[TR] Inspiration-McAllister Glaciers - D'ohrado Sphincter Towel Party 8/26/2012

[KaskadskyjKozak]

Trip: Inspiration-McAllister Glaciers - D'ohrado Sphincter Towel Party

 

Date: 8/26/2012

 

Trip Report:

 

The Plan

 

DC asked me to climb the SW Buttress of Dorado Needle last year, but I had a full calendar, so when he asked again this year, I found a free weekend for the trip. As usual, I procrastinated until Monday the week before the climb to really dig into the details. As it turned out, there was a bit more to this climb than I thought - mainly how to get to the route, and how to deal with route-finding. After extended discussions with everyone about Sibley Creek and around the Triad col versus the Eldorado Glacier and the same col... we opted for neither and decided to go with the old familiar Eldorado approach and beyond. Figuring we'd rather not fart around in the dark navigating to the McAllister glacier and on to the Dorado col, we'd deal with that on the first day and be closer to the route and have more time to do it and still get off without an epic. Day two would involve starting at dawn (6 am), climbing the butt, descending the NW ridge, and returning to the col for a second night. Day 3 would be a more relaxing start and hike out.

 

 

The Team

 

DC (his idea), JG (a willing joiner), Gaucho Argentino (off the couch climb after a hiatus of several months), and KK.

 

The Story

 

We all met up at 5:20 am Saturday hoping to be first in line at Marblemount. Unfortunately we timed it wrong and arrived at 7:08. 40 minutes later we had a permit for two nights in the Inspiration Zone.

 

For the first weekend in a while the temps were not too warm, and we made our way up the old familiar way. With the youngest of us pushing 40 no speed records were set, with some variation in pace, and synching up along the way. It took us around 7 hours to get to the base of the East Ridge of Eldorado. At that point we honestly would have loved to have stopped despite our plans, but our permit was not for that location, so we rested and then continued on.

 

Up to this point we had eschewed donning harnesses and roping up. The Eldorado glacier was easy to ascend, following boot paths and avoiding cracks. The flats were the same. None of us had been around the North side of Eldorado, so we had a discussion.

 

"Do we need to rope up?"

"I dunno."

"Maybe we can just walk a ways, see how it looks, and then decide?"

"I'd rather drag a rope rather than continue to carry it."

 

So, we roped up. We rounded a corner, and whoosh, JG punches through one of those surprise verically-oriented spider crevasses up to his chest. Falling!

 

We notice a party above us taking a high traverse. We stay lower - around 7800 feet. We mostly avoid crevasses totally now except for one section close to Tepeh Towers. After some weaving we head up. Near the crest we hit a gaper that looks to span the whole col. DC leads right and we barely are able to make an end-run to the right, with some face-in shenanigans over a 45 degree slope. Having the crampons on my pack, and a trekking pole in one hand with the ice axe in the other evinced poor planning at this point.

 

We continued on. The objective was now in view - so close! Another gaper. This one could swallow buses, trains, and other large machines. We go right. We descend a dip (clearly a thinning snow bridge), go up, then hop across a crevasse. Unbeknownst to us, we would not be able to return this way the next day.

 

From here we encounter one final obstacle just before the col. Here it was starting to look sketchy - with a large moat on the right and cracks moving left. we found a way across and then onto rock.

 

There are several excellent bivy sites at the col. There is also a large population of Snafflehounds. I've never met this particular species before - fat with big tails, bug-eyed, inquisitive, fearless, and voracious. They made their appearance at dusk and kept us entertained all night. Gaucho was particularly engaged as he repeatedly got out of the tent to bury more and more of his gear, food, and supplies. He put rocks on his boot laces. He even buried his keys and wallet - good thinking, Gaucho!

 

The long approach had taken its toll, and the snaffles compounded that physical deficit with interest. The alarm at 5 am was too soon, but we were here to climb not sleep. We started down the shittiest of dirt gullies at 6:15. It was mercifully short, and on the snow, we cramponed up and headed down. And down. And down. OK, nobody knew how far we'd have to go down, and now we knew - 900 feet before we rounded the nose of the rib below the SW buttress and started up. And up. And up. 800 feet of steepening, bullet-proof snow, leading to the famous white slabs, which had deep moats on all sides. Carefully approaching the four of us found 3 different ways onto the rock and then enjoyed the downward sloping, semi-slippery slabs - some in crampons, others just in boots. Eventually we converged at an alcove and roped up.

 

We had vastly underestimated our approach and it was now 9 am. Gaucho was eager to start up so I put him on belay.

 

"Hey, should we build an anchor?"

"Dude, you weigh like 250 lbs, we don't need an anchor"

 

Gaucho starts up. The arm-chair quarterbacks scream up advice:

 

"Dude, the route is on the left!"

"Don't go farther up, come down and head left!"

"Can you move left into that gully?"

"Can you find a placement where your hand is?"

 

Gaucho is in the best position to see what he can do. It is not looking good. This pitch is supposed to be 5.5-5.6 and lead to easy slabby terrain. Gaucho yells "this placement is not very good". He starts up. He stops. He tries something else. Then something else. Then he makes a move. Then, in slow motion I see him falling backwards. I pull my brake hand back and step to the left, barely freeing myself from a bulge in the wall on my right in time for my ride up. 4 feet higher up the gully, I look up to see Gaucho straightening himself. DC and JG report that that was the worst leader fall they have seen - 15 feet and completely inverted. Gaucho hit his pack, which saved him from whacking his helmet-surrounded cranium on the rock instead. Apparently unphased, Gaucho looks around some more before finally asking to be lowered, cleaning all pieces below the one that caught his fall.

 

We hem and haw. Are we at the right spot? Gaucho scrambles further up and reports he sees a white slab up there to the left of a chimney. OK, that could be the route. DC and I scramble up. DC shakes his head - no. I see no "white" on that slab and no pro options, and the spot would blow to belay from. I start down... it is sketchy and I ask Gaucho to hip belay me. He calls me a pussy but obliges. They scramble down. We chat more. Nobody knows for sure if we are on route. It's 10 am. It will be dark at 8 pm and we have 13-14 pitches left to do and possible bad weather coming in later in the day. We decide to bail.

 

We downclimb the shitty, downsloping slabs, find moat crossings, and face in downclimb softer, but still too-hard snow before we can face out and walk down. As we reascend the 900 feet to the col and camp, the sun beats our weary bodies like upstart basic trainees getting thrown a towel party. The shitty gully is the coup de gras - even worse to ascend this - the most shitty steep liquidy dirt and rock debris about anywhere I have been.

 

Defeated we lay around camp. It is 1 pm. Are we really going to hang out here for 7 hours, and enjoy another night in Snafflehound City? We opt to leave at 4. We are anxious to retrace our route around the sketchy snow bridge and crevasse end run with clear weather and our boot path intact. With weather coming in, who knows what we'd otherwise contend with.

 

Donning our full packs was an added joy at this point in the day. Marching uphill even for 300 feet to the col even more so. Then we were greeted with more news - that crevasse we had hopped was now a gaping hole that could swallow a Hummer. Totally collapsed. We went left and just when we began to wonder if the crevasse spanned the whole glacier, we found a wide snow bridge. But it was discolored and did not give anyone warm fuzzies. DC led up, placed a picket or two and we each double-timed this bridge in turn. This put us 100 feet below that crevasse we had end-runned near the col the day before (the one over the 45 degree slope). So, we traversed under it, then ascended the 45 degree slope to avoid it. From here we retraced our boot path back to camp below Eldorado's East Ridge.

 

It is worthy of note that the weather began to turn overcast, colder and windy at this point. We were thinking we had been wise to bail and get out of Dodge.

 

As we set up camp, Gaucho Argentino, ever the gregarious jokester, approached me with a somber face.

 

"I am not kidding, I am starting to stress out... I can't find my keys. I buried them at camp."

"Whatever."

"No, seriously."

"Uh-huh"

 

Well, this guy who has a Ph. D. really had decided to bury his keys and wallets under rocks at camp and really had left them there. Good times!! So, one or two of us would have to get up the next day, hike back with Gaucho, get the keys and wallet and come back.

 

As it happened a party of two were also camped nearby and we struck up a conversation with them. They were planning to climb Eldorado in the morning. I joked with Gaucho that he should offer to hike out with them to Dorado col. The next thing I know, he approaches them and offers them (college students) 100 bucks to fetch his keys with him in the morning ... and they agree!

 

During the night the winds picked up fierce and the temps dropped. We all expected it to be overcast and shitty in the morning but as Gaucho looked outside at 5 am, it was clear. So, three of us sleep in and Gaucho leaves to fetch his keys in decent weather. But, it appears our break was not to be - he returns in a little over 2 hours with bad news. That snowbridge we had crossed, the sketchy one, was gone. No keys. We hang around dejected and think about how we are going to get the hell out of here. Our best ideas are to hitchhike to Marblemount and beg someone to pick us up. Eventually with nothing settled and no cell-connection we head down. Gaucho and I get to the car first. We wash up in the stream. We pace around. DC and JG are still not down. Finally Gaucho says "fuck it, I want to take these boots off", pulls out his keys and opens the car. Motherfucker.

 

Pics

 

Traversing the N side of Eldorado:

 

Approaching Tepeh Towers:

 

Base camp at Snafflehound Col:

 

Sunrise on Sunday:

 

Ascending bullet-proof snow below the clean slabs:

 

Ascending slabs to the base of the route:

 

Views from the base of the route towards the Triad:

 

View of the N side of Dorado as we headed out and weather got nastier:

 

Beautiful skies on Monday (so much for weather moving in...):

 

Epilogue:

A talented up-and-coming climber once commented on a gumby "some people were meant to be astronomers; others astronauts". With this latest in a string of too-many failures, it may be time to sell the rack and buy some coffee table books with pictures of mountains.

 

Gear Notes:

Ice axe, crampons, helmet,Snafflehound proof force field for gear.

 

Approach Notes:

Eldorado standard approach is snow-free to the ridge above the Roush and down the gully. Snow starts soon after from there. It is possible to avoid crevasses up to the base of the East Ridge of Eldorado. Crevasses are problematic at and beyond Tepeh Towers.

[justcallmegary]

One hell of a joke..

[KaskadskyjKozak]

One hell of a joke..

 

He left the keys at camp, but got them in the morning (that snow bridge had not really collapsed). Just to be clear.

 

Wait until he unpacks and finds my open blue bag there.

 

[OlegV]

I feel your frustration. Nice effort - glad no one got hurt. It does look like you were off route below the rock pitch.

 

[Tom_Sjolseth]

Wow, sounds like quite the cluster. Thanks for the entertaining TR.

[KaskadskyjKozak]

I feel your frustration. Nice effort - glad no one got hurt. It does look like you were off route below the rock pitch.

 

You have been there? I'd love to know if we were off on the start. We used a pic from a different TR on cc.com and matched the pic on route.

[JasonG]

I disagree Oleg. I think they were right on, at least that is where we went. You go up a shallow gully on the edge of the slabs and when it turns into a nasty chimney thing, you hang a hard left and climb up a depression to the buttress crest. At least that is how I remember it. We certainly has a lot of disagreement in our party though. I insisted, and took the sharp end to see what came of my choice. It turned out work really well, but wasn't completely obvious from below.

 

Too bad about the climb and ensuing shenanigans, that sounds like quite the frustrating trip. That's a long way to haul the gear!

[Tom_Sjolseth]

FYI.. there's also a route around back that can be accessed from the lowest notch closest to the snow (climber's right of where the standard route goes). It never gets above 5.4. I stumbled upon this route when we encountered a moat hassle on the standard variation. Never heard of anyone else doing it before.

 

Alternate variation.

[KaskadskyjKozak]

FYI.. there's also a route around back that can be accessed from the lowest notch closest to the snow (climber's right of where the standard route goes). It never gets above 5.4. I stumbled upon this route when we encountered a moat hassle on the standard variation. Never heard of anyone else doing it before.

 

Is the start of this other route visible on one of my photos?

[JasonG]

No, this is climber's right of the normal route. Other side of the mountain from where you were.

 

I saw that variation Tom and was wondering how it went. Thanks for the info! That moat does indeed get very bad late in the season. We rapped over it coming down from the buttress, but you couldn't have climbed up it.

[Tom_Sjolseth]

It's the lowest point where the summit block comes down and meets the snow on climber's right. You can step off the snow and right onto the notch. There will be a gully that heads down the SW side.. descend the gully about 10 feet and go left on the obvious ledge.

[KaskadskyjKozak]

No, this is climber's right of the normal route. Other side of the mountain from where you were.

 

I saw that variation Tom and was wondering how it went. Thanks for the info! That moat does indeed get very bad late in the season. We rapped over it coming down from the buttress, but you couldn't have climbed up it.

 

Ah, the NW ridge. Yeah, that was not what we came to do. Maybe I will do the NW ridge some day instead. I am not too keen to return to the scene of a disaster any time soon.

[JasonG]

It would have been a good consolation prize though! From the col camp it is a quick ascent and very fun climbing.

[Tom_Sjolseth]

Yeah, it wasn't what we came to do either, but we summitted.

[OlegV]

I disagree Oleg. I think they were right on, at least that is where we went. ..

 

No Jason, I haven't been up there. I was surprised the guy took a clean 15 ft lead fall on 5.4 terrains.

[KaskadskyjKozak]

It would have been a good consolation prize though! From the col camp it is a quick ascent and very fun climbing.

 

The glacier looked very crevassed that way. We were not too excited about trying it. Also, we thought weather was coming in (freezing level dropping from 12K to 8500 feet and chance of showers after midnight). That coupled with navigating those crevasses prompted us to retreat to the Eldo camp on Sunday rather than stay a second night. Also, one partner did not want to get home late Monday and it is why we had a 3-day trip not a 2-day trip.

[KaskadskyjKozak]

Yeah, it wasn't what we came to do either, but we summitted.

 

Not always easy to get buy in from everyone.

[dougd]

That last part cracked me up K.

 

Thanks for sharing the story and pics.

 

Don't sell the rack, a week or two goes by, you'll want more...

 

d

[JasonG]

Hmmmm. Good point Oleg. I had forgotten about the leader fall. There is hard terrain immediately on either side of the weakness I went up, so maybe they were close, but not exactly right on. It felt a bit harder than 5.4, but wasn't 5.8. We wore rock shoes though so maybe if you were in boots....

[olyclimber]

Hahahaha a fine adventure! Everyone lived, so its all good.

Thanks for the TR KK.

[Gaucho Argentino]

And there was much more to it!!! Some diarrhea, people getting stiff, tent almost flying off, freaking rats chewing gear... oh, gosh!!

Anyway, my fun part was to listen KK and J plan every kind of option on how to go back home for the whole descent (triple A was the best), just to find out at the car that I got the keys back... I'm retarded for forgetting them at camp... anyway, it was a good sunrise while going back to pick them up.

About the route, I'm pretty sure we missed by a few feet only, going into the "narrow face" right of the chimney instead of left, up the more slabby one. Would love to go back with someone that knows the route, or if someone posts a pic of the start of the first pitch, will be very much appreciated...

Thanks to all my partners, lotta fun, and have to go back to get that sling, really saved me of a bad one...

[JasonG]

Yep, you were right on. I started to the right, backed off, and went up the left side of the weakness. It is steep for about 8' and then backs off as you climb the left side of the weakness. From the top of the first pitch you really can't miss the route, just follow your nose.

[KaskadskyjKozak]

Would love to go back with someone that knows the route, or if someone posts a pic of the start of the first pitch, will be very much appreciated...

 

Screw that... let's just go back!

[YocumRidge]

Tricky routefinding always make good stories.

Glad you OK, Nelson.

 

[BootsandPants]

Finally Gaucho says "fuck it, I want to take these boots off", pulls out his keys and opens the car. Motherfucker

 

Came damn close to spitting water all over my computer laughing at this. Sounds like a good adventure with some fun people. Remember, the worst day in the mountains is better than the best day sitting at home . Thanks for sharing!