[TR] Forbidden Peak - West Ridge 6/26/2016

[matiasfrancis]

Trip: Forbidden Peak - West Ridge - Car to Car

 

Date: 6/26/2016

 

Trip Report:

I work at a climbing gym. At said climbing gym there are lots of potential partners. A new hire provided new partner. We both had saturday and sunday off. We both had long weeks at work dealing with screaming kids. We planned to do the West Ridge of Forbidden over the weekend. Camping in the Boston Basin on saturday night. Our foolishness lead us to believe we could easily obtain a overnight camping permit from the ranger station. Our 10:30am arrival proved us wrong. One of the rangers said the 6 available permits sold out only minutes after they opened at 7am. We debated changing objectives but settled on doing it in a one day push on Sunday. This means we had a couple hours to kill before going to bed. We turned to Newhalem sport crag. We could only find one route that we could do in approach shoes and lapped it numerous times. Grabbed lunch at the Buffalo Run burger place in marblemount and drove off to the TH. The ranger told us to take the farthest TH we could find. Meaning to drive the farthest down cascade pass road was our understanding. So we did. We arrived at what we thought was the trailhead to the boston basin and chilled out, ate and talked to other parties. None of which had been on Forbidden, all on Sahale. We put down the seats in the car and tried to fall asleep around 6:30-7:00ish. We tossed and turned, heard and saw climbers/hikers getting back to their cars and witnessed a couple deers going at it in the parking lot. Our 12:30 alarms go off and we get ready for what is definitely going to be a long day. We leave the TH at 12:54am.

 

We had read that the boston basin trail was steep, in rough shape, totally overgrown, and with tricky stream crossings. The trail we were on was amazingly defined, not very steep and the streams were more like puddles. It wasn't until we got to what we found out to be the Sahale arm and looked up and couldn't find the sharp knife edge ridge line in which we thought we would be graced by their presence. Nope. We found Sahale Peak. We were on the Sahale Arm.

 

Our motivation dropped like a meteor. If someone dropped a bowling ball from the top of the Space Needle. Our motivation would beat it to the ground. But alas we debated our next moves. We can make out the Forbidden Peak ridge line. But holy shit did it look far away. Do we do something up Sahale? do we turn around and call it a day? Or do we try to traverse these snowfields below Sahale and the Quien Sabe, which at the time we didn't know if there were rock bands or impassable sections. We decided to just go for it. It was only 4:30 am and we had plenty of day left. We traversed over. Crossing a tricky rock 4th class downclimb section. "Are we on a glacier?" was asked multiple times. 2 hours later we are at the bottom of the boston basin, at least that's what we thought. We had committed to coming down the boston basin trail after the tricky rock section. We could see one party already approaching the couloir as we were gaining more and more snow. There were nice steps but it was almost easier just to make our own. We finally got the couloir and ran up it pretty quick. It looks like the couloir will be in for at least a bit longer. We got to the end of the couloir. Finally on some rock. I brought my approach shoes, thinking I was going to be able to sport them after the notch. No. I was wrong. There is still a decent amount of snow on the route.

 

We kept our boots and crampons on for the first couple pitches that we simul climbed. We were done with the majority of the snow. We had a tendency to stay low on the north side rather than follow the ridge. Which lead to some exposed climbing. Really fun. On the first actually belayed pitch I took my crampons off and just used my boots. After 2 pitches we gained the actual ridgeline where I took my boots off (which felt damn good) and donned my approach shoes. Cruised up the "5.6 move" and through the rest of the climb. My partner kept his stiff boots on and was fine. We gained the west summit and celebrated. Then we saw that the east ridge looked a tad taller. We gained the actual summit, (around 12) took some pictures, became very tired. Coming down was almost as long as going up. Lots of down climbing, lots of "fuck this shit" and "I want a burger, big double cheeseburger". Descending the ridge took 2 hours. We rapped as much of the couloir as we could but eventually the rap stations got to high and we couldn't access them. Time for some downclimbing in super soft snow. we got to the bottom after some major postholing and one legit self-arrest move. Running very low on water we headed for the recently exposed slabs. THE BEST WATER I'VE EVER HAD. We had the plan of descending the boston basin trail and either walking the road to the Sahale TH or bumming a ride. We heel plunged as much as we could and pretty much ran down the trail. Rolled my ankle a couple times. The trail was incredibly steep. By the end of the trail everything was sore. I was very tired. Spirits high through. Back to the car at 7:48pm.

 

18 hours 54 minutes car to car West Ridge Forbidden Peak June 26 2016

 

Pictures (in no order): https://docs.google.com/document/d/10-iUiSRxTa0OrPZKxVavy6fB7954CYGQlGgbVbvfMY4/edit?usp=sharing

 

Gear Notes:

5 cams starting from .3-2 and a set of nuts. Lots of slings. Double lengths. Crampons and an ice axe

 

Approach Notes:

Maybe take the right trail? but really wasn't that bad

Edited June 28, 2016 by matiasfrancis

[Bronco]

Funny story, good job making the climb anyway.

[matt_warfield]

A recent comment mentioned Sahale Arm approach avoids the normal trail, maybe cleaning it up a little bit from what you did and of course knowing where you are. But you snatched victory from the jaws of defeat- a worthy attribute for an alpine climber. But bushwhacking, permit scramble, and stream crossings are other attributes to be "enjoyed".