[TR] Chilliwack area--Custer and "Hard" Mox - Standard 7/25/2013

[dugdaled]

Trip: Chilliwack area--Custer and "Hard" Mox - Standard

 

Date: 7/25/2013

 

Trip Report:

Allan, Phil, and I spent 5 days in the Chilliwack region climbing 2 of the 6 “top 100” peaks in that region that they had not yet done. The weather was fabulous and the climbing spectacular—though somewhat marred by a lot a loose rock and a rockfall injury to my leg.

 

The drive from Everett was long, but uneventful, with the last mile including 2 car-bottom-scraping bumps. The hike to Lake Ouzel had a modest amount of deadfall over which to climb, but is in pretty good shape.

 

Phil joined Gretchen and Brett on Redoubt while Allan and I relaxed the rest of the day, preparing for what we knew would be a long day on Hard Mox.

 

On day #4 of the trip, we left camp at 5:15 AM, dropping down into the basin south of camp,

 

http://www.cascadeclimbers.com/plab/data/500/medium/mox_approach_1.JPG[/img]

 

Although the summit tower has less loose rock than the gully, there was still plenty, and we had at least 1 “near hit” in spite of being cautious.

 

We joined forces for the descent starting about 3:15 PM, and after adding a sling to the summit rappel anchor, did a single rope rappel to the 2nd belay ledge. From there, we again added a sling and did a double rope rappel to the notch at the top of the gully—and prayed as we successfully retrieved our ropes. Another double rope rappel took us to a fairly sheltered ledge. However, it was there that I got hit by a grapefruit sized rock falling from above while we pulled our rappel rope. Having been unlucky enough to get hit by a rock, I was VERY lucky to have only a mildly painful injury that needed little attention during the descent. The final double rope rappel led us back to the base of the gully from which we could scramble to the platform that allowed us to see the snow finger we had descended.

 

The ascent of the snow finger was straightforward, but it led to an awkward exit to the ledges with loads of loose rock. We had several “near hits” during this segment. Phil set up a hand line for us across the 4th class traverse. This traverse is very crumbly, and seems to be getting smaller with each crossing! We then retraced our steps, following cairns, back to the 4th class step, which we downclimbed. We briefly lost the route, but Phil’s “routefinding nose” got us back on track. Further traversing led us back to the Col of the Wild where we could all relax some after many hours of somewhat tense climbing. Now we just had to race the sun back to our camp! We regained camp at 9:45 PM and got in our sleeping bags as quickly as possible.

 

For the hike out, we did the direct descent from the Redoubt glacier down into the creek valley. With careful routefinding, we found a route that was even easier than the route back to Lake Ouzel, though it did require searching for a creek crossing. We found a reasonable one that even allowed us to avoid the terrible willow thicket we had crossed on the way up—hooray! From there, the rest of the descent was steep and tiring, but straightforward. We were sure glad to see the car!

 

[KaskadskyjKozak]

Nice job and report! We also had a long day on Hard Mox: 4:15 am to 12:15 pm (camp to summit) and 1 pm to 6:30 pm (summit to camp).

[Eric T]

Tuff luck on that rock. Great fortitude for walking out injured; this game's hard enough when you're not hurting. Nice Tics...