of the gentlemen had remarked to us that he had climbed the South Ridge before and said that it was a great climb. He was not a lanky, toned alpinist but rather a jovial, slightly-rotund-through-the-midsection local from Nelson, and he was very friendly (as were the others that he was with). He talked with Adam and me for a few minutes and then after they had their own snafflehound barrier built they began their hike. Adam went over to his soup which was now ready and ate it, nearly burning his tongue. Seeing this, I chose to wait for my serving to cool a bit longer and I kept on with my packing. When I was done with my rucksack a few minutes later I picked up the saucepan and began eating while Adam started the process of constructing the rodent barrier. I set our packs together, ready for the approach, and then began to help him. We folded up the tarp and put it in the trunk, and then at eight minutes after Noon we shouldered our packs and started on the trail.

At first Adam set a blistering pace, but after a couple hundred yards I slowed him down, saying that there was no need to wear ourselves out just getting to our high camp. We did, after all, have nearly 6 hours to get there in daylight and still have light to set up camp. The approach wasn’t going to take more than 3 hours, even as loaded as we were, so we slowed down. We crossed a rushing torrent of a creek as it came sprinting down from the high meadows on a log nailed with metal grating to give traction. After successfully staying dry on this obstacle we kept moving on up the trail, which was well worn yet not looking over-used (even though it probably was well over-used). We stopped a couple times to rest briefly (never longer than a minute or two), and then kept on going, saying that we would rest at camp. The first part of the trail wound through the trees and up the gentle part of the ridge that would later turn into the more narrow ridge at the foot of the mountain with a few campsites. The forested section of the approach was not densely vegetated, as can be the case in the North Cascades, and everywhere we looked there was a break in the trees allowing us the most spectacular views into the rounded valleys far below with great granite peaks soaring far above. We pushed on through the trees and as we came out of them and rose above timberline we could see the majesty of the Valhalla sitting right in front of us.

Valhalla is where the Vikings believed they went to be with the gods, Odin and Thor, when they died in battle. My first sight of this place from the vantage point I’d just come to told me that such heavenly places are for the battle-conscious. Directly in front of us was our objective mountain, bright in the sunlight, and framed with passing clouds. The trail became less obvious now and wandered up through talus, with occasional tangents leading off onto the snowfield which bordered the rocky path. Adam stayed on the rocks wisely following the occasional cairn while I took to the snow. After several hundred meters of walking up one of these boot packs I veered back toward the talus and met back up with Adam, who seemed to be laboring under his pack while making easier progress on the rocks than I was on the snow. I was sweating into the back panel of my pack, but I felt great and my legs had barely felt as though we had hiked at all. I kept going and turned around to see Adam documenting the approach on his camera, so I turned toward him and did the same. The group of day hikers who had started just before us could be seen on the ridge not far above and ahead of us and I started thinking to myself that maybe we had to hike another 15 minutes before arriving at camp. It turned out to be about five.

The place we had come to was quite the little get-away. There were two main areas on this part of the ridge where it appeared that people camped regularly. This was evident by the metal food-storage locker and the open pit toilet (both of which sat no more than several minutes walk from each other) that we encountered prior to arriving at “the beach.” The Beach was a large flat area that had been constructed into a cozy little camp with a stonewall windbreak and room for two tents. Nearby, a third spot had been started for another tent site, but the windbreak had yet to be built up to even a quarter of the same height as the other. When we had our camp set up I decided to pay my karmic debt to the Valhalla and give some time to gathering stones for this third tent site’s windbreak. I felt that touching these rocks and laboring for the area which was accommodating us would bring us closer to the area and give my soul a greater sense of connection to the place.

Prior to our leaving Portland, the weather report had said that there was a slight chance of thunderstorms today (7/27) and tomorrow (7/28), and the next day (7/29) would be nice. The weather up to this point hadn’t concerned me, but as we were standing around our camp in the afternoon on this ridge it was plainly obvious that the clouds in the southeast distance had something in store for us. Huge banks of white, puffy, cotton-ball clouds were heading straight for us, and bordering there clouds was the threatening gray wall that would bring with it the moisture and fear. The idea of being on this exposed ridge was not comforting to either of us, especially when we were surrounded by our metal gear. We discussed what we should do when the weather arrived and settled on putting all our gear in the small tent we’d pitched and then running down to the rocks lower down where there were a few protected places from the rain. We felt the first drops and in an instant Adam had all our gear in the tent and was beelining it to our pre-arranged shelter (less than 5 meters away from the metal locker!). As the rain, thunder and lightning raged around us, we stayed dry under a giant boulder which looked precariously balanced on another boulder. We repeated this retreat to the shelter one more time, and the third (and last) time the weather came we just jumped into the tent with all our gear and cups of tea, as the rain and hail spewed from the sky.

By the time the third wave of weather hit us the sky was really darkening into dusk, not that the dark clouds hadn’t done that already. We had seen a couple climbers descending back toward the base of the south ridge as this weather was slowing down. They stopped and talked to us on their way back to their own tents and then they came back up to talk to us after they had settled back into camp. They had done a new route called “Dark Side of the Moon” and it was clear that they were locals with plenty of time to come up to this paradise anytime they wanted. They told us a little about our route, saying that the 3rd pitch is “all there, but certainly don’t pass the pro when you notice it.” I didn’t give this much thought at the time because I was tired and wanted to get into my sleeping bag. But these words would resonate in my head very soon. As we concluded our conversation with the locals (Sean and JT) we both got into our bags and, with dropped eyelids, slid into rugged slumber.

July 28th:

My alarm went off at 5:30am. The sky was already light and a delicate shade of blue, and the sun was getting ready to rise above the east ridge that ran between the Wolf Ears to the east and Mt Gimli to the west. Adam had said, “… just a half an hour more…” and with that we dropped off again until 6am. As the alarm rang at 6:05 we got out of our bags and began to ready ourselves for the day, fully expecting to be out for the majority of it. Last night we hiked our rack and ropes up to the base to save us time this morning, but that turned out to be nearly pointless since the hike up there was a whole 10 minutes. Still, with our gear already waiting for us up there, and a beautiful blue sky above us, we quickly ate our breakfast and gathered the little things we hadn’t stashed last night at the base of the route. Then we hiked to the base to begin.

Upon our arrival to the base where we hung our gear from a crack, we set to retrieving it from its resting place so we could rack up for the climb. Our pack had seen some visitors during the night, even as well hung as we had set it, and parts of the pack straps had been nibbled on. Our gear, however, had not taken any damage. Fortunately, we were wise enough to not stash food or they might have torn our pack apart!

Adam had said back in Portland - months ago - that he wanted to lead the first pitch, the crux pitch, and I was not anxious to argue with him for it myself. When we were racked and ready Adam started up some awkward cracks, which we later discovered we’d been attacking in a most difficult fashion. Watching him climb these fissures made me glad he wanted to take this first lead, because it didn’t seem like it was easier than 5.10a. Quite to the contrary, in fact. He placed a nut that might have held and came back down to figure it out again. He repeated this up and down movement a couple times and then, tired of seeing him wear himself out on this first 20 feet, I suggested that he put in the big cam and pull up on it. As Colin Haley says, “... free climbing in the mountains is a contrived difficulty…” and it was proving to be so for us here on the first of nine pitches between us and the summit. Adam, to his credit, made quick work of this section, now, and after reaching a comfy alcove 20 feet above me he said he would bring me up to him so he could have the big cam for higher up where it was actually needed. He set up an interesting anchor and brought me up to it.

The rest of the first pitch was a beautiful south facing corner with a crack taking all kinds of gear. Adam fired up this crack to the roof which capped it, masterfully executing the exit move onto the steep mantle above the corner. Then he disappeared from sight after a few more feet. The first pitch was something like 30-40 meters, but it seemed longer. I followed uneventfully, pulling out the gear and sticking awesome moves. I was reeling for more and daftly terrified all at the same time. The mantle to get out from under the roof was especially exciting and as I did it I looked back over my left shoulder to see the ground below us. We were officially off the base of the route.

Adam also led the second pitch, which was longer than the first (perhaps 45 meters). It was a blocky pitch that never felt terribly difficult, but never seemed to let up any, either. It was sustained at about 5.6E (E for Exciting) and went, for the most part, directly up to the top of the pillar to a chockstone set in between it and the main wall. Adam had belayed me up to this point. The crystal-clear sky we had started with had now given way to patchy clouds, which were heading straight for us.

Sean and JT had told us that there was a 40 percent chance of thunderstorms today, but this was our window to do this climb and Adam and I had set our minds to doing it. Now, however, as I reached the top of the pillar and saw that we had climbed our way into clouds, my first thought was retreat. I didn’t say anything about this to Adam because I wanted to climb this route with him and I wanted him to fulfill his goal – on his mountain, on his trip. I was the tourist taking the ride. This was all Adam’s planning, and if we were going to retreat it was going to be because the suggestion came from his mouth. But I looked up at the 3rd pitch and the clouds were just light enough that we could see the 5.7 variation of the pitch directly above. This variation was more sustained than the 5.9 original way and both paths led to the same belay tree (supposedly). This was going to be my first lead of the day and I wasn’t totally psyched for it now that we were sitting below it in a sea of white. I suggested that we wait for a few minutes to see if it would clear a bit (as if that would actually calm my nerves), and eventually it would. No lying about this, I was hesitant about taking the sharp end!

The 3rd pitch started by moving up from the chockstone, which we stood on to the top of, to a flake which had a 1 inch crack on its left side. We altered the anchor Adam had built so that I could take as much of the rack as possible, leaving me as many options for protection as we had brought up with us. After I had moved up and stood on the flake 8 feet directly above Adam’s belay I knew I was committed to the pitch. The route traversed some small edges, and with sparse protection. I placed a small cam that gave me little confidence, but I found a better piece just above and that made me feel much better. Following this second placement I forgot about Adam, and the beta I’d read and heard, and just started climbing. I went around the crest of the ridge out of Adam ‘s sight, and this gave me a true sense of being “out there” as I continued to search for the route. I ascended a series of small corners by climbing up and to the right, and in doing so I managed to get off route somewhat. I climbed up, right, and up again through three different minor corners until I arrived at a friction slab that had two bottoming, flaring, unprotectable cracks in it. These cracks were useful to pull on but otherwise had nothing to offer me. I found a manky cam placement and moved to the left across this slab still in search of a belay tree. I never did find the tree, but I set up and awkward belay with a nut, a cam, and a slung horn at a small stance that had a slung chickenneck at my feet (it was more like a petina I think). My meandering path had caused me considerable rope drag and just getting to this stance required pulling hard from my waist to have enough rope to move. When I reached this chickenneck, prior to setting my anchor, I looked down to see a beautifully spacious belay ledge… but still no tree. I didn’t need a guidebook to tell me that this was the place I’d been looking for, but there still was no tree to be found. I shrugged it off and brought Adam up to my stance rather than to the ledge below, thinking that the drag would be worse if I belayed from down there. He had followed wearing a jacket and I thought that he must have gotten cold while he belayed me – which took time since I was moving cautiously(read: slowly). He reached me after a little while and when he did, he took the gear from me and headed up for the lunch ledge which was about at mid-height on the route.

The fourth pitch was trickier than either of us expected, but we both ascended it without trouble and once we were both on lunch ledge we stopped for some snacks and water. After surveying what was to come above, Adam bravely led off on the 5th pitch. The order we had taken for the leads this far confused me because I thought we had decided to lead in blocks [before we even left Portland]. Obviously this plan had been scrapped, and I think I figured out why: If Adam led the 5th pitch (sandbagged 5.6) and I led the 6th (airy, sandbagged 5.7 right on the blade of the ridge), then it would leave the upper crux roof pitch for Adam to lead. I wasn’t sure if he was doing this to save me from it or if he wanted both crux pitches for himself, but the more I thought about it the more I was just happy to be here with him at all, and felt grateful for what I had. The 5th pitch ascended blocky ground at first and then transitioned into discontinuous cracks that ended at a belay stance on small edges just left of the crest of the ridge. Adam did this wonderfully (though he later confessed that he was terrified out of his mind, which I never suspected) and brought me up for the exciting, full-exposure lead of the 6th pitch that climbed finger cracks up to an obvious short traverse left and up to a slung horn on a downward-sloping ledge. The great corner and roof crux of the upper portion of the route loomed above.

Adam reached my belay at the top of the 6th pitch with a fearful look. He said he had almost vomited lower down and was freaking out after following the pitch I’d just led. The exposure was great and clearly getting in his head. I was sympathetic to this because I can remember feeling this same way once (and likely will feel again in the future). But, undeterred, he composed himself and then sent the last crux pitch that would lead us to the final pitch of technical climbing and then to the scramble to the summit. I was inspired watching Adam send this crux pitch because I knew he was scared, and seeing him rise up to the rock and challenge it back as it challenged him made me feel elated. I hadn’t really thought anything truly bad about our chances of finishing the route so far and this sight of Adam leading in the state he had just revealed to me said that we were warriors and we were fighting this one to the end.

As I followed the crux moves in the roof I exclaimed loudly that those were the most fun moves I’d ever made! The full exposure to the ground some 1000-like feet below were exciting to look back on as I edged across to exit from under the roof, and when I pulled onto the slab where Adam had his belay I started to think that the hard part was behind us and we had the whole climb in the bag. Of course, this is naturally when the weird music starts playing and the true adventure begins.

The West Kootenay Rock guide, which Adam had acquired from the guidebook authors, said the final pitch went up some 5.5 terrain. This was my lead and I went straight up from the belay when I should have traversed a fair distance to my left before going up. I’d gone up to a thin layback crack on a 70 degree slab with a minor corner that terminated below a blank slab. To my right was another blank section and to my left more slabs that appeared to not be featured at all. But determined to carry on my lead, and not wanting to pull out my top piece and downclimb what I’d already started, I rigged my tagline on my top piece and rappelled down the crack I’d ascended to a good stance, removing my gear as I rappelled while Adam took in slack on the climbing rope as I descended. Then, in some dyslexic state of consciousness I decided that the easiest way off from where we were led to the right. So I started climbing back toward the crest of the ridge. Then things got interesting.

At first the climbing was easy and protection wasn’t really hard to find, though it was a fair distance between pieces. JT’s words from last night came into my head: “Don’t pass gear when you find it…”. I placed gear when the rock presented the opportunity and continued climbing, all the while climbing on or nearly on the crest of the ridge with the entirety of the east face of Mt Gimli dropping 1200 feet below me. I kept moving up and at times stopping to admire the dangerous place I’d climbed myself into. The exposure was breathtakingly fabulous and I took it in, feeling free and alive despite the petrifying place I’d come to. As I climbed, the moves got more difficult (felt like at least 5.9+ but wasn’t harder than .10 because I was on It, still) and the gear more spaced out (and thin!). I placed the remaining thin wires that I had on the rack as I climbed. Lower down there were sections where I had to run it out 15-20 feet from one thin nut to the next, and when the final thin nut was placed (this was the only type of gear that consistently presented itself to me on this pitch) I began to wonder if I was climbing my way into a trap. I had made all kinds of moves that I would never want to reverse and I was not sure when it was going to end. The slab to the left of the crest didn’t seem like anything I wanted to be on so I kept on, fighting rope drag that was trying to pull me off at every move. I had to pull up slack, laboriously, before I made each move at this point, so that I could ascend. I was not yet scared but getting concerned. As I made a few thin moves upward with the full drop of the East face below me I could see above where I wanted to exit onto the slab to my left – where I thought there might be a stance for a belay. But the moves were thin and there didn’t appear to be any more gear – all I had on the rack now was large and medium protection. I made one more move, knowing it was going to be slightly difficult, and then three feet beyond my outstretched right arm I saw a single rusty knifeblade sticking out of the most beautiful yet incipient crack that I had ever seen. A few moves lower this pin blended into the rock and I didn’t see it but now it stood out like it was lit up with disco lights. I couldn’t have wished for this and come to it, yet there it was waiting for me to clip it. But I had to make one last thin, smearing step up to reach it. Once I got there I clipped it and ran the rope through the bottom biner as I breathed a quick sigh of relief while scanning for my next move. I pulled myself up on marginal holds, and found the stance I’d been searching for – the move to gain it was a nearly holdless mantle. I managed to find a decent hold for my left hand but not my right, and fearing a barn-door that might have a boxer-soiling result I grabbed the draw and pulled up onto a small stance that barely fit my wide ass. Of course there was no place to build an anchor here so I had to traverse and as I did I came to some slabs with flat spots on them. I found a crack with a chockstone in it and slung the thing without question, and put a medium cam in a weird crack behind me. I looked far to my left and 50 feet away from where I stopped there was the first bolted anchor I’d seen on the route so far. I knew we were in the right place – I just took a different path that the beta had suggested for this pitch. Then I called “off belay” and began to bring up Adam, who was really going to hate what he had to climb. If the exposure from the pitches that I led below were enough to make Adam almost want to vomit then he might just have a panic attack during this one.

When he finally reached my jengus belay anchor it was clear that he was ready to be down at camp sipping an adult beverage. He was certainly anxious to be at the top so we could start planning our descent. Still, between us and the summit lay several more ropelengths of simulclimbing and scrambling to reach the false summit before we would reach the main summit on the north peak… We were still on the south peak. As Adam came up and I told him that we should just simulclimb the rest of the way up. He said to me, “What’s that? I don’t know what that is! What about a Belay?...”, and I realized that we hadn’t ever really worked on simulclimbing before. Fortunately the terrain was now laying back and truly getting easier. If we had practiced simulclimbing together it would have made more sense for me to lead it since I consider Adam to be the stronger climber of the two of us (pound for pound Adam is much stronger than me), but with time and light no longer on our side I let out a rushed response:

“Just go… and don’t forget to place gear along the way – VERY IMPORTANT! – and I will BE the belay!” As we got 300 feet above my chockstone anchor we decided to unrope and scramble another couple ropelengths to the top, and after 12 hard-fought hours on the route we stood on the summit with a mother goat and her calf which had come up the east ridge.

We signed the summit register and did all the touristy stuff at the summit cairn that we could and then we started down, following the cairns over the descending ledge system toward the east ridge. Even with the goats following behind us, knocking rocks down in our direction, we made fast progress and found a few gullies below that looked like they might lead back to the snowfield that we wanted to take to the toe of the route we had just ascended. After some 4th class downscrambling and a little glissading on some smaller snowfields, we finally reached our intended snowfield and took it up to the base of the route where we connected with the approach trail. Then, 14 long hours later, we walked into camp. We ate dinner and drank our water and shared a solemn moment on the rocks near our camp before getting in the tent and ending our epic day. It was the single best day of climbing that either of us had ever done, and the experience had taught us volumes. We were lucky to be here in this beautiful setting in these enchanted mountains and with our story now coming to a close, we drifted off to the best sleep either of us had ever earned.

 

Not Gimli, but not bad!

Thar she blows!

Ready for approach

Gettin up to it!

Basecamp!

The first wave coming right for us... we ran like rats escaping a sinking ship!

Stashing the goods to save us from humping it up the *wink* long approach from camp

I must commend the guidebook authors for making such a nice compact volume of route beta - yep, it went with us

Adam leading the first pitch... just finished the crux!

Ready for pitch two

 

clouds and talus and snow, oh my...

Looking up at the third pitch.. original route goes up and traverses right to the crest(5.9). The 5.7 variation goes straight up to a left-facing corner(at the top of the picture).

Glad I didn't need to use this thing after the 3rd pitch lead, but...

...this is what I built instead

Adam leading up the 4th pitch - very glad to be moving up from here.

Coming up to lunch ledge

And the fifth pitch...

Looking across the valley to the west from the middle of the 6th pitch - eek! Still can't believe i pulled out the camera for that one!

Don't know where this one was but its a long ways up there!

Raoul Duke and Dr. GonzoAdam racking up for the last hard lead Looking down from the upper corner crux... our tent can just barely be seen to the right of the snowfield toward the top of the pictureAdam getting ready to style the crux moves in the upper corner - with full boxers!The diving board - no thanks!Looking down the slab I ended on after my final off-route lead. Sorry, no pictures of the pin - I was in self-preservation mode at that point! Our guiding spirits!Finally, the summit!!!

 

Descent pictures are boring, so I added these instead because I thought they were cool!

 

Gear Notes:

Single rack to #4; lots of slings; mojo bar; extra underwear.

 

Approach Notes:

Comfortable, considering...

[layton]

is the suicide note still in the summit register (there as of sept 2001)?

 

also, post pics of said hottie canadian yoga instructor

[ivan]

after so many weeks, i thought you was never gonna be writing up this t.r. boy-o! congrats on surviving the canuckistani border and scoring an alpine summit worth remembering - what's next?

[Off_White]

FYI to mods & admins: The OP asked me to remove his TR because he'd prematurely published. This will be back in some format or other before too long.

[AlpineK]

Thanks, I was wondering about that

[DaveLeo]

Great TR Kenny!

 

Good reading, though sadly lacking of said yoga instructor!

 

Glad to hear the route went and you got back in one piece!

 

Prost!

 

 

[G-spotter]

Adam had said back in Portland - months ago - that he wanted to lead the first pitch, the crux pitch, and I was not anxious to argue with him for it myself. When we were racked and ready Adam started up some awkward cracks, which we later discovered we’d been attacking in a most difficult fashion. Watching him climb these fissures made me glad he wanted to take this first lead, because it didn’t seem like it was easier than 5.10a. Quite to the contrary, in fact. He placed a nut that might have held and came back down to figure it out again. He repeated this up and down movement a couple times and then, tired of seeing him wear himself out on this first 20 feet, I suggested that he put in the big cam and pull up on it. As Colin Haley says, “... free climbing in the mountains is a contrived difficulty…” and it was proving to be so for us here on the first of nine pitches between us and the summit. Adam, to his credit, made quick work of this section, now, and after reaching a comfy alcove 20 feet above me he said he would bring me up to him so he could have the big cam for higher up where it was actually needed. He set up an interesting anchor and brought me up to it.

The rest of the first pitch was a beautiful south facing corner

 

The best way to start this pitch is via face climbing left of the corner to the mentioned ledge.

 

Was up there once watching British Army climbers take repeated whips on doubles from the opening cracks and nearly touch the ground on rope stretch with each fall, hee hee.