Eisenhower Tower

Edit June 2017
Google killed Picasa so the photos in this post don't click through to larger versions. Here's the full album if you're interested: https://goo.gl/photos/2LYxjhmyHPHoKgQ6A

Our original plan was to climb the east ridge of Edith Cavell with Brian. That idea got put on hold when a large chunk of the north glacier fell off wreaking havoc and closing access to the mountain for the rest of the season. (The first time I climbed Cavell I think we bivied right behind the outhouses in this photo.) So instead we set our sights on Castle Mountain to climb Eisenhower Tower, the three of us having climbed Brewer Buttress together in 2010.

Castle Mountain: Brewer in green, Eisenhower in red


After hiking up the Rockbound Lake Trail and skirting around ledges we arrived at the broad plateau which girdles the entire mountain. From here the first order of business is to get onto the Dragon's Back, a short crenellated ridge that juts out from the foot of the tower itself. We took a line just to climbers left of the prow and after a few easy 5th class moves we were scrambling along the top of this feature. It's quite spectacular in a few places.

Brian on the Dragons Back


Between the Dragons Back and the Tower is a deep notch with a short but tricky 5.6++ crack. We got the rope out here for the first time. After some grunting and groaning were up the other side just in time for second breakfasts and a good look at the route above where there are two main options.

Eisenhower Tower


I had climbed the left side before so this time we headed to climbers right. We didn't have any route description for this side and just kinda winged it. Unsure whether to keep the rope on or not we left it on and took turns running out it's full 60m length, slinging a few blocks along the way, and then bringing up both seconds at the same time. I think we did about 5 or 6 pitches.

Brian on the route


It felt much less travelled than I remembered the other side being. We came across one fixed anchor after the first pitch and nothing but the odd sling after that. I think there was more continuous climbing on this side but none of it was really exceptional. Nevertheless it's still a fine route to the top of a Rockies landmark.

Le Sommet


We had a good view at both the route we had just come up and also of the route we would be descending (in green) where there is a series of established rap anchors.

Routes


A couple of notes on the descent for anyone interested. The first anchor can be found by scrambling down below the crest of the plateau as in this picture where Brian (the lowest figure) is standing at the anchor.

First rap anchor


A bit of scrambling and another rap brings you to rap #3 (?) which is placed behind a fin of rock with an awkward start. If you rap to the end of the ropes here (we had a 60m) you end up in a tenuous spot to pull the ropes with some tricky downclimbing below. Instead, there is an intermediate 2 bolt anchor several meters to climbers right that looks like a much better option.

After some scrambling you end up at a "funnel" where all of the scree collects from the amphitheatre above. We made our way to the bottom of the scree and then followed an exposed but easy ledge to skiers left which placed us right at the top of P1.

Finally, rather than retracing our steps across the Dragons Back, we rapped down the east side of the notch which separates the Dragons Back from the tower. A 60m rope isn't quite long enough to reach the ground with one rappel. There is an intermediate anchor about 2/3 of the way down that is easy to miss.

In the end we somehow turned this into a 12 hour day which was a good 4 or 5 hours longer than we had anticipated.

Mount Huber

After another 4:30AM start we reached Wiwaxy Gap in the half-light and began making our way across the Huber Ledges.

Huber Ledges in Winter


Plenty of cairns, even a few bolts on a steep pitch, but we didn't bother with the rope. The general guideline here was up and left, rinse, repeat, until we hit the lower glacier.

Brian on the Huber Ledges


We put the rope on to cross the lower glacier to a rock band, scrambled over the rock band, and then put the crampons back on for the upper glacier. It was a cold morning and our crampons hardly scratched the surface of the snow that still lay in the shadow of Mount Victoria. Across the glacier we went and into the sun at the Huber-Victoria col.

Huber-Victoria Col


From the col the guide books ("Suspected" and "11,000ers") describe two routes to the summit, one far left and one far right, but the beaten track basically split the difference right up the middle so this was the obvious way to go.

Huber route seen from Victoria


Once above the 'schrund we dispensed with the rope and made our way up the steep snow slope to the ridge.

Ross on the Ridge


On the ridge proper the softening snow gave way to hard ice with the change in aspect. Another 50 metres or so of careful steps and we met up with a guided group on the summit by 9:30AM.

On top


We lounged around in the sun and took in magnificent views all around before retracing our steps back down the ridge, belaying this time to keep the fun factor high on the icy ridge.

Brian at the anchor


Back across the two glaciers, across the rock band, and down through the Huber Ledges with a rappel at the one steep pitch.

Huber Ledges


It all seems so uneventful as I write this up! But once again a wonderful day in the mountains on one of the classic 11,000 foot peaks of the Rockies.

Mount Victoria

After climbing Odaray we set out the next afternoon for the Abbott Pass Hut with the intention of climbing the south summit of Mount Victoria the next day. All of us had climbed to the North Summit a couple of years ago, and Ross and I had previously climbed the SW Face to the South Summit, but none of use had ever climbed the classic SE Ridge from Abbot Pass.

The hike up from Lake O'Hara is notorious for the awful and ever-shifting scree. It was pretty foul but thankfully some long ribbons of old snow helped make progress a little less painful.



The hut is perched on a windy and desolate col at a location which in many ways witnessed the very birth of Canadian mountaineering over 100 years ago. You can almost feel the history here.



Away by 4:30 the next morning to pick our way up the initial part of the route in the eerie pools of light cast by our headlamps. We made a few blunders in the dark but found our way from cairn to cairn without too much trouble. The sun came up to cast a warm red glow over everything and help with the route finding.



The crampons were on for one small section but mainly we just scrambled our way over bare rock until reaching the well-known feature called The Sickle. This is a narrow snow covered dip in the ridge that required some careful downclimbing on the hard snow. It was a spectacular setting.



After The Sickle the route switched back and forth between snowy arete and easy scrambling over bare rock with a couple of short technical parts thrown into the mix.





It was wonderful stuff. On top by 9:00AM for the obligatory U2 album cover photo.



The weather crapped out on the way down. We got drenched a couple of times from horizontal rain but thankfully managed to reach the hut before the worst of it hit. We sat around eating hot soup as the rain lashed at the windows. It cleared just early enough for us to bolt back down to Lake O'Hara in time for dinner.

We had enjoyed an absolute classic mountaineering route in great conditions.

Pics on Google Photos: https://goo.gl/photos/pmBjtUCEnLRUWN2J8

Grassi Ridge

Update August 2017:
Google killed Picasa Web Albums so the photos in this post don't click through to larger versions. Here's the album if you're interested: https://goo.gl/photos/SY7tQmBmgNTY3LUR9

Ross and I once climbed Grassi Ridge about 10 years ago. I was a far better rock climber back then but apparently had much less common sense. That day I think we set a record for the most dumb stories ever to come from a single climb. Many are still told to this day among our small circle of friends.

There was the great "ease yourself gently onto that dodgy piton" story. You can guess how that one goes. There was the "diabolical double rope predicament", wherein the second, who was tied into two ropes with each one somehow going in the opposite direction, was completely unable to move up or down as the unwitting belayer pulled tighter and tighter from 50 meters above. And of course there was the unforgettable "Andrew gets off route and has an epic meltdown as it begins to snow" story. That one chaffs to this day since this particular lapse in judgement on my part caused us to miss the best climbing on the whole route.

Grassi Ridge in December 2011


So, back on Grassi Ridge again, seeking a redemption of some sort. Brenda and I formed one rope team and Ross and Brian the other. On our first time here we only had Dougherty's "Suspected Alpine Climbs" which by modern standards would probably be considered a little thin on detail. This time we were armed with multiple topos from various Internet sources, some of which I gleefully noted had skull and crossbones or big "Off Route!" warnings at meltdown central.

We got to the base of the climb just before a guided party arrived. I suppose the guide should remain nameless since I'm about to bad mouth him. I'll just refer to him as a well known ice climber with the initials S.I. No one will ever figure that out.

Expecting S.I.'s group to be much faster than us we urged them to go ahead. Unfortunately this exposed the leader of the party that followed (ie: me) to an annoying stream of route and gear suggestions shouted down by S.I. from the next pitch above.

"The station is 5 metres above you!!".

"You're almost there! It's to the left!!"

"Easy climbing duuuuuude!!".

This in turn confused his clients because they thought, not unreasonably, that he was yelling instructions to them. So they started shouting. It turned into a bizarre early morning shout-fest in the mountains!

Thankfully it came to an end after a few pitches as they slowly moved out of earshot leaving us to enjoy the rest of the climb in relative peace. And what a great climb this is.





A big change from 10 years ago is the proliferation of bolts on the route; there are bolts at the crux moves and at every belay station whereas I don't think there were any bolts when we did it the first time. In fact there are even intermediate belay stations probably placed there by guides in order to more easily watch their clients. I'm no arch traditionalist but I think a something is lost when this happens.

An oddly negative post about what was actually a very positive day. We even got a new a story to add to our ever growing list of tall tales.

Mount Odaray SE Ridge

I helped organize a mountaineering camp for the ACC at Lake O'Hara this summer. Great weather, great people, and overall a great trip. On our first day I climbed Mount Odaray with Ross and Brian.



Most of this route is a fine general mountaineering sort of climb. We crossed the glacier without much trouble and made our way to a rocky step that bars access to the ridge. We used the rope here for a short 5.4 section where there was some fixed gear left by the guides who operate out of O'Hara Lodge (thanks Larry).



Once onto the broad ridge we made our way up some tedious scree and scrambled over the occasional rocky outcrop.



Eventually we reached a false summit to gaze across a cleft to a dark and ominous steep wall that blocked the way to the top. It looked horrible. Thankfully we'd been warned about this part in advance and had been told that it looked worse that it was. Glad for this advice we eased our way down into the notch and peered upwards at the other side. It was a steep gully that seemed to be made up of 4 inch children's blocks piled one on top of another and all angled slightly downwards with terrific exposure on either side. Let's just say that it provided us with a slow and very mindful 20 meters of climbing.



A jog back to the ridge and then to the summit where we spent a good hour taking in the magnificent views. Look at these tourists.



A fine day in the mountains as they say.

Sir Donald

I first climbed the Northwest Ridge back in 2009 with Ross. On that occasion we were so focussed on getting up and back down again quickly that afterwards we both agreed that it would be good to do the route again just so that we could enjoy it! So near the end of July I went back with Brian for another go.

The forecast was the same for the next two days with a 30% chance of afternoon thunderstorms; not perfect but fairly typical. Ominously it bucketed down for a couple of hours at midday on the day that we hiked up to the bivy site.



It then rained again overnight. I swore that I'd never let myself get caught in crappy weather on Sir Donald. Nevertheless the next morning we went up to the col for a "look". How many times have we said that before? "Having a look" is the mountaineering equivalent of saying "hold my beer and watch this".

It was fun while it lasted as we enjoyed the warmth of the rising sun.



We pushed our luck and managed to get up to the highest bolted rap on the ridge about half way up. From this point we knew that we could get down in almost any weather. Right on cue it started raining and hailing and the rock became slick as motor oil in a matter of seconds. Down we went into the cold wet mist, cartoon legs skittering around as if we were wearing ice skates on a vertical skating rink.



All's well that ends well. Looks like we'll have to go back again.

Grizzly Peak North Ridge

Not until late July did we make our first overnight trip to Hermit Meadows this year. On the way up we met a group coming down from Tupper. Turned out that one of them was Dan, a fellow we met at Bon Echo last fall. Small world.



We camped next to a babbling brook, had a fine evening, and got a civilized start the next morning.



First task was to skirt around the southeast ridge of Sifton and find our way to the Little Sifton Col. We've often skied this way in the winter but always in the opposite direction. The slope from the col seems really steep on skis. Not so bad in summer.



From Little Sifton we followed the shattered ridge up and down and all over the place. It was mostly just scrambling with the occasional rocky step thrown which (as always) left us wondering exactly what 3rd class is supposed to mean.





We wound our way up and found ourselves at the top for lunch about 4.5 hours after leaving Hermit Meadows.



On the return journey we took advantage of the summer snow to bypass much of the ridge before regaining it again just before the Little Sifton col. Here Brenda was gripped by summit fever and insisted that we summit Little Sifton rather than skirting around directly to the col. I don't know what's got into that girl. 11,000er training I guess. Aided by all the snow it was a quick 2.5 hours back to Hermit Meadows where we packed up for the knee jarring return to the highway.

A fine easy day in the mountains.

Yak Peak

Stymied by the weather but desperate for exercise we made a trip to the Coquihalla to hike on Yak Peak. I think the route we chose was the climber's trail rather than any "official" hike. Parking at the Zopkios break check, we doubled back about a kilometre to an obvious cairn and dropped down to the swampy start.



The trail went straight up through classic west coast old growth to the base of the giant slab visible from the highway. A spooky place in the mist; we were pretty wary of rock fall.



We soon reached the snow line where the already gloomy morning became decidedly wetter.



The Yak-Nak col was completely snow bound with wind rolls and cornices.



The ice axes came in handy.



Here's a somewhat bedraggled looking Brenda on the the top.



A nice short hike.

Avalanche Mountain SW Ridge

We could have made an argument to use skis for a good part of this trip up Mount Avalanche in early July. But we made an early start and thankfully the snow remained firm underfoot for most of the morning.



Taking a break on a rocky knoll we saw a coyote sprinting across the snowfield opposite. We'd never seen coyotes around here before and it seemed strange to see this one in such open terrain. Perhaps he was hoping to snag an unwary marmot emerging from its burrow.

We gained the crest easily enough and began working our way along the ridge, sometimes on rock, sometimes on increasingly sloppy snow.



Although the SW ridge is supposedly just a 3rd class scramble, having descended this way once before (after climbing the SE ridge) we knew that there was at least one tricky bit. Sure enough at one steep corner festooned (yes!) with rap tat we were left scratching our heads at the "3rd class" designation. Rather than dorking around we got the rope out for the two slightly unhappy seconds and were soon kicking steps up the final steep pitch of snow below the summit.



It took much longer than anticipated (doesn't it always) but we finally topped out by early afternoon.



The snow made for a mercifully fast descent to the snow line but the switchbacks on the Avalanche Crest trail still seemed interminable.

A great day out. Thanks to Craig for the company. Sorry we got you home so late.