A Formidable Day (Well, Weekend)

Posted on August 16, 2016 by evejakubowski

The NE Face of Formidable, JT bottom left for scale

The southeast side of Johannesburg, Cascade Peak, and snowy Eldorado framed by the Triplets and Mixup Peak

The title is an understatement, but I had to get the peak in there somehow. This came to fruition on a Thursday night, when I had three realizations. 1) JT was back for just the weekend, 2) we had a 24ish hour weather window on Saturday 3) I was going crazy after not really doing anything for the entirety of July and JT felt similar. Oh, and I have this ridiculous list of peaks I wanted to bag that would likely be absolute sufferfests, and that’s what I usually pitch to Sam and JT. Unfortunately, Sam’s getting tan surfing and relaxing and not suffering (besides the FOMO I imagine this will give him) on the east coast, so JT and I decided to be a two man team and see just how thrashed we could get.

Mt. Formidable has a taunting (or daunting – little column A, little column B I think) face with an 5.6 line up the NE side, which you stare at as you hike the Ptamigan Traverse. Usually you look at peaks and think “shit ,that face is ridiculous, the route must be on the other side.” Well yeah, the standard route is on the other side, but we were eyeing this route. Could it be done in a day? No on had done it in a day before (spoiler alert: we also did not do it in a day). But we figured we’d give it a shot with an alpine start Saturday morning and a deep understanding and resignation that we might be in for a shiver bivvy that night. Bivvied 8/7/2016, gotta start listing dates since I’m so freaking behind in blog posts. I even skipped one to write this one! Jeez.

Distance: 24 miles? Honestly not sure
Elevation: Also not sure. Net ~5000ft gain (8325ft highest point) but you gain 3400ft to Cache Col, lose 800ft to Kool Aid Lake, gain another 1200ft to Spider/Formidable Col, drop 600ft again to heather ledges, and finally gain the last 1300ft to the summit. Sneaky elevation.
Weather: 40’s and foggy, 60’s and sunny
Commute from Seattle: 3 hours. Cascade River Road takes forever. At least JT doesn’t drive like a granny (I do).
Did I Trip: You know what? Not really. No faceplants. I did slide 15ft down some scree at 4am when we were off route though, that was a rough start.

Awkward icy sidehilling without crampons

I dragged myself out of my parking lot bivvy at 2am, admired the stars above Johannesburg and Cascade Peak and the Triplets, gave JT my extra socks (he had only brought cotton, and cotton is rotten) and we started up the Cascade Pass trail. Summitpost describes the trail as “stupidly inclined,” which is appropriate. You don’t even know you’re going up. What that means is… switchbacks! 36 of them, to be exact. Woo! But nighttime is a time warp, so suddenly the switchbacks were over and we were at the pass! Fog rolled in almost immediately and I started to get discouraged. We followed our GPS track up another 1,000ft or so, and then started to traverse the scree and snowfields over to what we thought was Cache Col.

Forbidden, Sahale, and Buckner with clouds spilling over Cascade Pass

Well, we had two realizations as the fog cleared and the sun rose. 1) we were several hundred feet above the standard route, which has a nice pleasant bootpath. When you hit Cascade Pass, go right, and near the toilet sign, go left. That’ll take you on a rising traverse to the col, instead of the mediocre sidehilling we got to enjoy. 2) Snowfields are icy at 4am. 3) Scree sucks. We struggled through it, wasting maybe an hour crossing frozen snow while the two runners below us probably laughed (or worried, depending on how nice they were and how clumsy we looked).

The real Cache Col. Suckers!

We eventually made it to the gap, only to look ahead at what was actually Cache Col, across a glacier hidden by the terrain. Good start. The glacier is quite mellow though, and we were able to make quick work of it after losing a few hundred feet of elevation and regaining even more. Behind us were clouds spilling over Cascade Pass, with occasional peeks of Eldorado, Boston, and Sahale. From Cache Col you get your first glimpse looking south at Formidable (yes!) and it’s a line of sight path to Kool Aid Lake. Which requires you to drop another 700ft, and drops you onto endless fields of unpleasant talus. RIP my ankles.

Formidable over Kool Aid Lake

At Kool Aid Lake we saw the only other group we’d see for the rest of the trip. Well kind of, we saw their tents but they were asleep. Ah, to sleep in on a climb. What a dream. We kept moving, eager to get to Red Ledges since it would mark our turn off to drop onto the Formidable Glacier. Plus, Kool Aid Lake had been unimpressive. We crossed heather benches, more talus fields, more snow patches. The red ledges are very obvious, a scar of red rock cutting through the cliffs. It looks ridiculous from afar, but as you get closer, there’s basically a trail along them. We dropped down into a moat, pulled off some nifty third class scramble moves to get to the ledge, and scampered over to the other side where the trail continued.

Red Ledges

Carrying on to Spider/Formidable col (obvious notch)

About a quarter mile past the ledges, you can drop down onto the glacier. But JT and I weren’t very fortunate here. We couldn’t see a decent line up to the glacier. The previous reports all had far more snow coverage than we did, we’d be dealing with nearly a thousand feet of steep scree with terrible runout and a serac waiting to collapse above us. As if on cue, a huge chunk of ice fell from the glacier and started a domino effect of tumbling ice. Yeah, maybe we should pass. Slow start, late in the morning, it’d only get warmer as the day went. Would my mother yell at me for trying this? Yes (that almost always applies though). Would WH&C shit all over the article about my death because I should have known better? Probably yes. Would mother nature flip me off and deny me from mountain heaven post mortem because I was an idiot who didn’t earn it? Maybe. Okay, standard route anyone? (You’re welcome, mom).

JT laughs as I hang stuck by my pack in a moat between snow and a rock

We hung out for a few more minutes scouting out potential lines for a return trip. Many of these remote peaks have fairly simple lines waiting to be climbed, it’s just that no one ever goes out there to do them. My feet were already killing me, covered in raw wet hot spots. JT had brought his cotton socks, so I made him give me back my Darn Toughs and he donned his cotton socks. Sorry JT. We eventually got moving again, and met the side of the Middle Cascade Glacier. The bottom half of this glacier is an awesome ice fall, but the upper half is pretty mellow. We did some painful sidehilling to avoid crevasses, I bitched about my boots killing my ankles, and soon enough we gained the Spider-Formidable Col. From here we could see that our route to the glacier on the NE face wasn’t as steep as we thought, and might have been doable. Dammit. But we were committed to the standard route at this point, since we had spend an hour or two getting up to the Spider-Formidable Col and backtracking would likely take just as long.

First views of Le Conte Lake and Gunsight, Old Guard and Sentinel Peaks

The col on the right has two small bivvy spots, the narrow col on the left is where you’ll want to drop down to the next section of the Ptarmigan Traverse. I lost my breath at the top col seeing the view on the other side – Old Guard and Sentinel are one huge glaciated massif with glacial turquoise Le Conte Lake below them, with Gunsight (an obsession of mine, the twin spired peak behind Old Guard). Spectacular, especially against the red rock we were standing on. I have one complaint. Le Conte Glacier is on Old Guard Peak. It drains into Le Conte Lake. That makes sense. But Le Conte Peak is to the west. Why isn’t the Le Conte Glacier on Le Conte Peak?!

Checking out the bivvy col

We dropped down quickly to the snowfield below, and headed along the Ptarmigan Traverse path to the fourth notch in our journey. The Traverse continues to Yang Yang Lakes which you can see from the S/F col, but we veered off right to the notch that would drop us onto the final face of Formidable. So many cols. This snow traverse was nice and easy, and we gained the notch I later named Heather Ledges. This is because you have two options to drop down onto the final traverse. A “nefarious gully,” which gets its namesake from the absurd amount of scree that managed to conglomerate on this third class scramble, or some heather ledges, which are steep but pleasant enough in crampons, which we were too lazy to drop off. The ledges do eventually dump you into the nefarious gully, which we battled down to another snow field.

Looking across to our notch on the ridge, Yang Yang lakes center left, Le Conte back left

Atop Heather Ledges looking at the final section of the climb. Gain the grassy rib on the left, head up and left from there.

After the nefarious gully you have a few more snowfields to cross, more talus, fantastic views of a jagged ridge that amazingly has no name, and Buckindy in the background. And of course, Dome and Old Guard still loom over the far horizon as you gain a grassy rib and scramble up to the base of the gully that leads you to the summit.

Quick break to soak in views

Except it’s never that simple. We missed the nice grassy rib, and ended up in a low fifth class gully. Luckily we had lugged a 60m rope and a light alpine rack thinking we were doing the NE face, so what the hell, let’s put it to use. One pitch of easy climbing later (ignoring the hollow flakes that broke off as we climbed) and we were up by the gullys, which were supposedly marked by cairns. There are two routes up, one that follows a series of ledges with an airy traverse and one that follows a loose fourth to fifth class gully. We were aiming for the ledges.

Part of the airy traverse

We managed to find the airy traverse, which was quite airy, and marked by a single cairn at the end. From there, it was a choose your own adventure, supposedly to the top of another gully marked with a cairn which is where the ledges route meets the gully route.

Just kidding! No cairns for you, not out here. Just that one at the end of the airy ledge. Choose your own adventure. We started working our way up through the path of least resistance. A few wrong turns, a few backtracks, a few definitely-not-third-class-moves. We almost ended up on the wrong summit, but I noticed that the one to the right looked taller and made JT backtrack. He was just ready to get the false summit but hell no, I wasn’t letting that happen. “I’ll carry the rope! I’ll carry the rack! I’ll carry your bivvy!” “Joke’s on you, I didn’t bring a bivvy!” Dammit JT! So you’re just gonna huddle in your clothes and shiver for a few hours? We had come this far, we were committed to bivvying. Yep, guess that’s the answer. We downclimbed to a nice gully with what’s that? A cairn? Two cairns?!? Yes!! On track!

Summit shot!

Cloud deck to the west on the way down

I quickly moved up the gully until boom, summit. The views were stunning. Cloud cover below us to the west, sunshine up above, Old Guard (yeah I’m not over it) and Sentinel in the distance. And some other peaks, like Boston and Sahale but I’m obsessed. And a brilliant turquoise lake beneath the jagged, no name ridge. Eve Ridge. We could see the trail of the Ptarmigan Traverse below us, and had a brief “shit, we’re far away” moment. Oh well. Like JT said, “those are problems for tired JT.” Deal with it later. Heather Ledges looked pretty steep and shitty from where we were too. Well, tired Eve problems. No point in worrying now. We took a quick break, snapped photos, and headed down immediately. We wanted to at least be back at Heather Ledges by dark.

Time to head down

We made it down the gully quickly, and back across the airy ledges. We rapped down our low 5th class gully rather than trying to find the standard route, which was a great plan, and we were making great time, until… the rope got stuck as we pulled it down. Fuck. I looked out across the valley. I snapped a picture of sunset. Similar to Cutthroat peak, I had a simultaneous “wow, pretty” and “oh, shit” moment. JT climbed back up to free it and luckily we got it loose. At this point, the sun was down. We had maybe an hour of dusk before it would be dark, so we started walking.

Dome Peak teasing me

JT and Glacier

We got back to the base of the even-more-nefarious-in-the-dark gully, and scrambled up to the ledges. I destroyed so much heather this weekend. My headlamp was dying, despite having new batteries. Bulb issue? Shut up Calvin, if you’re reading this I don’t want to hear it. At the top of Heather Ledges we took a break and contemplated bivvying there. “We could just…..keep going” “bivvy here!” we said simultaneously. Shit. Suck it up, we’re gonna keep moving. At this point my feet were lovely swollen painful pruny shredded stubs. I missed my hiking poles. I’d have been limping if it was one foot, but it was both, so I just hobbled. And I couldn’t turn my ankles, since the boots had left huge gashes on my ankle bones. They’d just buckle any time I put pressure on the sides. So that was great. But we weren’t camping at Heather Ledges. We needed to at least get back to the col.

No Name Ridge (Eve Ridge!) in the foreground above that turquoise lake, Buckindy back left

We agreed on the suffer stretch and started off. It was an eternity. Pitch black, thousands of stars, tiny sliver of a moon, entire Milky Way scattered above us. I was exhausted. JT laughed in front of me. “My mind’s playing tricks already.” Eyesight gets funky when you’re exhausted. “I thought that stick was a boa constrictor!” Great, it hasn’t started for me yet but I was sure I wasn’t far behind. For me it’s rocks that look like tents, dead trees that look like zombie creatures, wind that sounds like voices next to the trail. Luckily we were above treeline so no creepy shit. We took breaks every 20 minutes or so, maybe more often and just every stretch felt so long. At one point I flopped down on my pack. “Well, I don’t know about you, but I’m thoroughly enjoying this.” I cracked up. That’s JT. You push it all day just to savor the point of exhaustion when you’re lying on a glacier dozens of miles from civilization looking at the entire galaxy wondering how you ended up here and why you think it’s fun.

Another break on the way back to Heather Ledges

The struggle back up to the col was tough, but singular. Even though you’re tired, it’s kicking steps in steep snow, and you sure as hell don’t want to slip. It was warm enough that it was soft which made kicking steps easy. It was Andrea who pointed it out on Cutthroat Peak a few weeks ago. Climbing is so singular. You need to focus and you need to focus on this one thing and nothing else and that’s how the short climb to the col was. Just me, and a snow slope, and my tool and my boots and the stars and the shine of JT’s headlamp above me.

“Oh how pretty!” “Oh, shit.”

Our bivvy spot was phenomenal. I felt like a princess with my bivvy and sleeping bag liner. I put in my headphones (11th essential: ipod shuffle) and dozed on and off, snuggling my pack for warmth and using the rope as a ground cover with visions of Excel spreadsheets and emails in front of my eyes. My feet and socks were still wet, I debated between warm wet wool and cold dry feet. Ugh. Everything kind of sucked, but you know you’ll be fine so you just wait it out. I only know I slept because I have vague memories of spreadsheets, which means I dreamed about work. I dreamed about work, sleeping at 7,000ft in a bivvy in the most beautiful section of Washington. I obviously wasn’t uncomfortable enough.

Waking up at our bivvy spot, Yang Yang Lakes and Heather Ledges covered in fog

Alarms went off at 5am. JT was ready to go. Absolutely not, I said. I was finally warm ish and I knew I could get back to sleep and I was going to savor my hour. Sunrise was gorgeous, clouds were spilling over the notches into the basins around us, and we were on top of it all. I dozed for another hour or so until the sun hit us, and finally got moving. We were above the clouds, and descended into whiteout.

I was relieved we had made it to the col. Waking up at Heather Meadows in the fog would have been demoralizing, cold, wet, brutal. Instead we woke up dry and above the clouds, enough for me to mentally rally. I stuffed my feet back in my boots. Ouch. JT didn’t even take off his boots because he was worried his feet were too swollen to get them back on. Why do we do this? JT had peach rings for breakfast and I had Whole Foods chocolate truffles and a fresh baked Whole Foods peanut butter cookie and a few bites of a Sledgehammer sandwich which was also from Whole Foods. JT had the breakfast of champions. All I needed was a girly Starbucks drink to complete my Basic Bitch Breakfast.

View from the bivvy spot the previous day

We roped up and started across the glacier. Up and over the crevasses this time, no sidehilling, give my poor ankles a break. Glaciers are annoying to navigate in fog, but we got a few glimpses since we were at the top of the clouds. We met the rocks, and we went back across the endless talus fields, back across red ledges, more talus fields, finally to Kool Aid Lake. We got off track many times between the lake and Cache Col. Endless talus fields in fog all look the same. At Cache Col we vaguely knew the route back to the notch that would drop us onto the slopes above Cascade Pass.

We were too high at first, sticking to the cliffs along the side for easy navigation. But the route itself was a few hundred feet lower. There were minimal crevasses for us to use as landmarks. There were only two places where we could gain the notch, and the rest would cliff out.

JT on the Cache Glacier. Phenomenal views. Bet you’re glad you can see the full version of the pic so you can see all the details.

We took out the GPS. We looked up photos we had taken on the way up. We only had a few dozen feet of visibility, so we tried to match waterfalls, red streaks in rock, interesting shaped patches of snow stuck in the rocks, just to figure out where we were. I tend to get analysis paralysis when there are too many options, where I take forever to make a decision and second guess everything. We tried to just keep making decisions as efficiently as possible. It started to rain. I put on my Goretex layer. “I really want to be off this glacier by dark,” JT said. Shit, has the bar dropped that low? Knowing you have a bivvy in moderate weather is great. Surprise night #2 bivvy in rain and fog… that would suck. Finally I went out on a limb and crossed to a new patch of snow, where we found what looked like very old footprints. They led me to a few nice steps of heather ledges, which dropped me off at one of the two notches. Not the one we had come up, but one that would go nonetheless. We dropped down to the talus and snowfields, and the fog blew through for a hot minute. Cascade Pass! So close yet so far.

Quick reminder of why we do this. Gunsight and Old Guard anyone??

We continued down below the snowfields to try and follow the bootpath that we had seen the two runners take the previous morning. It still wasn’t pleasant, but it was a hell of a lot easier than steep sidehilling on snow, especially with my bloody bruised ankles. Shitty. We saw the huge rocks and hikers below at the pass, so far beneath us. Getting back to the pass was amazing. I was drenched from fighting through wet rainy shrubs with clumps of goat hair stuck to my legs. Luckily, the hikers had left the pass, so no one was there to laugh at how ridiculous I looked as I limped like a 90 year old down the trail. Great, all we have left is 4 miles and 36 switchbacks.

Halfway!

The trail down was exactly what you’d expect. Tedious, endless, tiring. Stupidly inclined. I joked with JT that we should count all the switchbacks. Except I was totally serious. I needed something to focus on. JT got ahead of me. At one point someone started writing the number of the switchback at each corner. I thought it was JT and I was thrilled when I saw the first one. It gave me something to look forward to. Switchback #14, that’s 7/18ths of the way there, which is 38.9% of the way there, and switchback 15 is next. Switchback 15, that shares the common denominators 3 and 5 and no wait just 3 with the total 36 so 15/36 can be reduced to 5/12 which is 42% of the way there. And 18 will be halfway and then you can check the GPS and see how much mileage you have left! Woohoo, a treat!

Yeah, I was tired. At the second to last switchback you get a great view of the parking lot. Why didn’t anyone put fucking stairs there?! I was pissed. Seriously just make it like Paradise and put in some steps it isn’t that hard. I yelled whoop WHOOOP to JT who didn’t hear me and then speed hobbled the rest of the way to the car where I stepped out of the woods laughing at what we had just done and how shattered I was. Without good reason! The terrain was annoying but nothing too difficult, just lots of ups and down and long days and mental strain getting back through whiteout. I think it was just the wet feet that had screwed me over, which was an issue only a few miles in so I had no escape.

Yay!! I swear I felt more triumphant than I look. I was disappointed by my summit cookie.

I had left three bites of a sandwich in the car and it was amazing. My feet were almost too swollen for my flip flops. I was glad JT drove because my granny driving would not have made it down Cascade River Road. We went back to Calvin’s where he and Quinn and Haley were enjoying his hot tub. 1) I was far too offensively disgusting for a hot tub 2) A hot tub probably would have been brutally painful on my stubby torn feet. But it was a nice thought. Rain check?

Mt. Shuksan via the Sulphide Glacier

Posted on July 31, 2016 by evejakubowski

Baker and part of the ridge above the clouds

The forecast called for Mostly Sunny. Every forecast showed sunshine. You know how that goes, usually it turns out to be mostly sunny. Psych! Not this trip. A last minute plan for Shuksan as a day trip came to fruition when I realized it was Angie’s last weekend in the PNW and we had to do something. We had not yet gone on a glaciated climb since she always had to be back in Seattle by a reasonable hour on Sundays to drive back to Ashford. We had always been limited to shorter trips. Here was our chance, and with Haley and Angie I knew we’d have a kick ass girls team. And with a forecast of mostly sunny, what could go wrong? I was in the mood for some incredible sweeping views of the North Cascades. Anyone who knows me knows how I feel about Shuksan. Sulphide is huge bang for your buck, Fisher Chimneys is the most enjoyable route I’ve climbed up anything out here (small sample size, to be fair), Price Glacier and North Face will hopefully happen sometime in the next year. So many routes, such great views, very alpine feel. But Shuksan’s a tease, and doesn’t return my unrequited love. Just strings me along with false promises and narrow weather windows and glimpses of mind blowing views.

Distance: 14.4 miles round trip
Elevation: 6500ft gain (9127ft highest point)
Weather: Foggy and 40’s, sunny and 60’s
Commute from Seattle: 2:30 without traffic
Did I Trip: A majestic, foot-caught-on-branch-land-face-down-in-mud-and-skid-a-few-feet beauty. So you could say yes.

A well camouflaged toad on the trail

We camped at the trailhead, where Angie and Haley ended up sleeping in my car while I bivvied on the ground. Three people in the car is a lot of people, and I could not be bothered to share. “Does not play well with others,” I snarkily announced as my head hit the pillow I had made from rolled-up extra sleeping bag. At one point it started drizzling and I laughed and rolled my eyes. The proud owner of the car had been relegated to the gravel parking lot, while the plebs slept inside it. Luckily the rain didn’t last, and my bivvy was wonderfully cozy.

Foxglove!

I woke up to my alarm at 3am. Usually I’m up before it, but I was completely unconscious. The best night (okay, the best two hours) of sleep I’ve ever had. But I dragged myself out of my bivvy and packed. No stars in the sky, just thick fog everywhere. Whatever, mostly sunny forecast, it’ll burn off when the sun rises. I was excited to see how my camelback bladder did in my pack. I always just carried water bottles, but I was experimenting. I reached for the bladder I had filled up at home and – wait a sec, where the fuck is the water? The bag was empty. My trunk was dry. The bag was dry. I definitely filled it up, Angie had watched me. It was a total mystery. Ghost water. I though of Kacie, who I teased relentlessly when she forgot her water on Baring. Now I understand. She had the ghost water. Well, I refilled it with the water I had in my trunk and we started out.

The bright green crampons look great with my blue & pink runners

I was wearing my brand new trail runners, finally getting the update to my trusty old Saucony Peregrines, which (I am almost ashamed to admit) are nearly 3 years old with well over a thousand miles on them through the Cascades, through Wisconsin, through Montana, through Moab, and I’m sure some extra epic trails I’m forgetting. There were toads everywhere, and huge flowers (foxglove?) and salmonberries!! So many salmonberries. But we figured we’d get them on the way down. We hit the ridge and broke out of the trees. Baker was completely obscured, but clouds seemed to be clearing up since there were patches of blue sky. Snow started at the notch (around 5200ft), and Angie and Haley switched to boots. I went to take a drink from my water hose for the first time and – wait, where the fuck is the water?? AGAIN?! It had disappeared. My pack wasn’t wet. My back wasn’t wet. If it had all leaked out of the hose (which was resting against my leg) my side would be soaked. This shit made no sense. Sneaky ass ghost water, dehydrating unsuspecting climbers all across America.

We came up upon the first campsite we had seen all morning, which we thought was IMG. Angie works for IMG, and we were going to say hi until we realized duh, everyone’s asleep, it’s 6:30am. We carried on our merry way, and stopped to refill water (or in my case, see if I could fight the magical disappearing qualities of my bladder). I made Angie and Haley top theirs off too since there was a chance I’d need some if my bladder kept emptying its damn ghost water.

“Mostly Sunny” my ass

We found low camp next, which housed a Mountain Madness team and I believe a group with the Mountaineers. Again, we didn’t chat much, as everyone was asleep besides two people having coffee. And we had work to do. I took a sip of my water. Which was still there.

At this point, visibility was around 30ft, and with a mellow, mostly featureless glacier (very few open crevasses), navigation is like 30% difficult and 70% boring. We aimed for high camp, only to find… nothing. There’s a toilet up there somewhere, but we didn’t exactly miss out on the views from that lovely throne with all of the fog. Remind me to mark a waypoint there next time. We roped up and stayed left near the ridge since that was the route we were familiar with from last year, and ridges make for easy navigation. It meant a few unnecessary steep slopes, but they were short. Kicking steps in trail runners turned out to be difficult, but I was anchoring the rope, so I had Angie and Haley both kicking steps in front of me. Staircases, woohoo!

Holy shit! Mostly sunny!

Soon enough we were on a ridge that I remembered from Labor Day weekend last year, when we had to descend Sulphide in similar conditions. We took a quick break there for snacks, and as we stood up, the clouds started to clear. I couldn’t form words. “GO! GO go KEEP GOING” I was waving my arms until Haley and Angie turned around and realized what was happening. We caught glimpses of the summit pyramid and Baker, and as we got higher and higher it got clearer and clearer until we were officially above the clouds surrounded by sunshine and blue skies. Blue skies are nice. Partly cloudy is better. Above the clouds is second best. And best, is being above the cotton candy clouds, but below those high, wispy cirrus clouds. Well after all that fog, I’ll settle for second best. Now if only a few other peaks would poke up above the sea of clouds.

Baker and part of the ridge above the clouds

Clouds playing along the arm

We were quick getting to the summit pyramid, despite my fifteen micro stops. “Guys wait I need sunscreen.” “Guys wait can I borrow someone’s chapstick with SPF?” “Guys wait my shoe is untied.” “Guys hold up a sec I need to delayer.” “GUYSIDROPPEDMYGLOVESSORRYWAIT” “Hahaha… guys… sorry but one more stop I dropped a coil.” I’m usually more organized, I swear. At least I still had my water, which was a record for the day. It hadn’t disappeared yet.

Angie coming up the scramble

We unroped at the patch of rocks at the base of the scramble. We kept crampons and ice axes for the next 50 or so vertical feet until we were officially on rock only, and stashed them at the base of the central gully. We followed the gully fairly well (a few hesitations, a few sketchy off route moves while scouting) until the top, where we went too far to the right. A big part of scrambling and rock climbing in general is trusting your feet, and I did not trust my feet in those trail runners. Which isn’t the shoes’ fault, I just had to get used to them. I mean shit I watched my friend climb a pillar at Ruby Beach in flip flops. You can’t always blame footwear, sometimes it’s just in your head.

Angie on the ridge

Anyway, we ended up on the SE ridge for the last maybe 50 vertical feet, but at that point there are no technical moves left (the rest of the ridge is 5.6ish). One slabby move sketched me out until Angie pointed out that it’s way easier than downclimbing, and she was totally right. As soon as I realized my shoes would in fact stick to the rock it was quick moving, and before I knew it, we were standing on the summit.

Summit quilt!

We snapped pictures, destroyed Haley’s like 5lbs of M&Ms (she did most of the work), I took 50 pictures of my trail runners (should have left the crampons on) and eventually we started down as the clouds were rising. Downclimbing the gully was a painstaking affair. We took a slightly different route down, which was easier than our route up but downclimbing 4th class is a bitch. Summitpost claims it’s 3rd class, I don’t think that’s true. Unless we missed a blatant gully that would have been way easier.

Haley on the downclimb

I can see why everyone prefers to rappel. Step by step, we inched down. The cap came off my sunscreen, spattering the rocks with lotion. I tried to carry it down balancing it in my hand but eventually had to give up, my hands were too necessary on some of those moves. I basically needed handholds any time I had to face inward to downclimb, which again is really more mental than anything. Those trail runners did fine. Sure it was tough edging on footholds whereas the Nepal Evos can edge on anything, but they still stuck to all of the slabby moves, and I didn’t actually lose footing once (which could have been because I was being ultra conservative with every single move).

We grabbed our axes and crampons, roped up, and descended back into the clouds. So much for “mostly sunny.” We saw another party coming up just below the summit pyramid. I yelled to Haley and Angie, “Don’t trip now!” We pass the group, say our hellos and good lucks, and Haley immediately wiped out. Day = made.

Back at low camp we unroped, didn’t recognize anyone, and carried on to what we assumed was the IMG camp (the Eureka tents are kind of a giveaway). Angie said hi to her coworker, we told everyone it was sunny and glorious above 7200ft, and made our way back to the notch.

Back into the fog

We took a more extended break along the ridge, and pounded downhill where we each had a muddy wipeout (or in my case, two). We devoured salmonberries left and right, leaving none for the parties behind us or the parties coming up or the local bear population. Suckers. I always thought the yellow salmonberries were unripe, but it turns out they’re just a different species! They’re edible too, and taste even better than the red ones.

We were back at the car by 6pm, where my feet were thrilled to be relieved of trail runner duty and assigned to flip flops. I forgot that glacier travel means snow, which will make your feet cold and wet, and that means blisters and pruning and general discomfort (and stink). Yuck. And the crampons had rubbed my ankles raw, which was less than pleasing. Though interestingly, the aches and pains and blisters and wounds on my ankles and feet were no different from what mountaineering boots give them. So maybe my feet are the problem, not the footwear. And my water was still in my pack. No more ghosts.

Baker again

We piled back into the car. Angie fell asleep right away, snoring like a train. I was jealous, but not too tired just yet. Too busy daydreaming about mac n cheese and the chicken bacon ranch sandwich I had in the car. Delicious. We dropped Haley off, and Angie and I headed back to Seattle, where she somehow dragged herself off the couch at 3am AGAIN to get back to Ashford. I did not leave my bed. But in case you’re curious, yes, the water in my camelback had disappeared again when I woke up. 2L of water in plastic doesn’t just evaporate. Bastards, those H2O molecules.

Fresh new kicks. Should have left the crampons on for the picture.

Round Lake & Breccia Peak

Posted on July 20, 2016 by evejakubowski

Heading down from the summit

Wow this is from a while ago. A month, in fact. I got my ass handed to me on a silver platter by work, followed by two three day weekends, and this got abandoned on the back burner in favor of reports from Rainier and Olympus. But I can’t pass up one of my favorite hikes. I had attempted this peak last year but turned around due to my friend’s severe leg cramps. But with how gorgeous the area was, I knew I’d be coming back, and finally had the opportunity for a revenge trip. Hiked 6/19/2016.

Distance: 13 miles round trip
Elevation: 5100ft gain (6487 highest point)
Weather: 50’s and cloudy, 60’s and sunny (shit, I just realized weather is like a spoiler for the whole blog post)
Commute from Seattle: 2:30 without traffic
Did I Trip: Everyone did!!! I didn’t see Angie wipe out but it was pretty good. Dru tripped enough for all of us. Surafel had one good one, Chelsea had one, and someone fell off a log while trying to cross it by straddling it, which was the highlight of the wipeouts.

Ferns on the forest floor

“Partly Sunny.” See it, on the left? Hint of sun.

The forecast was for something like “partly sunny” on NOAA and “some clouds” on MF. “Some clouds” is anything from completely cloudy or socked in by fog to a few nice puffy clouds on the horizon. “Partly sunny” on NOAA usually means “Psych, just clouds, suckers!” So I wasn’t going to get my hopes up, but I mean.. they were kind of up.

We met in the Lynnwood Park n Ride at 5am. I was late, as usual. Guys I swear once upon a time I was a chronically early person, to the point where I’d awkwardly drive in circles or walk to Starbucks to kill time. I don’t know what changed. But I was late, and luckily I have good friends who waited and did not give me shit. In fact Dru had an extra coffee and Surafel had gotten tea. Stop being so nice guys. Chelsea and Angie, step up your game.

Green trail

We all piled into the xterra (like a family road trip, I was already laughing) and drove off into sunrise. Oh wait, the sun rose at like 4am because it’s June. We drove off into what looked like midday. The mountains were still in clouds, but they looked like the type that might blow over. We reached the trailhead, I immediately started down the wrong trail just like I did last year, and everyone else saved my ass and we found the correct trail. Don’t take the boot path in front of your car when you park. Go like 10 feet further down the road and the real trail is very obvious with a register and everything. The bootpath by your car is from idiots like me and people who have to pee.

Surafel admiring the sunlight streaming through trees

The first two miles of the trail are through forest. Green forest with beautiful mist and sunlight spilling through the tall trees, and people who like to stop and ooh and ahhh at everything. Except Angie, who will never be impressed by anything.

Round Lake

After 3.25 miles you reach Bingley Gap (HA guys this explains a lot I thought Bingley Gap was 2.4 miles in), where you turn right and follow a ridge to a beautiful vista above Round Lake. We reached the ridge and were continuously in and out of clouds, and eventually hit snow right where you get the views of Round Lake. I was going crazy, having been there last year I knew exactly what views were being obscured by the clouds, and no one else had any idea.

Various stages of walking, falling, and glissading

We followed the route I took last year, which is not the best, but it works, and after a short stint of near-bushwacking through steep trees (I laughed because I’ve dragged Chelsea through much worse) I didn’t want to take any chances with an unknown route. I knew my route from last year would take us along the crest of the ridge to a 3rd class scramble above Sunup Lake, where we could drop down and gain the slope to Breccia.

Well, the 3rd class scramble was wet and mossy this time around. Crap. Everyone got down, slowly but surely, and we debated between taking the steeper more direct route, or the mellower, longer route. There was fresh snow and some sloughing, not enough that I was worried about avalanches this time of year but enough that you might get hit in the face with some pinwheels. And we chose, as usual, the steep direct route.

At the bottom of the scramble

Summit photo! (Photo Credit Dru)

We took turns kicking steps up the slope, navigating through patches of steep heather covered in three inches of snow (the worst conditions for heather) and packed snowfields (a relief). Dru was fueled by F bombs, not enjoying the slippery heather. But with every F bomb he got stronger, and I laughed harder, and eventually we were on the final ridge, which was all snow! Woohoo!

Here it comes!

Except we were in the clouds. Like IN the clouds. Completely socked in. Just as we got to the summit. Because how else would it happen? We plopped down on our packs and had snacks, sharing chocolate and sour patch watermelon and combos. Well I ate most of the combos. What are combos, you ask? If you walk into a gas station and ask ‘What’s the least healthy thing I can put into my body in this gas station,’ Combos are your answer.

Glacier Peak

After 45 minutes with no cloud improvement, we finally decided to head down. “It’s going to clear up as soon as we’re back down,” someone said. I started singing. “I CAN FEEL IT COOOOMING IN THE AIIR” and they were right, within five minutes we reached the bottom of the summit ridge and bam! Sunshine! And the clouds were moving! We all started to freak out. We snapped pictures. Surafel got some awesome pics of Sloan shrouded in clouds. There was one big ass, slow moving cloud covering Glacier Peak. It would peek out, just the tip, and then disappear again. Surafel started taking a time lapse. 20 minutes later, the cloud had crept slightly left. Surafel’s arm was probably tired from holding the camera in the air with no tripod. Hurry up, clouds, we got shit to do.

Sloan and Bedal, Dru for scale

We named peaks, the group favorite being Ointment Peak. That’s a terrible name for a peak. Or Mt. Pugh, an actual peak which some of us thought was pronounced “pug.” Mt. Pug. Also a terrible name for a peak. We eventually gave up on Glacier Peak and headed back to Sunup Lake to rejoin the Lost Creek Ridge trail. The scramble back up to the ridge crest was much easier (though involved fighting through some trees), and the race back to dry trail went quickly, as plunge-stepping down snow usually does. Plus it’s great when you have line of sight and can see the best route back from up high and not waste time fighting analysis paralysis – “This way? Will it cliff out? How does the topo look? Am I pushing anyone’s comfort zone? Fuck I just dumped water all over myself pushing past these bushes. Are they having fun? What if they aren’t having fun?! Shit, I still haven’t picked. Up and left or straight and traverse?!?” Yeah, on the way down you (ideally) know where you’re going.

Glacier Peak peeking over the edge of Sunup Lake

Heading home, dwarfed by mountains

Back along the ridge, we turned around to marvel at Glacier Peak, which was finally completely clear with no clouds. There it was, the day was complete. We made it to the top, socked in by clouds, and we left fully satisfied with incredible views, pictures, and a solid two hours of consistent giggling. Back on dry trail, we made good time through the trees down the countless switchbacks (but actually we should have counted) and eventually popped out at the car. The consensus was Mexican food. We piled back into the car, rolled the windows down to air everything our, and within an hour we were devouring burritos and strawberry (raspberry?) lemonade.

One last pic of North Cascades greenery

Mt. Olympus

Posted on July 17, 2016 by evejakubowski

View from the summit

Any DFW fans out there? A Supposedly Fun Thing I’ll Never Do Again? Yeah, this trip might get that label. Was it good? Yeah, hell yeah I mean it was great. But I am way to lazy to do this again any time in the near future. We’ll get to that. Regardless, this trip almost didn’t happen for me. I was going to bail the night before since I had a visitor in town staying at my apartment, but being a moderately selfish person and realizing that I was either a) bailing on visitor (lose) or b) bailing on friends with a specifically organized climbing trip (lose) I should just go with whatever I personally wanted (win). And I wanted to climb Olympus. Well, sorta.

Distance: Simon’s Suunto claims like 52 miles, but I don’t think it was actually that long.

Elevation: 7400ft gain (7,979ft highest point, and also all of that elevation gain is in the last few miles so get pumped)

Commute from Seattle: 5 Effing Hours so carpool and bring great music and snacks

Weather: Foggy and 50’s, sunny and 60’s

Did I Trip: Yeah, and I ended up in a river. Stop laughing.

So much green

There had been several (okay, two) obstacles preventing me from climbing Olympus sooner, or from even really wanting to do Olympus. The drive (5 hours without traffic… add traffic to that and I might have literally died had I driven alone), and the approach (18 mother fucking miles of flat ass well maintained low valley forest trail, which to some is a dream, but to me, is a nightmare). I always assumed I’d do it as a one day trail run when I wa in decent shape. But somehow, my damn friends convinced me it would be fun, and I did have to check it off the list. Apex peak, whatever. We drove out Saturday morning, naturally taking longer than expected. We planned on leaving around 4:30 or 5am, but actually got out around 6. We stopped at Ruby Beach on the way there. you pass Beach 2, Beach 3, Beach 4… what comes next? Beach 5? Nope, Ruby Beach! Seeing the ocean actually almost took my breath away, mostly because I had no idea the drive to Olympus would take us right next to the coast. I miss the ocean constantly, maybe more than I miss toilets when I’m on a glacier.

I started a possibly illegal parking area, ran into the water, got destroyed by a surprise wave, hopped around some logs, stole a bunch of toilet paper from the bathrooms, and we continued on our merry way, blasting Sublime down the national park roads (should I apologize?). My pants were dry within half an hour despite being heavy duty ice climbing pants. The parking lot at the trailhead was packed and we ended up parking in a one-day camping parking lot, but what can you do. We got started on the trail around 12:30.

Awesome nurse log

The trail is… I mean it’s pretty, but it’s tainted by the fact I’m starting to hate approaches. “It’s all about the journey!!!” Yeah, if the journey is above treeline, on rock or ice. If it’s bushwacky, or straight up or off trail or anything like that, great, I’m into it. But 18 miles along a flat forested trail? I was going to go crazy. I haven’t been that stir crazy since the Snow Lakes approach to the Enchantments, which at least had the excitement of new skis. Tedious, I think, is the word for it. At least it was spectacularly green, with the occasional enormous tree or nurse log for us to marvel at. Luckily we were camping at Elk Lake (revised to Martin Creek because we thought we’d have campfires and Elk Lake doesn’t allow any), so we only had to go 15 miles in. Okay Eve, keep reminding yourself that.

More green

The approach trail is the Hoh River trail, which as I’m sure you can imagine spawned more than enough sophomoric humor to sustain me for the first few miles. “Are you enjoying the Hoh?” “Is the Hoh treating you well?” kept the mood light for the first two or so hours, until passing parties became more sparse and there were no more groups to tolerate us giggling as we dropped one-liners left and right. We took a break at the ranger station 9 miles in (which is pretty cool, that there’s a ranger station 9 miles down a trail) to wait for Sam, who was lagging – maybe because he was carrying a splitboard. And that meant an entire extra pair of boots. Three pairs of boots, in fact. Approach shoes, mountaineering boots, and snowboard boots. Yeah, not jealous.

We got to camp around 7. Connor and I claimed the best tent spot, since Haley had to wait for Simon who was carrying their tent and showed up shortly after us. Sam hobbled into camp with his extra boots and snowboard an hour later, tossed his bivvy on the ground, and was unconscious within minutes. The rest of us whipped up some dehydrated meals, completely ignored the campfire that we had been so excited for, and chatted about the summit bid.

You might as well look as ridiculous as possible if you’re carrying a splitboard through a rain forest

It was Connor’s birthday, and Simon and I had brought up cupcakes and even a candle to celebrate. We snuck off to get the cupcakes, and carried them back to the campsite where Connor managed to be the most oblivious birthday boy in the world (or is really good at pretending not to notice and then feigning surprise). We set up cupcakes and candles basically right in front of him and when I said “should we sing!?” he starts singing “What I Got” by Sublime, which was immediately drowned out by Happy Birthday as he lit up when he saw the cupcakes. I know, we’re fucking adorable. Nothing beats mountain birthdays, even if they’re sitting in a foggy misty jungle after a pounding 15 mile approach that didn’t even get you to the fun part. Unless you’re Sam, who confessed the next day that he thought he dreamed we offered him cupcakes but logically thought “why the fuck would they have cupcakes right now” and continued to sleep. The good part of that is that we had an entire extra cupcake, to be devoured post summit.

Simon’s wardrobe malfunction (“YOU BETTER NOT HAVE GOTTEN A PIC OF THAT”)

We got up around 6am, I bitched about the fog and weather, and we started towards Glacier Meadows at 7. Sam got a head start, knowing he’d be slower with his snowboard. The ladder was a hilarious endeavor as Simon’s pants immediately fell off when he started down, and I have to admit it’s a tricky spot to have to have a serious wardrobe adjustment. I believe he has since returned the pants. Falling off in precarious situations isn’t a 5-star experience. Also, why’d they set up the ladder if you have to go back up the gully once you’re at the bottom? Someone hit that with a shovel and dig out a traverse. I’m never doing that approach again unless it’s for a damn good reason but maybe if you drop me in via helicopter I’ll help out.

The further we went, the clearer the skies got, and by the time we reached the meadows, it was a sunny blue sky day. Holy shit. I’m like never wrong with weather and I was so, so wrong. I was torn. I wanted my “I told you so” moment, but I also wanted sunshine. I’l settle for the latter. We had agreed to meet Sam at the ranger station at the meadows, which turned out to be a platform of wood with a sign saying “Ranger Station.” Great! A platform of wood, with no rangers, no Sam, and no signs of Sam. We thought maybe he’d be by the glacier, so we kept moving. Eventually the trail forks and you can choose lateral glacier or moraine. Choose lateral. Moraine might be fine in winter or early season, but this time of year and onward it’s just a lot of walking across a broken exposed glacier. We headed for the side, hoping to run into Sam.

Crossing the Blue Glacier. Route goes to center frame, then turns right to go up behind the rocks.

We hit the ridge a little too early (“scenic route!”) and scrambled along it to meet the glacier. I was finally in my element, off the damn Hoh River Trail slog and floating along a steep ridge instead. We finally saw Sam ahead of us. We waited for the entire group to reconvene, Connor tossed me the rope, and I dropped down the ridge to get it all flaked out on the glacier. The glacier looked pretty mellow, but we figured hey, good practice, and better safe than sorry. Connor took the lead, I anchored, and everyone else clipped in in the middle. Anchoring means you get the best pictures because you see the whole team in front of you.

On top of Snow Dome

The route goes directly across the Blue Glacier and then turns slightly right to go up a few rocky outcroppings just before a steep snow slope up to Snow Dome. Glaciers are like deserts when it comes to sunshine, and I was baking. No shade, everything reflecting the sun. Like being in a toaster, and you are the toast. “Top Brown” is the dream, but sometimes I end up charred. I had my sweet new nose cover from creme-brulee-ing my face on Rainier the previous weekend, so at least that was under cover, and a new keychain of SPF 50 to be reapplied in motion. We took a lot of breaks which helped fight off the sun. Connor drew out a potential new line up the ice fall, which was awesome. Give me a few years to get up to M7 and I’ll tag along. I’m not tackling any 5.11 rock any time soon.

Wrapping around behind the summits

We reached the top of Snow Dome, where Sam finally bailed on his splitboard. He set it up right there, waiting for the return down. We looked ahead of us at Olympus and saw two routes. One potentially ended in a bergschrund – the Autobahn route, which goes straight from Snow Dome up the face of Olympus right in front of you. The other route wraps around the back of the false summit and then gains the summit scramble. Logic would have told us that the footprints going from the Autobahn to the standard route meant the Autobahn wasn’t doable, but I wasn’t positive until another group confirmed that you definitely had to go around the backside. Great, that’s what we’ll do.

Up to the false summit

The trail from here is fairly mellow until the climb to the false summit. I recall Simon in front of me, “please say that’s the summit!” I was ready to be the dream crusher, but Connor took care of that. “Nope!” You drop down on the other side of the false summit and then ascend another short slope to start the scramble to the true summit. We left our heavy things on the snow saddle, reflaked the rope for rock climbing (I’ll just mention in passing how five people on one rock rope is… ugh) and headed up to the scramble. Connor and I scrambled along a ledge to a belay station before the tougher scramble began. The ledge is like a class 2 scramble, but with a bit of exposure. From there, you get a few class 3 moves with one arguably low 5th class move. We simulclimbed the section to the rap station, where Connor carried on to the summit as I belayed the other three up to the rap rock. We did use a small rock rack to set up pro and make sure everyone was 100% comfortable with everything we were doing, since Sam, Haley, and Simon had never been on anything beyond low class scrambles before. And despite all of the pro, I will never forget the hilarious image of Simon, Haley, and Sam all clinging to the rap rock, cheeks pressed against stone, snuggling the damn thing for their lives. I get it, I remember my first rock climb. I was like a starfish stuck to a rock.

I honestly do not remember how or why someone else got my camera but there’s Connor and I on the summit

After they worked out what sounded like a rope nest spaghetti mess (my fault – I clipped them into the anchor in the order they arrived, should have anchored them in the order they’d be heading to the summit) we belayed them all over to the summit, where I made sure to flake out the rope clearly so we wouldn’t deal with the same mess on the way down. I took the most bad ass picture of Haley that anyone’s ever taken ever. More on that later.

Simon has conquered his first real rock

We signed the summit register, snapped summit pics, ate summit chocolate, and laughed at the trails of footprints of the pour soul who tried to take the Autobahn route. They had looked at every corner of the schrund trying to figure out a way around it, to no avail. Thanks for taking one for the team, buddy, we’ve all been there. Eventually, we decided it was time to head down. Clouds had been moving in slowly all day, it had taken a long ass time to get everyone up the rock, and we knew it’d take a long time to get everyone off the rock as well. Connor led the way to the rap station and we belayed everyone back across there. I went last, and had the luxury of rappelling first. Rather than walk everyone through autoblocks, we settled on a fireman’s belay from below. I set up at the bottom and held the rope while Connor got everyone else set up on rappel, and eventually everyone was back down at the scramble ledge.

Connor jogging ahead

Back on the snow, we grabbed the axes and crampons we had stashed at the top of the slope. Connor tossed his crampons down to his pack, only to watch them fly 10ft and get stuck a third of the way down the slope. Ha! I held on to mine and walked down, literally too lazy to glissade. Upon returning to my pack, I realized I had spilled chocolate all over it. No! Ugh! I dumped it out on the glacier, half melted, looking like rodent poop hundreds of meters above where rodents should be. Sorry guys. I left a trace, I know 😦

We didn’t bother to rope up for the way down, knowing how mellow the glacier was the entire way. We half walked half ran down the slopes, back to Snow Dome where Sam finally got to put his splitboard to use. I took his camera and jogged ahead of him to get photos. There are few things I enjoy more than jogging down snow when it’s soft enough to plunge step, I leapfrogged Connor and Haley glissading between scramble sections laughing like a kid. I snapped a few shots of Sam as he finally passed, and soon enough we were back on the flat section of glacier. We made quick work getting back to the ridge, drank some glacial runoff, and started down the trail back to camp as the sun set.

Connor and Haley and the last light on Olympus

My headlamp was in my pack and you all know how lazy I am. Actually I had two headlamps, because after cutthroat peak I’ll be damned if I ever forget a headlamp ever again. I put it off until it was officially freaking dark – I had been right near two people with headlamps, stopped with Sam and Connor for a second, and as soon as Simon and Haley were a few steps ahead, I realized just how dark it was and caved. Haley and Simon started yelling for a bear at once point. I thought they were just trying to freak me out (I don’t like dark forests or wildlife) but they swore they heard something huge rustling in the bushes. I’m oblivious, and heard nothing. Maybe bears have literally walked across the trail in front of me and I just haven’t been paying attention. That happened with a deer once.

Almost sunset!

We got back to camp where I was thrilled to ditch the mountaineering boots and beyond excited to curl up in my sleeping bag. I freaking love bedtime on climbs. Doesn’t matter what time it is. But I needed dinner (Sweet and Sour Pork! Yes!) and we had been talking about that last cupcake for like six hours. We split it four ways, and it was the best 1/4th of a cupcake I have ever had.

Bedtime was amazing as always. It was a little ridiculous having a zero degree down bag in a four season mountaineering tent set up at 2,000ft in a rainforest but I don’t have any true backpacking gear. We woke up to Simon telling us they were ready to leave (false – it took another hour and a half for them to be ready) and Sam again got a head start. We caught up to him quicker than I expected, but to be fair, I wasn’t carrying a million pounds. Really the only heavy things I was carrying were tent, boots, and glacier gear. Connor had rope and small rock rack, and eventually took half of Sam’s splitboard, which he mounted horizontally on his pack. Horizontally. I get it, you want it to be evenly weighted, but it looks hilarious and I was just waiting for him to clothesline someone.

Sam finally enjoying his snowboard

We only had one mishap on the way out. I was setting the pace and crossing a log jam over a river when I stepped on a not so secure log, which slowly started to sink into the water. Haley stood behind me staring. I couldn’t dive off because I didn’t want my entire pack to end up soaking, I tried to jump to another log but just sunk the log further, and finally I just stood there defeated as I sank to my ass in beautiful refreshing blue river. My camera survived because it’s virtually indestructible. My phone wasn’t as lucky. RIP my bank account and the best pic of Haley anyone’s ever taken.

Group summit selfie!

Well my pants dried within a half hour for the second time that weekend, and we were back at the trailhead in around 6 hours. My feet did not want to see those trail runners again. Did I even remember where we had parked? Um… we’ll just walk in a convenient circle. Haley and I ran to the car as soon as we saw it, flying by the grumpy duo that was Simon and Connor, attempting celebratory cartwheels after we dropped our packs. Would Sam find the car? We figured we’d get all of our shit organized (plus I was 90% sure I had torn a muscle in an attempted cartwheel, that must be what it feels like to be 80 years old) and if he still hadn’t arrived we’d drive over to the visitor center (right near the trail exit) and meet him there. It’s pretty hard to miss my bright yellow xterra.

So lush and healthy

After some celebration chocolate and beer and pirate booty and some extra reveling in the comfort that is flip flops, Sam popped out of the trees. Yay! Everyone was back in one piece, and ready to head back to Simon’s for steaks and drinks and ice cream and fireworks. We stopped at McDonalds on the way (aiming for Carl’s Jr but those are NOWHERE) where I destroyed a big mac, followed by a girly drink pickup at Starbucks, and eventually, a 1lb steak that for the first time in my life I did not finish. I blame the big mac. And you know what? I never have to do Olympus again. Except by now I’ve forgotten the misery of the approach, so maybe I could be convinced. Maybe. I mean, looking back it now those pictures of the forest look pretty nice…

Mt. Rainier via Disappointment Cleaver

Posted on July 7, 2016 by evejakubowski

Descending the Cleaver on trip 2

I requested Monday off from work, which was a bold move on my part (and still nearly regrettable, despite how incredible the weekend was). Big deadlines Friday, many 12 hour days in a row on top of moving to a new apartment (a process I am still wrapping up as I sit here typing instead of unpacking the four bags on the floor in front of me). Kayla had set up an REI team (well, 3 REI employees, I am sadly an ex-employee) and organized a three day trip, and I was in! Kayla’s a total bad ass who was incredibly helpful and encouraging when I started mountaineering last year, so I couldn’t say no. At one point last year I mentioned to her that I was hoping to go up Rainier with a few friends in April but didn’t have any of the gear, and she showed up to REI the next day unprompted with a bag of overmitts, crampons, slings all nicely daisy-chained, a harness, everything I was missing. That’s the type of person you want to be friends with.

Distance: I am honestly not sure. Maybe 18 round trip? 4 to muir, 5 to summit?
Elevation: ~9000ft from Paradise to summit
Commute from Seattle: 2:30
Weather: 70’s and sunny in the day, maybe 20’s at the summit? Not too bad!
Did I Trip: Maybe running to see Kacie. I never legitimately ate it though I don’t think.

JT skinning up

I had a fitful night of sleep in my car in the parking lot listening to other groups of climbers getting started in the early morning, though a few groups bailed due to visibility. I woke up to fog that I knew we’d get above, and met Kayla, Charli, Rick, JT, and Sam all at the ranger station at 7am. We lined up to get camping permits and climbers’ permits, only to be told that everything was gone. Kautz was open, and three spots on Emmons were open, but no spots at Muir or Ingraham Flats. I turned to JT. Kautz?! Rick and Charli laughed. Not happening.

Luckily, a miraculous 20 new spots opened up at Muir, and we were first to snag them. JT and Sam would be staying through Sunday, Kayla Charli Rick and I would be there through Monday. We signed our permits and ran outside to meet our porters(!), who were helping carry group gear up to Muir.

Our porters knew Charli through OSAT, an awesome organization that this weekend would be taking over Camp Muir. I met H, Dustin, and Lord Byron, who packed my tent, shovel, and rope. Sweet! And I wasn’t even carrying skis! Officially the lightest pack of 2016.

The rare appearance of my vestibule

JT was skinning up, and Sam would be battling his knee injury so he decided to take it easy. The rest of us started up, clomping up the Paradise trails in our mountaineering boots. There was patchy snow from the start, but still plenty of rocky stairs to go up, which I knew would be brutal on the way down. We could also see the train of people ahead of us heading up to Muir. It was going to be a crowded weekend.

I went ahead of the group to scout out campsites. At Muir I claimed three spots and awaited our porters when I awkwardly realized I didn’t have a shovel for my platform or a tent to set up on the platform. I got distracted when JT arrived and allowed one of the spots to be poached by squatters. Crap. When JT was done I leveled out my own platform with his shovel, and just as I finished, H arrived with my tent! Woo! I popped it up, guyed it out with some rocks that I then buried with snow (I’m paranoid, remember?) and we made dinner. I whipped out the berries I had jokingly brought for Sam (everyone has their rituals, Sam swears that berries make him feel better at altitude) and passed them around. They were almost as good as the brookies Charli had brought (brownie-cookies) which had half melted in the sun and turned into delicious soft cookie brownie batter lumps. A feast fit for kings. Eventually JT went to slept in his tent, and Sam and I went to sleep in the climbers’ hut so I wouldn’t wake Kayla when I got up for the Sunday morning summit. The climber’s hut was actually a lot of fun, despite everything I had heard about it. It’s small, and dark, and reminded me of Orizaba which was a cozy nostalgic thought. I fell asleep on the bottom bunk listening to the whisper of stoves and the thumping of mountaineering boots on the floor, which is quickly becoming a comforting environment.

Skipping to sunrise, Adams in the back

At 10PM, Sam’s alarm woke the entire hut. I dozed for another 30 minutes as Sam took some night shots from camp, and we met JT at his tent to rope up. We were moving by 11:30. Halfway to Cathedral Rock, JT stopped and dropped his pack. “I just want to make sure I have my camera.” Five minutes later? “…I definitely don’t have my camera. Should I go back for it?” I laughed. Yes, if I were you, I’d absolutely go back for it. 15 minutes later? “Sleepy me is smarter than awake me. It’s in my pack.” Dammit JT.

We made quick work getting to the cleaver, and were on top of it in about two hours if you subtract the camera delay. The moon was a fat, blood red monster above the horizon, looming above the trains of headlamps we could see crossing Ingraham Flats below us. We tried to pass a few groups taking a break, but the leader of one rope team looked straight at JT and made sure their whole team got in front of us. Okay, they must be fast, I get it.

Weaving through crevasses

Except… they weren’t. The team in front of them was having technical issues, and refused to step aside to let everyone pass. We were on a steep traverse, so I suppose I get it, but we spent nearly an hour and a half walking five steps, stopping for ten minutes, shaking and freezing. JT put it nicely. “I am… not a patient person.” I was doing “the washing machine” to stay warm, which we used to do during swim practice when the heater broke. It’s basically a less attractive shimmy. “Sam, you should have brought your camera to take some night shots while we wait.” Missed opportunity! That’s how slow it was. There was an IMG group behind us, and finally the guide yelled at the team ahead to move aside. After several attempts at shouting, they finally listened and moved off the path, and we were all able to pass.

Sunrise over the crater rim

The route overall was in incredible shape. The cleaver is far more enjoyable (more like “far less torturous”) covered in snow, there were no ladders, and only two sections of fixed lines, neither of which we considered necessary. We took more frequent breaks as altitude set in (at one point JT just turned around and said “Well, I’m hitting a wall” while Sam insisted on being dropped off, to which we all agreed “fuck no, you should have eaten more berries, who needs an LCL anyway” and kept walking). There was a small hill to crest a couple hundred feet below the summit crater, and we took a break right next to it. Which was hilarious, because you watch every single climbing team get to the top and think it’ll be the summit crater and boom, another 400 vertical feet to go. I watched so many faces change from sheer joy and excitement to defeat and resignation. But everyone pushed on. We summitted just around sunrise, so maybe 5:30. Wanting to get down by noon, we walked over to the summit register, snapped the obligatory photos, signed the book, and turned around. Going down should go quickly, right?

Me, Sam, and JT summit!

The first awkward bottleneck

Well, we ran into more bottlenecks. Groups were still on their way up while we were trying to go down, and passing other teams in between crevasses or on steep descents can be awkward. We spent maybe 20 minutes at several different points waiting for other teams before we could descend. But hey, there are worse places to be stuck, and the sun was up so it was fairly warm. Going down the cleaver resulted in some unbelievable pictures, and we were back at Muir by 10:30. Yes!! So much sleep!

Another bottleneck near a collapsing snow plug

Kayla had my sleeping bag and pad all laid out in the tent already (yay!!), and I basically went straight to bed. I didn’t hear Sam leave, but I remember saying a sleepy bye to JT before he skiied down from Muir. Sam snowboarded. They were probably back at the cars in like 30 minutes. Jealous. I lay in my sleeping bag trying to sleep and simultaneously nursing my nose, which was already horribly sunburned.

I dozed on and off for a few hours before getting bored and deciding to make food. I ran into the rest of the OSAT crew, who had taken over half of the campsites there. It’s awesome knowing so many people on a climb. I cooked my three cheese pasta and had a bunch of crackers and cheese. We laid out our ropes and gear next to the tents so all we’d have to do in the morning is get up and grab everything, and then we went to bed. So basically, I climbed, slept, ate, and slept, only to wake up and climb again. Living the dream.

Alpenglow at sunrise

We got up at 10:30pm again, with the intention of being moving by 11. We were a little late to our goal, but got on the route around 11:15 or 11:30. Charli and I were on one rope with Kayla and Rick on the other. With far fewer teams on the route this time, we were able to keep a steady pace, which was a relief. We leapfrogged with a Minnesota Nice rope team decked out in all camo. How did I see them, you ask? They should be invisible! Well Mossy Oak doesn’t camouflage well with snow, unfortunately. Wrong camo. But they were good natured and hilarious, and I was glad to be leapfrogging with such a genuine pair.

It was still cold, and windier than the previous day. I pulled my buff over my face only to have it freeze solid because of my breath. I couldn’t believe I didn’t bring my balaclava. My camera lense froze too, which you’ll notice in most of the photos. One big smudge and a blown out sun. Add that to the list of abuse my camera has endured. And somewhere around 1am on the cleaver, daydreaming, I realized I did not set an out of office email. Shit.

70% of mountaineering is me waiting for the sun to rise and convincing myself that everything will be okay once the sun rises and you can feel your feet again and your face doesn’t hurt and your camera works normally and your water bottle isn’t mostly slush. But Charli had explained why she wanted to summit when we were carrying coils on the cleaver, and I realized I was emotionally invested in everyone getting to the top. That’s not always the case, I can be a little selfish sometimes. But this time around, it was about all four of us getting there.

RMI rope team at sunrise

Coming along the crater rim

Charli trudged behind me as Kayla and Rick brought up the rear. Rick, who I don’t believe I’ve mentioned yet is 62. That’s not a typo. Sixty two. And crushing Mt. Rainier at 4am. We crested the false hill to everyone’s dismay, and pushed on towards the summit. Charli announced that she was done with this shit. A four person team was starting their descent as we gained the crater rim, and when I said hi they laughed and replied “You have your own summit reception party!!” just as Charli behind me said “FUCK my LIFE I hate EVERYTHING” and I burst out laughing. I think I was the only one who heard both teams, but the timing was perfect. Charli apologized for being grumpy and I laughed even harder because grumpy Charli is basically my constant internal dialogue. And of course, 15 feet later, Charli was all smiles.

Rick, Charli, and me on the true summit! Kayla snuggling in a sleeping bag out of frame.

Once on the crater rim, we ran into the OSAT group who had beaten us to the top and exchanged congrats while I hid my blistered nose from view. I was rocking white face from all the sunscreen I had been using too, and still no luck. Kayla was freezing cold so we set her up in my sleeping bag and started making hot chocolate and tea to get her warm again. Rick (62!! Can’t use your age as an excuse anymore Rick!), Charli, and I trekked over to the summit register so we could sign and snap our summit photos, and then returned to Kayla. I kept an eye on where the Emmons route meets the crater rim, hoping we’d see Kacie and Shawna’s OSAT group as well.

Me and Kilo Charlie!

Amazingly, they summitted 15 minutes later! I turned around to see several 4-person rope teams gaining the ridge, and knew it had to be them. I dropped my stuff and ran back across the crater. Literally. Past our Minnesota Camo friends, who had just summitted. I got to the summit register and asked if anyone was with OSAT. I saw Shawna sitting by the register and ran over to say hi, followed by “WHERE’S KACIE?!” “Over there!” “KACIE!!” And there she was!! Kacie Grice, conquering Rainier!

Descending into the clouds

“Come over here so I can smoke downwind.” I cracked up. Top of Rainier, and she’s about to smoke. Well okay. Gotta mark your territory. I went to go sit downwind with her and immediately burned my ass on a fumarole, which I thought was her cigarette until I realized she was smoking her cigarette, which had to mean it was not touching my butt. Amazing how hot those heat vents are even when everything else around you is freezing. We snapped a summit photo of the two of us, and I returned to my friends to start our trek down. Clouds were moving in and the forecast called for thunderstorms, and I didn’t want to end my weekend like that.

Great visibility

The route had already changed, even just in the 24 hours since I had summitted with Sam and JT. One crevasse was widening and had become a significant step, and a snow plug was collapsing piece by piece. The snow plug was still passable going quickly while it was still cold, but late in the day, we’d probably have wanted to set up protection. The larger crevasse had turned into a legitimate jump, and on our way down there was a ladder ready to set up across it. It’s amazing how well the guides care for the route. DC would be a pretty gnarly route in August if it weren’t for their help.

Top of the Cleaver, clouds clearing!

We were back at camp around noon, leaving us two hours before our porters met us. We made food, napped, chatted, and I basked at how I was chilling on a glacier instead of sitting at a desk in front of Excel. I tied a shirt around my face to block the sun because everything hurt. Lord Byron and Dustin arrived and told us H wasn’t coming because he wasn’t feeling well, but as we were packing up, who comes trudging through camp? H! Pushing through the pain to help us get down. And they had bought us fresh fruit and coconut water! Guys, apples taste SO GOOD on climbs. So good. So do blueberries. I bring shitty food on climbs. That needs to change.

Glissading! Woohoo!

We began the glissade descent to Paradise. Dustin had mapped out every glissade chute, and even named some of the steeper ones. Glissading is both hilarious and efficient. It’s like sledding for adults. My allegedly waterproof pants were soaked through after a few chutes, but that’s not enough to stop anyone! Once past the glissade chutes we fought through the stone stairs of knee destroying doom and Kayla figured out a shortcut to the overnight parking lot so we didn’t have to go by the ranger station. Yes!

I cramponed my spork 😦

I got to the car and realized something was missing. My hat!! Not my hat! Shit I just lost Hat 1.0 like a month and a half ago, how did I already lose this one?!?! Okay Eve calm down deep breath let’s walk a little ways back up the trail and maybe it’ll turn up and YES there it IS IT’S LYING IN THE PARKING LOT I have never been so relieved in my life. I slathered lotion on my sunburned face and we regrouped with the team to figure out where to grab dinner. I suggested treating our porters to dinner and of course everyone agreed. We settled on a small pub about 2.5-3 miles from the national park gate.

Looking back up at Rainier from near Paradise

I was pretty tired. I knew it was going to be a long drive, so I was thrilled to break it up a bit. And lemonade is always so freaking good after a climb. We devoured our burgers and fries and I chugged several pink lemonades (lies! they were yellow! The waitress warned us though). I put more lotion on my face. And ate more. I couldn’t finish my burger, which was weird. I’ll chalk it up to the sunburn. No one was spared. Rick had a raccoon burn going, Kayla’s arms were lobster red, and I look like someone had tried to make a creme brulee out of my face.

Huge, huge thanks to everyone who was involved in this weekend. It was an awesome weekend with perfect conditions and good company, and it’s amazing that everyone summitted successfully. You guys are all bad asses. And honorable mention to my dermatologist, who didn’t fire me as a patient when I showed up at 7:30am on Tuesday with high alpine facial burns.

Selfie with the summit marker

Cutthroat Peak: Why the 10 Essentials are a Thing

Posted on June 22, 2016 by evejakubowski

Tony, Calvin, Andrea, and Quinn

Yeah, I often cut corners with the essentials, you all know that. But here’s a trip that slapped me in the face and called me an idiot in the most pleasant, enjoyable way possible. My Polish heritage shone bright and strong on this one. From the beginning (for me, at least) it was already a struggle. Saturday morning arrived, and I was crabby. I know, I know, that’s how most of my favorite climbs start. But this was more of a frantic, active crabby than a resigned-to-my-fate crabby. My flight back from San Diego had landed late Friday night. I was not packed. I had done no research besides knowing we were taking te West Ridge, which at its best is a 5.7. I did not know where my slings were, where my quick draws were, where my cams were. How many slings were in my closet? Were most of them in the trunk? Do I need to poach from my pickets? How many biners do you still have? WHY AREN’T ANY OF THESE COLOR COORDINATED? I was a disaster. I considered bailing. No don’t be a flake. I left late, despite waking up at 5am. I hit traffic. I considered bailing again. Traffic cleared. Woo! I hit more traffic. Everyone else was at a bakery in Concrete and I was stuck behind a semi in Marysville. I was definitely bailing. I had forgotten my camera. I messaged Calvin asking how much I’d fuck up rope teams if I bailed. The answer? “A lot.” Suck it up, buttercup.

Cutthroat Peak from the highway

Well, despite the entire world yelling at me not to go, I made it to the bakery, had an amazing scramble for breakfast/lunch (….brunch), grabbed a cinnamon roll for the road, hopped in Tony’s car, and we were on our way after a brief stop at the ranger station. Which you should stop at, because the rangers are super chill with tons of knowledge and they have this really cool 3d topo map you can geek out over for hours, if you aren’t shoo-ed out by your friends.

Crux of the approach – building a bridge

We get to the trailhead and who’d have guessed, the peaks were all out in full view! And the weather was only supposed to get better. We were in luck. We started up the approach. I almost asked how the approach would be on the way there, and then I remembered Calvin abhors approaches (“hate” doesn’t cut it) so the approach must be short and awesome. And it was! We were at camp in what felt like an hour. It was more like 90 minutes, but after the past few trips, it passed in the blink of an eye.

Here’s where we’re going to start checking our 10 essentials off the list. We’ll be using REI’s updated 10 essentials since the original list is a bit archaic. Let’s see what Team Cutthroat brought.

Andrea not sharing her Shepherd’s pie

We set up our tents on what flat ground we could find, and started dinner. I had nearly brought a bivvy because it was so clear out and weather was supposed to improve (it was mid June!), but had forgotten mine when I hopped into Tony’s car. Andrea refused to share her shepherd’s pie. JT had sour patch watermelons for dinner. I, shockingly, was not hungry, so I made hot chocolate and sipped that while soaking in the views and the roiling clouds. The ignition on Tony’s stove wouldn’t work, and I was so excited to save the day with my lighter when someone else stole my thunder and offered their lighter. Essential #1: firestarter. Stove doesn’t count.

Snow sticking? Time for bed! (Photo credit: Andrea)

Within an hour, the views we had were gone, it was windy, and it was snowing in various directions. Essential #2: Shelter. Bivvy would have been okay, but damn was I happy to have a four season tent. In mid June. I bailed on the group and went to hang out in my sleeping bag. After maybe an hour I heard JT say “hey is anyone bored enough to go for a hike?” Yes, I was probably bored enough, but I had also just regained circulation in my toes and fingers and was not about to head back into the snow after getting dry and cozy. Can we just talk about hiking instead of actually hiking? Sorry guys, I’m gonna be a princess on this one.

Marmot scouting out the tasty snacks in my tent (photo credit Tony)

I dozed on and off for 12 hours, wondering whether the wind and snow would stop. I eventually got up around 7am and unzipped my tent to reveal blue skies, sunshine, and several inches of fresh (did I mention it was mid-June) snow. And Tony, impatiently running around camp.

We made a quick breakfast. I tried Andrea’s dehydrated scramble and nearly vomited, devoured my cinnamon bun instead, and still spent the next 20 minutes fighting off nausea because it was way too much straight sugar at 7am. We weren’t sure how conditions would be, so over coffee and tea we debated whether we’d need crampons, gloves, would it be half snow half rock, will it be wet from snowmelt. I’ve never led a climb in less than stellar conditions, so I was anxious about potentially having to wear gloves and deal with wet rock. But I need practice, and I figured we’d be back down by early afternoon, so it wouldn’t be that long to be uncomfortable. And we had a solid 8 hours of leeway to fuck up before the sun set. Yeah, I drastically underestimated that.

Views across the highway

Cutthroat over our tents

We started up towards the ridge, warming up with some nice 3rd class scrambling. And a move that was supposedly 5th class, but honestly everything from 3rd class to like 5.6ish feels the same to me. If I tell you what a scramble is rated it’s because I read it somewhere. I’m not good at climbing, just oblivious. We stashed our gear at the base of the first pitch, only bringing bare necessities. Andrea and I were one rope team, and she carried the bag. Water, food…. is that all we brought? That might be all we brought. That and our glowing personalities.

JT heading up the first pitch

Everyone switched to rock shoes. Except me, because ~~I am dumb~~ I had never done an alpine climb in rock shoes before, and it literally did not occur to me to use anything besides my Nepal Evos. So that’s what I had. Calvin lent his rock shoes to Tony and wore mountaineering boots himself, so at least there were two of us. I spent the next 18 hours (that’s not a typo, 18 hours) hearing how much better rock shoes are.

JT and Bish started up the first pitch. Calvin was managing two ropes and bringing Tony and Quinn up behind him and went up a slightly different way. I started up JT’s route so we could climb at the same time. Choss city, baby. I always find the first pitch awkward. It’s like warming up swimming, I never remember how it’s supposed to feel and I’m uncoordinated and slow. I got a mediocre cam in followed by another mediocre cam, and grabbed a large handhold only to hear the entire thing creak as I put my weight on it, so I immediately bailed and went to climb a corner crack instead. Yuck. I don’t care how easy rock shoes might be, those Evos can edge on anything.

My turn to head up (photo credit Tony)

I clipped into Calvin’s anchor and belayed Andrea up, who kind of alternated with Quinn and Tony. Andrea floated up to me (Andrea I’m gonna tell you right now I do proofread but I keep accidentally typing “Andrew” so if you see that anywhere I AM SO SORRY) and we waited for Quinn and Tony to reach us. JT and Bish were already on the next pitch. My nose was already getting sunburned. Essential #3: sun protection. Don’t be Rudolph.

Tony, Andrea, and Quinn, with my rope and Calvin’s two ropes

This continued for the next few pitches until we decided to just go ahead of Calvin’s group, because hauling two people up on two individual ropes is not very efficient and I’m impatient. Andrea and I quickly caught up to JT after an easy pitch to the ridge and a light ridge scramble. We protected the ridge, though I will admit I had one or two half assed anchors (I doubt Andrea was reassured by the shrub tiny tree I tossed a sling around like 15ft from where I set up my belay station). The main reason we caught up to JT and Bish was that they were stumped by the fifth or so pitch. We weren’t sure where to go. We had an idea, but figured it was best to wait for Calvin & co, so we sat around for an hour or so while they made their way over to us. Essential #4: Map and Navigation tools. Did we know where we were, and could we get down safely? Yeah, but I mean, I’m impatient and I wanted to go up. Going up requires navigation too.

Starting up the milk jugs (photo credit Tony)

I usually do so much research before climbs, but I had done zero for this one, and route finding was getting less obvious off the ridge. Calvin had a photo of the exact section. We eventually found our way to the next pitch, which JT stared at for 10 minutes, with every minute letting my mind question my abilities more and more. And then Calvin caught up. Do we climb the juggy part (eventually dubbed “milk jug”) on the left, or the crack on the right? Calvin and JT discussed it while I sat there staring into the distance losing confidence by the second. Finally JT got started up. He and Bish didn’t totally make it look easy, and I was sitting there like okay if their muscles were shaking on these moves, I’m fucked. This was only my second climb of the season, and Dorado Needle barely counts. But we’re here, so fuck it, let’s see what happens. Essential #4.5: ~~A huge pair of balls~~ Confidence and/or Ignorance.

Bish belaying JT up the chimney

JT left his gear so I wouldn’t have to waste time bothering with placement. Besides the stopper that had slid out of its place once he got above it. I placed another stopper, hesitated before the move, heard Calvin saying something behind me, and finally said fuck it and started up. And turned around at the top to see my stopper had popped out just like JT’s. Great. Luckily the moves weren’t nearly as bad as I had thought they’d be. I anchored to a less than stellar horn along the ledge that JT had slung, and Calvin came up next, making some comment about placing a better stopper. Yeah, his fell out two minutes later too. That sneaky crack.

Calvin made it up to me, and I belayed Andrea up. JT was halfway up the chimney, and I could hear him. A series of grunts and scraping, followed by “I hate chimneys.” But he did well, and soon enough Bish was on his way up behind JT. Once Bish was out of sight, I started up with Andrea belaying me and Calvin peeking around the corner. Which was helpful, because eventually I got stumped hanging beneath a chockstone until Calvin gave away the secret – put your foot against the wall behind you. Duh.

Tony enjoying the views

Up and over the chockstone and onto some gravelly scree, where I finally slipped and started sliding. I managed to catch myself before the rope did (I got complacent, don’t get complacent) but unfortunately I kicked a football size rock onto Andrea. Who took it like a champ and sacrificed her wrist to keep me on belay! I felt terrible about it but couldn’t help but think that if I had kept sliding and hadn’t caught myself before the chimney, that belay would have been pretty damn important. We duct taped her wrist for stability, luckily no blood to worry about. Essential #5: First aid.

The next two pitches were straightforward but trickier than I expected. My amateur opinion is that there were one or two more 5.6ish moves between the chimney and the top. And so, so much rope drag. Extend your protection, guys. Hauling rope is brutal with that much rope drag. I had to get creative with pro, since JT had some of my gear and much had been left behind for Calvin’s team. I had Andrea clean the second to last pitch so I’d have some left for the final pitch.

Summit!

We finally got to the step below the summit. Which I was told was a scramble, but looking at it (maybe I took a bad route), I wasn’t positive I could make the move without falling backwards (which would be unpleasant when leading), and I had JT throw me a loop of his rope. It was probably all mental because naturally as soon as I was on his rope the move was a piece of cake. Again, Essential #4.5. I whipped out my phone to take a summit pic, aaaaaand… my phone died.

I cried a little on the inside and belayed Andrea up. She enjoyed a hilarious summit pee (sorry Bish and JT) and we had summit chocolate and took summit photos. I took like 11 selfies on JT’s camera. Eventually it got cold and I realized how late it was. 7pm. Also I was out of snacks. Essential #6: Extra food. Well it shouldn’t take more than 2 hours to rap down right? JT started setting up his rappel as Calvin & co made it up to the summit. I was getting impatient and briefly celebrated them before getting annoyed. Blatantly annoyed. Poor Tony. He’s seen me snap a few times now. No I don’t want to take 20 more photos, it’s time to go down. I suggested stacking rappels on one rope to be faster, and everyone agreed. JT dropped down the first rap, followed by Bish. I was ready to get Andrea all set up when Calvin decided he’d teach Tony, Quinn, and Andrea how to rappel, and I could just go off with JT and Bish, which was music to my cranky impatient ears. We’d go down and figure out the route, which would make it easy for the other four to follow us.

One of my favorite pics of me ever taken. (Photo credit Andrea)

My other favorite picture. Rappelling always makes bad ass pictures. Sunset just helps. (Photo credit Tony)

Tony snapped a sweet picture of me rappelling which made me a little happier. I dropped down to join Bish and JT and we pulled the rope and set up the next rappel. It was a race to see how far we could get before the sun set. It was already tough enough to figure out where to go. I’m convinced we did not take the best rap route, but we were following obvious slings and rap stations for the first few, so it had clearly been done.

Bish and JT only had fleece sweaters over t shirts. I at least had a puffy. None of us had headlamps. Andrea had my water, Bish and JT were out and Bish’s extra water bottle was at our gear stash below. I recall looking at the sun setting over the peaks and seeing it halfway below the horizon and thinking wow, it’s gorgeous, but we might be fucked. Essential #7: Hydration.

First I thought “It’s gorgeous!” Then I thought “shit.” (photo credit Tony)

The first hour after sunset is still light, and we carried on our merry way, getting colder every minute. Eventually it was dark, and we couldn’t see rap stations below us. We got down to a gulley, scrambled a little further, followed a broad ledge around a corner that I was hoping would lead us to where we had left our gear. Nope, still a few hundred feet up. Shit. But wait is that a rap station?? By that tree? I couldn’t tell until I was like five feet away. Yes!! Old slings! YES! JT caught up to me and we took stock of the situation. Was there another ledge below us? Two ledges? Could we even cross the snow if we got down to it? “I’m waiting for headlamps” JT declared. “You wanna lead that?” I laughed, or tried to. “Nah, looks like we’re waiting!” “Well, I’m going to go huddle with Bish to stay warm, wanna join?” It’s 1am, it’s pitch black, we’re fucking freezing, and we have no headlamps. Or water, or snacks, or layers. Yeah, I’ll come snuggle with you guys. And you know what? To everyone who told me how much better rock shoes would be, ask me how warm my feet were. Well, not warm. Ask me how not freezing cold my feet were. Essential #8: Illumination. We wouldn’t have had to wait over an hour if we had brought headlamps, and we’d have been moving a hell of a lot faster.

Group huddle. Damn close to a shiver bivvy (photo credit Andrea)

That’s when I realized just how fucking cold JT and Bish must be. Essential #9: Insulation. We were all shivering, but they had basically no layers, I at least had a light puffy I had worn all day and mountaineering boots. So we huddled. For ages. And ages. It actually helped. Every time we turned around it looked like the other four had made zero progress. We watched their headlamps slowly descend. Finally they were on the broad scree ledge, and made their way to us. We got Tony involved in the group huddle and I felt tolerably warm for the first time in a while. I have no idea who said what, but I remember someone making me laugh (more of a soft giggle because laughing was hard and loud and would make me breath more cold air) as we sat there shivering. I knew we had to head down but damn I was enjoying sitting there. The other benefit of illumination? You can pretend it’s the sun and feel warmer.

Calvin led the first rap down, and the rest of us followed. My harness was killing my hips. It took my breath away when I started each of those last two rappels, it hurt so badly. I debated not backing up the rappel because it’d be faster, but realized that being so tired, this was absolutely the time to keep using that prussik to be safe. There was one more rap to get down to snow below, where we could traverse over to the saddle where we had left our stuff that morning. Oh wait, I mean where we had left our stuff the previous day.

#tbt that one time it was light out. Hardy, Golden Horn, and Tower mountains.

Calvin rapped down first again. “FUCK!!!!” is the first thing we hear drifting up over the wall. Followed by several sentences comprised of 90% F bombs and 10% various incarnations of shit. Some of our group laughed. I looked at JT and said “that sounded like a real fuck, not like Calvin complaining about approaches.”That snow we were looking at? Our concerns had come true. The snow was firm and icy, and no one had brought crampons.

JT went down next. He and Calvin put their heads together. I was third. “Bring the ice tools!” “What tools? You mean the nut tools?” “Tonight, they’re ice tools!” I rapped down with our MVT (Most Valuable Tools) and met up with them. Kicking steps was actually feasible with mountaineering boots. JT holed up in a moat to belay Calvin, who started across the snow slope with a double belay because I totally misunderstood directions. I was told to tie a knot in the rope between JT and Calvin to be like an anchor, which I assumed meant belay. So I tossed a munter on my locker (I had dropped my ATC in the moat RIP ATC) and started belaying Calvin.

Here’s where the nut tools came in. Calvin was cutting handholds in the snow! Ha! It’s all about improvisation. The steps were solid enough for me, but the nut-tool-cracks were good for balance, and I can only imagine how this would have been in rock shoes. Like using your bare feet to walk across a steep icy slope. Even I’m not that masochistic. I think.

Remind me why we do this (photo credit Andrea)

Turns out JT meant knots to use as handholds. Whoops. Oh well. Calvin made it to the rocks on the other side and set up an anchor and I clipped into our little hand line (which ended up being easier than knots and holding it would have been) and repeated his steps, kicking them deeper and more frequent for the plebs in rock shoes behind us. I got to the other side and unclipped and waited with Calvin. Why the hell didn’t I bring a headlamp. I hate relying on other people and here I was waiting for light. Until I got impatient and said fuck it, I’m just going. I headed up to where our stuff was, whooped, and waited there for everyone. I tried to figure out what stuff belonged to everyone, but that’s tough in the dark.

The scramble down was easier than the scramble up. We dropped down quickly, and finally made it to scree that you could just plunge step down. We reached the snow, also icy, and Calvin and I slid down on our hips half-self-arresting at the same time. I was ecstatic, so close to camp and enjoying the slide down ice, until we heard “ROCK!!!!” from above us, and looked up to see a few football sized rocks tumbling towards us. Calvin miraculously ran to the side of the slope. I’m uncoordinated and awkwardly bear-crawled-with-an-axe to the side. Rocks dodged. And yes, between the harness misery and the arrest-slide I did wake up covered in bruises the next morning. As in Tuesday morning. Because the sun was rising, and it was Monday.

Sunrise on Monday (photo credit Tony)

I went to grab water from the stream. Nectar of the Gods. Tony said he was going to make coffee. I said fuck no, you will not make coffee, I have to get to work and you are my ride. JT and Bish packed up and left in like 10 minutes, while I paced around bitching about it until everyone else was packed up. If I turn bitchy just put all the group shit on my pack when I’m like that and I’ll a) be slower and b) probably stop bitching because I’ll be too busy being proud of what I’m carrying.

Andrea took off on the way down. I kept stopping for water and layer adjustments. Calvin and Quinn and Tony were somewhere above us. We got to the forest and did a pretty good job of crossing a questionable stream on an even more questionable log. We lost the trail in snow but found it five minutes later and soon enough we were back at the road waiting for the boys. You might notice I never used the 10th essential, which is a repair kit. The only thing that needed repairing was my pride.

We changed into fresh ish clothes (new pair of underwear = whole new day) and got water from the stream across the road. I apologized again for kicking that rock down on Andrea’s arm and she once again lit up with pride that she had held the belay. We definitely heard an f bomb float out of the woods, and laughed. They must be getting close.

Black Peak in the center

The four of them finally popped out of the woods and we straightened out all of our gear. Back to civilization and straight to work! 18 hours of straight hiking and climbing. A blizzard, a bluebird day, killer trad lead practice for yours truly, a summit, a moonrise, a sunset, a moonset, a time warp because that’s what happens when it’s pitch black and you’re moving, and a sunrise. And you know what? There’s something to be said for watching the sun set from the top of a mountain, moving through the dark, and then seeing it rise as if no time had passed. I was totally into it.

Except you should always bring your 10 essentials.

Oh, did I mention this was Quinn and Tony’s first rock climb?

*My boss was less into it. I showed up to a chorus of “holy shit, why are you a zombie, what happened, is everyone okay” as I blindly attempted to get work done while on-and-off dozing in my chair and hallucinating doing something in Excel only to jerk awake and realize I was in fact clicking blank space on my desktop or running reports in one of our programs. The exception was my coworker Roger, who said “Damn you look beat, must have been an awesome weekend!!!” Now that’s the attitude to have. There’s no such thing as failure.

Eldorado Peak & Dorado Needle

Posted on June 14, 2016 by evejakubowski

Tiny skiiers traversing below Mix Up Peak

It was 3:05am. “Guys. We’re fifteen minutes in and so far I’ve used a slug as a belay and I dropped my oatmeal in the river.” That was Kacie, grumbling already after we had schwacked across the maze of logs that drops you off at the beginning of the Eldorado approach. I didn’t drop my oatmeal or utilize the local slug population, but I was already wondering if lugging these stupid skis would be worth it. I had pictured the trip being “light and fast” and instead here I was with probably 50lbs on my back if you include the rope, skis, and ski boots. The only “light and fast” aspect was that eventually the skis might be on my feet,and I brought a bivvy instead of a tent, which saved me 2lbs. Except then I filled those 2lbs with crackers and a variety of cheeses and chocolates that I never got around to eating. So “light and fast” ended up being “slow and heavy and uncoordinated and slightly off kilter,” but I mean whatever, we’d make it work. Climbed 6/4-6/5, 2016.

Rob’s team above Moraine Lake

Distance: I do not know
Elevation: 6668 to the top of Eldorado (8868ft), then lose 1600ft and regain 1200 more going up Dorado Needle (8440ft)
Weather: 40’s in the night, 80’s and sunny in the day. Brutal.
Commute from Seattle: 2:30
Did I Trip: Shit, I don’t remember! Probably yes.

First light on Johannesburg

Like I said, we got started around 2:30am. That meant a 3 hour nap between arriving at the trailhead and moving, which you’d think I’d be used to by now. I don’t think you get good at it, you just get better at resigning yourself to discomfort and a lack of sleep. I whined and hoped for a 3am wake up, but these guys are relentless. 2:30 it is. John didn’t even sleep. Freakin’ animal.

The first river crossing is exactly what you’d expect to get from walking across slippery wet logs in the dark lit by KC’s spare headlamp because your batteries were assholes and decided to explode sometime in the night. We made it to the trailhead sign on the other side of the river, featuring directions to the trailhead from the highway (especially helpful when you’re already on the hike), a few more bushes, an overrun river sweeping away the hints of trail, and KC’s aptitude for early morning snarkiness. I’m convinced we never go the right way during the first quarter mile. I also never go the right way on the way back either, so maybe it’s just always more bushy than I expect. Regardless, after that quarter mile, the bushwack is over and you’re on a pretty well-traveled trail.

One of the many Logs of Sorrow (photo credit: Tony)

Rob dwarfed by Johannesburg

Well-traveled doesn’t mean pleasant. And pleasant depends what you’re into. It’s still a climber’s trail, featuring Logs of Sorrow (downed trees to crawl under) among other smaller obstacles such as roots, rocks, branches to snag your skis, trees to scoot (or fall) over. Then you reach the boulder field, and you think oh hell yes we’re out of the trees! Except the boulder field goes on forever. It’s honestly not so bad on the way up, it’s on the way down with the screeeeee of skis dragging along stone that really gets you. You think yes, I got off that rock perfectly, and then you pivot and thunk SKRIIIITCH there are the skis, not clear of the rock like you thought. But on the way up, it’s a nice break from forest. Johannesburg rose tall in the background, the sun came up, our speed picked up.

Johannesburg and Glacier Peak, three little climbers in the shade

We hit snow around 4500ft. John and I took the Scenic Route (a la Orizaba) once beyond the boulders and threw in some huge switchbacks up the basin trying to kill time letting the others catch up and finally said fuck it and went over to the notch. Rob was about 10 minutes behind us so we relaxed until he caught up and then dropped down the notch where we once again started the waiting game. Do we rope up with Rob (on foot) and leave Tony (skis) to rope up with Kacie and Steve? Do we leave Rob behind to be on a four person rope? Are we saintly enough to wait for everyone? Just as we were about to make a probably-not-saintly decision, Rob went over to check out the notch, and thank god, the rest of the group was coming. We got Tony on his skis and John led the way while I anchored our rope team and we left the foot team behind to figure out their own team.

Skinning across to Eldorado

We made decent time to the ice cliffs, which weren’t even recognizable compared to last summer. We skinned over them and quickly across the glacier, where Tony started to slow down as my energy practically exploded because I love everything and everyone and everything is great as soon as I’m on a glacier on a sunny day. Tony’s feet were bugging him and he wanted to switch socks, so we dropped him a few hundred feet from high camp. We got to camp, took off the ski boots, lounged around in the sun, and awaited everyone’s arrival. I grabbed John’s shovel ready to fulfill my destiny as the Patron Saint of Alpine Shits and dig out the composting toilet, only to discover… it was already melted out! Woohoo! No blue bags necessary, baby! That’s a luxurious glacier. The Four Seasons of glaciers.

the 5 star accomodations

Starting up to the summit

John fell asleep for the first time in what, 30 hours? I tanned and napped. We chatted with a few other climbing groups. We debated whether the rest of the group would want to summit today or would be tired and would want to wait for Sunday. The other three arrived. Tony said something to Kacie, who responded “You don’t know beef,” to which Tony, looking perplexed, said “what’s beef?” I jumped in with “Do you know what beef is?” and Kacie’s face lit up – “Beef is when you need two gats to go to sleep!” The Biggie quotes continued and we extended our break, Tony looking confused while Kacie and I cracked up and the climbing team next to us tried not to laugh out loud. We eventually settled on an afternoon summit of Eldorado. Awesome.

John and Tony on the ridge

The route from high camp is straightforward, especially so because there were like 40000000 people up there. Okay, not actually, I exaggerated by a factor of 100,000. It was more like 40. But 40 is more than that area should ever see in a 24 hours span, holy shit. Don’t tell any of them about the toilet. We’ve established I’m not a saint.

The route was clear up until the bergschrund which is opening up already. It was easy to pass on the left and the rocks were a simple route to avoid all potential obstacles, which were still mostly buried in snow. I was, of course, carrying my skis. I knew the top pitch would be too steep, and I knew I wasn’t good enough at skiing to dodge crevasses or bergschrunds. But Tony laughed and said “well you’ve brought them up every peak already, it’s kind of a thing now…” which was exactly the right thing to say. Okay fine, I’ll bring em, and just carry them down until it’s mellow enough to ski, as usual. Like I said, training weight.

Summit! (Photo Credit: Tony)

John led once again, which was great. Because breaking trail in slush sucks, and with him carrying a split board and Tony carrying skis ahead of me, almost none of my steps collapsed. We reached the knife ridge and started up it, and let me just say I am so glad we went in the afternoon and didn’t have to deal with the 40 other people on the ridge. It would have been a pain. We took turns heading up to the cornice which was the highest point thanks to snow. I didn’t actually stand on it – regardless of how stable it was, my chances of balancing on a cornice, tied into a rope, with skis on my back, were not convincing enough for me to risk it. So I settled for standing a foot or two below it and tapping it. You do you, folks, that was my choice.

Tony ripping turns off the cornice

We turned around and let Rob’s team go past us. I took the rope, and Tony and John set up their skis and split board (but not until they had urinated off the knife edge). I started to boot down to mellow terrain, and hear whooping and turn around to see John sawing off the stretch of cornice below them and knocking it down the slope. A dream come true. I whipped out the camera. Game time baby!

John after they quickly passed me

They quickly caught up to me and Tony agreed to take the rope so I’d have a chance of skiing (I can’t ski well with too much weight in my pack. I mean, I can’t ski well with a day pack, I basically can’t ski period with more than that). I snapped a few pictures of the two of them and carried on my merry way to below the bergschrund where I switched to ski boots and clicked into my skis. Let the pizza party begin.

Pizza party baby! (Photo Credit: Tony)

Team heading up at sunrise

So I hadn’t skied since Snowfield, which was an awesome, awesome day. I thought I’d be anxious getting back on them, but it was just the same old back seat skiing as usual, with scattered crevasses. Not many, luckily, so I was able to do a slow easy traversing pizza while (I can only imagine) the four or five bad ass skiiers on their way up chuckled and said “oh honey” as I laughed at myself, so happy to be skiing in front of Moraine Lake… if you can call what I was doing “skiing.”

John skinning at sunrise

Back at camp, I lay out the bivvy and cooked dinner. We were blatantly separate from the OSAT and Mountaineers and NOLS groups, who all had nicely pitched tents and organized kitchens and we had body bags that we tossed on the ground wherever we felt like sitting with bottles of whiskey. Tony decided they were ODAT, “One Drink at a Time.” Rob tested out a flat rock below me. “It’s not fit to my contours,” he muttered. I went to sleep giggling.

I was asleep before sunset, which is easy to do when sunset is at 9pm. I woke up for a few minutes to snap photos, and then periodically woke up throughout the night to see if we could see the northern lights, which we could not. Those forecasts are lies.

Me skinning up at sunrise (photo credit: John)

Some well-cut side stepping

At 4am, John and I woke up to hit Dorado Needle. We took our time getting moving, making tea and coffee, joking with the others who for some reason woke up as well. Even Kacie! We roped up on our skis and set off into sunrise towards the campsite I wish we had used on the col between McAllister and Inspiration glaciers.

There were a few short downhills that we skied, roped up. I couldn’t help but laugh. “Two not-so-great skiers, roped up, skiing downhill. What could go wrong?” John said on the first one. Luckily, nothing. I wish someone had been there to video it.

Looking at Dorado Needle from the col, you can see the two climbers breaking trail

At the col, after John wiped out 3 times and I could barely stop with my pizza while roped-up-skiing we decided it was too icy to drop to the glacier below. John put his board on his pack, and I planted my skis right where we stood. We joked about glissading down but continued to walk, which was a great choice because the slope dropped off into a crevasse/schrund ish feature that would have left us with very sore asses at best.

John ascending snow, Eldorado on the right

There was a team of two who had broken trail all the way up to the base of the rock climb, which was awesome for us. It meant quick, easy going. I led the charge this time with John anchoring, except the snow was softening and me with like a 15 lb pack didn’t pack down great steps for John carrying his split board, and as temperatures rose, our pace slowed as more and more steps collapsed. We reached the base of the summit block, and decided instead of following the first team’s route, we’d head up the snowy face.

Me leading the pitch past John’s spicy belay (Photo credit: John)

With a few small crevasses around us, John set up a belay just below the first feature and I led a pitch up to a patch of rocks. Except our twin 50 (aka 25m doubled over) wasn’t long enough to get there, so shit, I set up a deadman in the middle of the slope and belayed John up. John continued past, made it to the rocks, and hesitated. “How much rope do I have?” “Uhh.. 8 feet.” He had like 20 feet, I just suck at judging length (take note, boys). “Okay, how much do I have now?” “….. still 8 feet, but actually 8 feet this time! How does it look up there?” I couldn’t see him. “Not…. great…” was the response. Finding a solid anchor and belay spot was tricky. “What about now? Rope?” “5 feet!” followed by “That’s me! You are all out of rope!” and John set up what I could only imagine was a dicey anchor in a precarious position.

John nearing the ridge

I reached John quickly and laughed at the belay spot. “Climb like you aren’t roped at all, and get a sling around anything as soon as possible” was John’s advice. If we had had another 10 meters of rope, he’d have had a killer spot. I climbed on a nice combination of snow, jagged easy-to-grab rock, and ice, found a great thread, and started an upward traverse to the ridge where there was one random horn sticking up that I happily threw a sling around. Once on the ridge, set up a deadman and brought John up from his less than ideal belay spot.

Fun easy climbing, John leading the first rock pitch

The ridge was a piece of cake compared to the climb up the face. Very clear anchors, easy rock, and the views were absolutely incredible. John led the first pitch of rock up to the well l known finger traverse which was more exposed than it looks in photos. Don’t look down. The idea of au cheval-ing it freaked me out, so I led with the finger traverse on the way over, while John (climbing in snowboard boots!) went for the au-cheval move. He snuck past me and led the final pitch to the summit, and belayed me over to join. We snapped a few photos and turned around after just a few minutes, knowing the rest of the team was waiting for us.

Au cheval!

I’m an idiot, and after our first rappel down I realized my ice axe was still on the ridge. Mother fucker. There was another team going up after us, and I asked if they’d grab it. They said yes, but were so chill about everything I honestly couldn’t tell if they were serious. We waited down below while they simulclimbed, and they remembered my axe! Yay! So I only felt like a dumbass for 30 minutes instead of 8 hours.

Yours truly leading the finger traverse (Photo Credit: John)

John boarded down as I once again booted it. We met at the bottom of the slope for the climb back up to the col, which went by quickly. We strapped on our skins at the col, and started the traverse back. I was hoping to legitimately ski it, but there wasn’t enough downhill on the route I took, and I eventually gave up and put the skis back in walk mode. Bummer, man. We debated whether the rest of our group was still there. Would they wait? It was like 2pm. I laughed. I’d have left, but I’ve seen them concerned about other climbers before, so who knows maybe they waited. And if they did head down, we’d probably catch up to them.

The answer? They left. Tony left us a note saying he went down with the other “bassturds,” claiming it was less offensive spelling, but I prefer to think he just spelled it wrong. We took a quick break, packed up, and started down from camp.

Summit shot! Eldorado and a joke-glasses face in the clouds. I know you see it. (Photo credit: John)

John snowboarding the lower glacier

I pizza-ed the lower glacier as well, but had to take the skis off for an awkward stretch that gave you maybe 2ft between rocks on the right and a crevasse on the left that I had no doubt I’d miss (and even if I hit it, my huge fucking pizza wouldn’t fit). I’m also not great on uneven snow, and the slope was torn up by the mobs that had headed down before us. Either way, we got back to the notch which I’m sure I ascended in similar style to a beached whale.

From the notch, it felt like quick progress back down. The boulder field was a bitch, but that was to be expected. Maneuvering skis down that is a core and back workout. You need to turn around to downclimb things you could just hop off of, my boot was once again shredding my ankle, the heat was brutal, and I was almost out of water. But I get a little better at that boulder field every damn time I go through it. Fuck you, boulder field. Some day you’ll be covered in snow and I’ll just ski down you and laugh and flip you off (and probably immediately wipe out).

Baker, Shuksan, and the Pickets from Eldorado

Back in the forest, I hit my usual “this will never end” wall. But the forest is the last stretch and I was relieved to be in the shade, so I just zoned out and awaited what I call “Sam’s Tree.” Sam’s Tree is definitely not the halfway point, in the forest but I have mentally convinced myself that it is and I do not want to hear otherwise. It’s a downed tree that I tried to jump onto the first time we did Eldorado last summer, but I started falling backwards and Sam literally caught me and pushed me the rest of the way over so I didn’t fall flat on my back off a 3ft tree.

I think the Colonial group and Snowfield from Eldorado

Shortly after Sam’s Tree, I suddenly hear a variation of Tony’s rooster call combined with my “whoop WHOOP” response. That’s gotta be the other half of our group!! Wooo! We hustled down to them and I was laughing and went right up to Kacie, who said she knew I’d recognize the call! It’s official, Tony’s rooster sound and my whoop WHOOP have become a standard call and response.

Rob had hurt his knee, so Kacie was carrying much of his shit. Steve lifted my pack and looked impressed. Flattered but I didn’t want to think about it because lifting it up sucks ass. I finally shouldered it and we started the last haul to the cars.

The camp I wish we had made (from the McAllister Glacier)

We didn’t totally fuck up the last quarter mile. Part of the trail was beneath a river, but we managed to schwack over to the logs. Except the logs were nearly underwater too! Ahh! I was carrying 50 fucking lbs with skis and already have terrible balance before you factor in any of that. I used my poles and looked like a foal learning how to walk except suspended on a log across a raging river. But at least we were surrounded by delicious salmonberries. I saw the Most Perfect Salmonberry a few feet off one of the logs but couldn’t get to it. I told Kacie to have a look when she got to it. That’s why it was so perfect, because no one could reach it.

Another view of the camp I wish we had made (from the Inspiration Glacier)

But of course, as soon as we get across the last log, Kacie comes running up and opens her hand. “Look what I got for you! I kept it protected over the logs!!! Didn’t crush it!” It was truly the Most Perfect Salmonberry. I laughed and devoured it and we went into the bushes to get more handfuls and eventually made our way over to the cars, where Tony and Shawna (who had been leading an OSAT group) had a hammock set up between our bright yellow cars. That’s awesome.

We sorted out our gear, sorta. Someone ended up with John’s rope, I have Kacie’s headlamp, I probably have some of John’s carabiners, Surafel’s picket is in my trunk even though he ended up doing Sahale instead of Eldorado. But hopefully I’ll see them all again for another killer weekend. I left pretty quickly – my bra straps had cut bloody 2.5” long wounds into both of my shoulders, my face was leathery with sunburn, I had had a consistent nosebleed for the entire fucking day, carrying rope coils had chafed my neck until I figured out how to use my buff as a block, my lower back was bruised from my pack, my ankles were bleeding from my boots, and I had to meet my friend that night and try to not smell like shit and sweat and flake dried blood all over the place. My coworkers saw my feet in flip flops the next morning and were horrified, to my amusement, because my feet were actually pretty good ignoring the ankle wounds. Cause hey, it’s the price you pay for those views, right? Worth it every time.

Okay, our camp wasn’t so bad.

Trappers Peak

Posted on June 2, 2016 by evejakubowski

The mother effing Pickets

I’m convinced there should be an apostrophe in there somewhere (on some side of the S, I mean come on) but I can’t find a source even suggesting that it’s possessive, so “Trappers” it is.* Well, after I could not convince anyone to swap our Eldorado plans from Saturday to Monday (do I sound bitter?), I found myself on a snowy foggy gross slope at 5am Saturday followed by a gloriously mellow sunny hike on Monday. You can’t win em all but you can come damn close. Here’s a quick writeup for a quick hike!

Distance: 10 miles round trip
Elevation: 3900ft (highest point 5966ft)
Weather: 40’s and foggy, 50’s and sunny
Commute from Seattle: 2:30 (Road rough but passable – potholes and washboard but any car should be fine)
Did I Trip: I postholed and slid into a tree well but did this bad ass spin to make sure I landed feet first instead of letting my face meet a tree trunk (apparently it didn’t look as cool as it felt because no one was impressed)

Pyramid, Pinnacle, Bunyan’s Stump, Neve on the left, Snowfield on the right (hey we were just there a few weeks ago!)

So much green!

Trappers Peak is a hike that’s been on my list since I moved here, a list that rarely garners my attention now that I’m turning into a snobby climber. But since Angie needed to be back in Ashford by dinnertime, we needed a short easy hike, and that meant Trappers! Five star views with nothing technical. And since we weren’t doing anything Sunday evening when I tossed out this suggestion, we rounded up Kacie and Tony within a half hour and met at the trailhead for a fire, non alcoholic beer, hot pockets, and some hot wings cooked over the fire. You can guess who ate all the hot pockets (it was me) and most of the wings (also me) and a bag of oreos (me) and a whole roll of TimTams (you guessed it… NOPE it was Angie).

We woke up around 5:30am and started moving. I had a nightmare that the cloud level was just above our heads. I think I’ve established that I have boring dreams. Some people dream about flying or being heroes or climbing mountains and I dream about eating a sandwich, or washing the dishes and doing laundry, or going for a jog, or trying to complete excel spreadsheets except I’m drunk and all the formulas are wrong and oh god will my boss know I’m drunk at work?! That’s about as good as it gets. Well, to get to the point, I woke up, and my dream had come true. It was foggy. Dammit.

Bridge over (not very) troubled waters

We started up anyway. Kacie had the motors on and she and Angie took off while Tony and I hung back. The trail is obvious but a bit brushy right now thanks to spring growth. I believe it follows an old logging road for the first few miles. Flat, even, and straightforward. Finally it turns off the road, gets a little steeper, and you’re on a slightly more wild trail. For the record (because I’m fascinated by this shit), according to google maps, the road actually used to go all the way to the lakes. The trail takes a more direct route, but the road’s still on the map. I’ve been searching for an old map of logging & mining roads from the first half of the 20th century – haven’t found one yet, but it must exist somewhere.

Kacie’s hot Tinder date

Kacie’s single. I’d say get at her boys, but you have some stiff competition. The local Trappers Peak grouse has already staked out his claim. There’s a pecker joke in there somewhere. We heard some honking in the bushes, and it ran across the trail. Besides looking like it’d make a tasty dinner, this guy was a stunner. All fluffed up flaunting his stuff, with feathers that change color over his eyes (okay I swear they were red and then LATER THEY WERE ORANGE). We stood there snapping pics, and we all agreed the feathers changed color so I’m not crazy. We finally continued to hike, but this guy wouldn’t let Kacie go. Love at first sight, he tagged along beside her following us for a solid ten or fifteen minutes. Kacie fell behind, enamored with her new grouse friend. I mean she’s a Grice, and that’s basically the plural of grouse, right? So it kind of works.

First view of Trappers Peak

We hit snow around 4500ft and I swapped from trail runners to mountaineering boots (can you say overkill) and waited for Kacie. The trail was still easy to follow in the snow, and we made a great boot path. Soon enough we were at the split from the trail to the lakes and the trail to Trappers, and the fog was getting brighter. My hopes were up but I didn’t want to announce them and jinx it. We started off along the ridge to Trappers, and soon enough, we were suddenly out of the clouds. I ran through the trees to look out over the lakes and squealed, and called everyone else over. Tony was excited, Kacie was okay, and Angie was unimpressed. She’s been all over the world these past few months, so she’s a tougher sell than we are.

Short scramble section

The ridge was gorgeous. In and out of snow, some cornices left but some boot path totally melted out. Some small veggie belays, one or two scramble moves. I took photos in every direction. The Pickets were covered in fresh snow. Snowfield looked incredible. We got to the summit and Angie and KC set up on the rocks but I ran over to the true summit, knowing the Pickets were hanging out over there, wanting a better view of Triumph, desperately seeking the “top of the world” feeling I love so much but that’s tough when you’re on a 5966ft peak.

“Take one for my mom!”

The cool thing about being on a short peak with views is that you feel dwarfed. Triumph looked stunning, and the views of the glacier are awesome, especially if you go over to X peak. We took a solid hour break, maybe more, just soaking in the sun and the views and eating goldfish and chocolate-dipped brownies and laughing at how awake Kacie was even though it wasn’t even noon.

Tony on a beast of a cornice (don’t try this at home) with Mt. Triumph back right

Not a bad place for some snacks

Eventually we knew we had to turn around. The trip down went quickly. We made quick work of the ridge, and were soon back at the trail split. I wiped out due to a posthole and ended up in a tree well (to which Tony announced “DID YOU TRIP?!” but made a bad ass spin and landed on my feet rather than on my face, which had been the potential outcome when I first fell. Tony jogged down a snow slope, postholed, and fell flat on his face. One of the two behind me fell and yelped and I laughed.

Back along the ridge, more careful cornice navigation

Once we hit bare trail, we jogged most of the way down. I periodically stopped to wait for Kacie who is apparently not the biggest fan of running. I fucking love running, and as soon as the skis are off I’m going to be in trail running mode. Summer means speed and not slog!

Seriously, if you’re looking for a quick day with unbelievable views, Trappers Peak is the one. Camping up there would be insane! Night sky pics of the Pickets with stars in the background, I’m drooling.

If you look closely, you can see the three lakes (well, you can tell where they are)

*Well, it turns out the US Board of Geographic Names has an apostrophe eradication policy (WSJ). There are only five exceptions. They also transliterate freely, including shortening Bangkok’s traditional 189-character name to the 7 letter name we have now. I guess I’ll sacrifice the occasional possessive apostrophe if it means we can keep full names. Thank you for the info, Craig Romano!

Snowfield Peak in a Day

Posted on May 21, 2016 by evejakubowski

Traverse to Colonial Basin, Colonial on the left, Neve on the right

Colonial from low on the ridge

Snowfield in a Day, AKA RIP my Knee, Hat and Other Less Important But Equally Beloved Objects. Why one day? Because I’m impatient, and why not. What else did I lose? Read on to find out.

So the real reason is I had to be back in town Sunday to see a friend who was visiting. And Sunday’s weather was questionable. I have no idea why Sam suggested we do this in a day, but believe me, I was thrilled. If they had decided two days, I’d have been out, but one day? Hmm. JT as usual was “down for whatever,” and I was hesitant. Eventually Sam said “You and JT are two of the most fit people I know, if there’s a group that can do it, it’s us.” Well shit. You just brought my pride and fitness into the equation, and according to the Jakubowski clan commandments, that means I have to say yes. Anyone who knows me knows how much pride I take in being fit, even when I’m relatively out of shape (now). Almost to the point of fault. So I replied. “Fuck it, I’m in.”

Distance: 15 miles
Elevation gain: 7200ft, not including the ups and downs
Weather: 50’s and sunny
Commute from Seattle: 2:30
Did I Trip: I wiped out quite grandly as a matter of fact. On skis. Did not trip in boots. I’m good at walking.

Finally, consistent snow

At the last minute we added Jim onto the group, a guy training for Denali who none of us had actually met but he seemed to know what he was getting into. Like many of our other trips, we all arrived individually at the trailhead. We thought we’d start at 10pm, then 11pm, then midnight, then Jim arrived at 12:15 and we decided he deserved a nap. Okay, 2am start. Sweet. 5/7/2016.

The trail to Pyramid Lake went smoothly. It had been cleared since the last time I was there, so no blow downs to negotiate while carrying skis, and no snow to impede our progress. The three guys took off at a decent pace. I wasn’t positive I could make this trip, and I was dreading the steep sections, so I went for the slow and steady approach. I also was about as overdressed as you could be, and shed my first three layers one at a time within the first hour. Why did I wear two pairs of pants?! Why did I need the expedition weight long underwear?! Because I am dumb and I enjoy suffering.

But not quite enough for skinning

We took a break at the lake, where I lost item #1: my Julbo Explorers. I had them around my neck so I wouldn’t have to dig for them at sunrise, but removed them to fix something, placed them on the ground, and never picked them up. Being a fashionista (ha! jokes) I actually had a second pair of sunglasses with me, my sweet new Sunskis that I was planning to test out! They’re the opposite of my Julbos. The Julbo Explorer is not polarized, not cheap, indestructible, and not very fashionable. My new Sunskis are polarized, and cheap, probably pretty destructible (TBD), and quite fashionable. We’ll come back to that when the sun rises.

Plus we had this shit to deal with

We found the boot path skirting the right side of the lake, and off we went. The boot path heads southeast up to the base of the broad ridge, and follows that ridge to the glacier. It was not marked, but easy enough to follow for the majority of the time, save a few 90 second pauses where every direction looks like a potential path but no direction quite looks like the path you should take and you stand there in the dark deliberating. We went up and up, with some solid 3rd class scramble sections in the forest. Funny how that can happen, I forget there can be scrambles in the trees. As the sun rose, we reached 4,000ft (just below the shoulder of the ridge) and we hit consistent snow. Boot path covered, we were on our own. Not even tracks to follow. It had been a while since anyone was up there, and that’s how we like it.

The traverse to Colonial Basin

We traversed along the ridge side of most of the ridge, not wanting to waste elevation gain and loss over the ups and downs. That isn’t to say we had an easy time of it. There were some veggie belays (useful), some postholing (I dodged them), some moat struggles (I did not dodge these), some falling over backwards off rocks downhill because veggie belays are finnicky (Sam), some bitch-slapping by trees and branches and slide alder (to my face), some “who can choose the best route” “your route looks mediocre I’ll go this way instead” “haha, suckers!” “oh wait all of our routes are shit” debates. But eventually we made it to the traverse beneath Pyramid Peak to Colonial Basin. And that meant we were done with vegetation, at least for a while. Goodbye greenery, onwards to the kingdom of snow and ice!

Sam admiring the basin, glacier nicely covered by snow

JT and Jim took a long break and put their skis together while Sam and I started to boot across the traverse. The snow was shitty, the runout was bad, I saw no point in switching boots and stressing myself out trying to skin this when Sam was gonna walk. JT and Jim figured they’d catch up to us when they started skinning. Psych! The snow was that lousy collapsey backslidey type snow. We saw them start, and then split up. One sat down below the skin tracks after a small slip. For what seemed like forever. We kept walking. Eventually we realized they were taking their skis off. Ha! If they couldn’t do it, I wouldn’t have stood a chance, so I sat there basking in my correct choice. Sam and I popped out by the base of the glacial lake (frozen over, which is okay because I hear it is brown and not glacial blue), dropped our packs, and hit the snacks while we waited for the dejected skiers to catch up.

The only giveaway that it was a glacier. You can see it beneath this year’s snowpack.

We gazed up at the peaks around us, beyond pumped to be there. Like kids on Christmas, except the feeling is even better than Christmas morning. I get Christmas blues, I get stressed and sad that morning. There’s none of that up in the mountains. Just the joy of knowing you’re somewhere most people will never even know exists, staring at the beauty around you, without any sort of tracks to follow or any signs of other people. An entire swath of mountains just for you. Ditching the crowds and being surrounded by nothing is an incredible feeling.

Sam ascending Colonial Glacier with Paul Bunyan’s Stump, Pinnacle Peak, and Pyramid Peak in the background

JT and Jim finally caught up and had quick snacks themselves. They put on their skis for real, and started skinning up the Colonial glacier to the notch between Colonial and Neve glaciers, just to climber’s right of Neve peak. Sam and I continued with boots, knowing he was faster without skins. And I just wasn’t sure if I could ski whatever was on the other side of the notch, so why switch to skis and ski boots if I need to switch back to mountaineering boots at the top? Not worth it.

JT and Jim left us in the dust. We took turns breaking trail. I’m useful, sometimes. I played this trip way too conservatively. But Sam and JT seriously might be two of the most fit people I know, and I didn’t want to run out of steam halfway up Snowfield trying to be cool and break trail and push the pace. We made it to the notch, and I was afraid everyone would have an “oh shit, look how far away it is” moment like at Black Peak. Nope! JT came running back to see how close we were, all excited about it, Sam’s face lit up as soon as he saw it, and I could have run in circles with joy. We stomped through some ice to get running water, filled our bottles with fresh mountain runoff, I had a 5-star pee looking out at Snowfield, and soon enough, we were on our way down the Neve glacier.

Looking back on our rest spot from the meltwater

Jim and JT ready to ski down to the Neve glacier

JT and Jim skiied down, Sam and I booted and then skinned over to meet them. We roped up (my first time roping up on skis). The glacier looked mellow and the route generally avoids crevasses, but better safe than sorry. Some steeper sections of the glacier were already exposed, and we could see a few cracks and some dips in snow that could be weakening snow bridges. I am usually not too concerned about which side of my body the rope is on (uphill or downhill) since I’ve heard arguments for both sides, but JT pointed out that on skis it might be way more awkward being swept off your feet by someone falling than with boots. Okay, can’t argue that. I awkwardly stepped over the rope in skis. Best thing about Snowfield? No switchbacks! Which is good, because stepping over a rope in skis is awkward.

Sam nearly at the base of the summit pyramid

Sam led the group since we knew he’d be slowest on his fantastic (not) skins that never gripped and always fell off, and that way he’d set the pace. I was happy to go second, JT came in third, and Jim anchored. Skinning went by quickly, drifting across the top of the world.

Jim perfecting JT’s steps

We reached the base of the summit pyramid, already marveling at how short the peaks around us suddenly looked. The route technically takes the west ridge, but we’re an impatient group. And it was snowy. So we chose the North Face Direct. Which isn’t a real name for a real route, it just means we said fuck it and ditched the skis and started climbing the 55ish degree snow on the northwest face instead of scrambling the ridge. JT led the way, Jim perfected his steps, and I walked up their staircase with Sam close behind. Close to the top Jim and I thanked JT for breaking trail, and JT said “No problem! Actually if you don’t mind, I’d kind of like to finish it myself…” Like he had to ask for permission. If you’re in the zone, go for it. You aren’t going to hear it from me. At this point I knew I’d be fine energywise, but hey, if he’s feeling it, sweet. Get it dude. I felt a little guilty for never breaking trail, but let’s be real I’m the slowest here, if I’m breaking trail we probably aren’t moving too efficiently.

JT and Jim on the good trail!

JT brought us up to the final scramble, which was…. not great. We ditched the ice axes, made a few 3rd-possibly-4th-class moves, and JT and I stopped and looked at each other. It wasn’t looking great. Jim went to check out a snowy route sans axe. We debated. JT said he wouldn’t be bummed if we turned around here. I announced my obvious summit fever. JT pointed out we had a rope, one of us could belay the other up, set up anchors with a few slings, and then belay the rest up. I contemplated the idea and peeked around the other side of the ridge, where HOLY SHIT THERE’S A TRAIL! I turned to JT. It was Christmas morning again!!!

I (for once) have no idea what these are. Eldorado is in there somewhere, with Klawatti and Primus and Austera. Maybe Teebone Right on the right? Or maybe that’s too far right and out of frame. Any ideas?

Paul Bunyan’s Stump, Pinnacle, and Pyramid looking like tiny spikes, Neve and Colonial on the right

We took off. Jim found us soon enough as he had bailed on his steep snow sans axe route. The scramble was mostly 2nd class with a few 3rd class moves. I hopped up onto the summit, not ready to believe it was the true summit until I was standing on it. Too similar to Cashmere, or Black Peak, what if I get up there and there’s another hundred vertical feet, or we’re 50 feet to the left?! But it was, and it was a nice broad rocky summit, and I looked around and almost cried because this was the most awesome thing I had done in a long time and it was so damn pretty and no one else was there.

Baker and Shuksan, Pickets on the right

I snapped pictures of the others gaining the summit. I snapped a hundred photos of the surrounding peaks. Looking south it felt like winter, with snow covering the northern faces of all of the peaks and ridges. Looking north felt like spring, with more trees and a quickly receding snow level. It looked like snow had already melted compared to Black Peak the previous weekend. We all high fived, and had our snacks, and I donned both puffy jackets I had brought. We wrapped up the summit with a summit selfie, and soon enough were on our way back down.

Sam steps up to the summit

I had been worried about one of the tougher scramble moves, but they were all totally fine. We painstakingly downclimbed the steps we had made after debating a few new routes, and it wasn’t as terrible as I thought. It went by quickly, and once we were past the rocks, it was a killer glissade that took us perfectly back to the skis.

Jim, master of summit selfies

Since we hadn’t seen much to worry about on the way up, we figured we were safe to follow our tracks and ski down. I (surprise!) was last. But you know what? I made it all the way back to where we had roped up without wiping out. I was going 2mph maybe, with a pizza, but I made some huge awkward newbie turns and loved every single second of it. It was like Black Peak again, where the skiing felt like flying and not like crashing. I was getting better at controlling speed and turning. Not good, but progress.

Sam coming back up the notch, arm of Snowfield in the back (true summit out of frame on the left)

We met back up below the Colonial-Neve col. I skinned up this time, following Jim and JT’s tracks with some quality kick turns (can you tell I’m proud?). I handed my camera over to JT before skiing down the Colonial glacier so he could document that my skis do in fact occasionally attach to my feet, and I started my pizza slice descent.

I mean I basically dreamed of skiing with this background from the moment I started looking at skis

This slope was a stretch. I didn’t think it would be, it looked easy enough, but I had to basically traverse with my huge pizza to keep my speed in check. I had one small wipeout, had to happen eventually right? I was still on one piece so I jumped up and got right back to it. Finally I was at the point where I thought I could just bomb down the rest of the slope.

Pizza makes dreams come true

Nope. I hit a large bump of snow that sent me flying. I managed to land, but couldn’t get back in control and wiped out instead. Skis flying, bindings off, tumbling with my glacier gear clanking all around me (guys, at least put your ice screws away before you ski). I sat up and took inventory. Arms? Check. Leg? Check. Other leg? Yup. Does everything bend? Yes. Do I have all my shit on my pack? Yes. Stabbed by an ice screw? No. Okay, stand up, retrieve skis. Joints? Elbows and knees? 3 of 4 were feeling good. 1 of the 4 was a little crabby with me. I popped the skis back on and did the slowest descent ever, stopping at every turn waiting for adrenaline to die down. And everything had been going so well! Come on man!

PIZZA

At the base of the Colonial Glacier, Sam and I decided to boot across to the ridge again. Jim and JT started out on skis as Sam and I trekked behind them. Eventually they yet again gave up, and joined our old bootpath. The knee was achy but not an impediment at all, so I figured I’d deal with it once we were down.

Back at the ridge I finally caved and downed a caffeinated gu. Everyone else had already destroyed a few 5 hour energies, gu, caffeinated shot blocks, and I had held out for so long. But I hate the descent. And within 15 minutes, that gu had me jogging to keep up with JT and Jim who were half running, half walking the descent. I felt awesome. It was gonna be a quick hike back to the car.

Last light hits the basin

Here’s the sad part. We lost track of our old footprints. My phone was dead, so we had no gps of where we were relative to the route. We had maps and compass, so we weren’t in bad shape. But we dropped too much elevation far too soon rather than meeting the bootpath on the broad ridge, and ended up in a classic North Cascades bushwack. You can’t win out here. You might have a killer summit day, but you won’t be that lucky. We turned it into a game of Marco Polo. Can’t see Jim up ahead? Someone shouted “Marco!” and we’d wait. “Polo!” Okay, he’s that way! Scurry that way, catch a glimpse of him, shit I lost Sam, is JT still behind me? “Marco!” “Polo!” “Polo!” Okay, Jim’s to the right and Sam’s directly below. “Polo?” And JT is above me wondering if he was included in my plea for vocal directions.

Comfortable break spot in the morning

We endured a few hours of Bushwacking Marco Polo before I started to get crabby about it. We schwacked, and battled slide alder and pine trees and at one point I put on my winter gloves so I could use the only vegetation around me, Devil’s Club, as a veggie belay crossing a gully. Brutal. I dropped my gloves, picked them up, and realized my hat was gone. No!!!! Not my hat! I almost cried again, this time in sadness rather than summit joy. That hat was my favorite thing that I owned. It isn’t even that great for climbing but it’s great for sleeping and I like the colors and I like the pompom and it makes my forehead look less like a five head and more like a three head. I looked up at everyone like a lost kid. “I dropped my hat!”

Jogging back down the ridge

Well, you’re on the side of a mountain, and it’s getting dark, and you know you have zero chance of finding it. So you get over it, and you carry on. But in that moment, where I was already exhausted and frustrated with the bushwack and the fact we hadn’t found the bootpath and still had so far to go (you can see the damn highway, yet you’re still 3000ft above it) that hat was a person that I was leaving stranded on a mountain, alone, without purpose, without friends, exposed to the brutality of the North Cascades. I felt terrible. Yeah, my pride is up there somewhere with my abandoned hat.

Remember that one time the sun rose and now you’re bushwacking in the dark with no hat

As I was pulling the pieces of my recently shattered mental state together, we came across a downed tree. Sam was with me. JT was hidden behind us, Jim was ahead of us scouting out the way. I stared blankly at the tree. “This tree is my Mt. Everest,” I said lamely. There was no easy way around it. Have you ever bushwacked with skis sticking off your pack? It sucks. “Here!” Sam almost sounded excited about the fact he had found a way to step over the tree that didn’t involve skis getting caught on anything. Okay Eve, you had your low point, time to move the fuck on.

Paul Bunyan’s Stump and Pinnacle from Colonial Glacier

We turned on headlamps shortly after my Everest. Still no boothpath. We knew if we kept heading north/northwest we’d eventually run into either the lake or the bootpath, and that was the game plan in the dark. Finally we ran into a flag that Sam had mocked on the way up. “Who’s laughing now?!” the flag said. Shut up, flag, you win, thank you for being so glorious. Sam plucked it from the ground and triumphantly carried it. Soon we were at the lake. You know what wasn’t at the lake? My Julbos. So those were gone too. Lost on the mountain with my meniscus, my MCL, my hat, and the majority of my pride as I stood there in the dark.

Hozomeen (far background) is a sneaky peak

The trail back to the cars never ended. JT’s knees were bugging him. My body hurt, but nothing seemed worse than anything else, and I had forgotten about my bum knee. Crossing the creek was like an oasis in a desert. It was so dry on that trail, Sam washed his face and I drank a bunch of water (I had been running low) and used what little willpower remained to not lie down and nap in the shallow stream. I mean, it would have felt amazing.

Mind over matter, guys. You kind of space out and just keep moving. That’s the point I was at for the last 30 or so minutes. It wasn’t the worst I’ve been, but it was damn close. As soon as you start to think again, you notice the aches and pains. The skin was sloughing off the bottoms of my feet, my bony ankle was swollen in my boots which had started around noon, it wasn’t gonna be pretty. JT stopped and offered to let me go ahead of him, and I stood there staring into the distance leaning on my poles telepathically saying NO! and I think he got the message. Yeah sure that was 30% because I didn’t want to leave him, but it was also 20% because I was tired, 20% because I get spooked easily in the dark alone, 15% because I knew if I was hiking alone in the dark I’d convince myself I was going in circles in Twilight Zone fashion, and 15% because as soon as I thought of the Twilight Zone circles I creeped myself out. Woods are scary.

Sam coming up to the Notch with Snowfield in the back

We could hear cars, and see the lights from the dam, and yet we never seemed to reach the end of the trail. It’s two freaking miles from the lake. TWO MILES. And the end just never seemed to get closer. We finally saw the sign near the beginning of the trail, and five minutes later, were at the cars. Sam delivered me gatorade. I downed half of the bottle immediately. I grabbed my bivvy and sleeping bag and dumped my gear in the car. I was in the bivvy within minutes. I got a Mountain House meal to cook on Sam’s stove and instead fell asleep curled up to it and the gatorade in my sleeping bag. I woke up periodically to the wind blowing, and deliriously got scared various things would blow away. I woke up at 5am in a bag full of flip flops, socks, mountaineering boots (the wind wasn’t that strong), my mountain house meal, gatorade, my car keys, my cell phone, a plethora of snacks, and some rocks. I imagine I had plans for all of those before I was unconscious.

So tiny

Looking up at Snowfield, you can see our tracks center

Around 5am I wiggled out of my sleeping bag and stood up. Shit. My left knee was so fucked. I couldn’t bend it, it was swollen, and I could barely walk. It was 5am on a Sunday. I started driving, and could barely use the clutch. So I’d hang out in 5th gear, hoping no one slowed down when the speed limit dropped to 30, rolling through most stop signs, and generally being a terrible driver. I frantically texted coworkers. How does our insurance work? Who’s your primary? Do we need a referral to an orthopedic surgeon or can I just go? Who’s your orthopedic surgeon?! I have awesome coworkers who all responded, despite it being 7:30am on a Sunday.

Day packs are amazing

I got home and mourned the loss of one of my most important joints. There goes my summer. I hobbled to dinner with my friend, incapable of stepping off curbs or going down stairs. I mean, it was mostly fine after the skiing wipeout. I must have just pissed it off with that brutal bushwack right? We did lose like 5500ft of elevation in just over 2 miles. That’s already a knee banger when you aren’t bushwacking off route. But of course as soon as you mention skiing, everyone thinks you tore your ACL. The pain wasn’t right for ACL, so I figured I had torn my MCL or meniscus, but I was freaked out. Last time I went to a doctor I thought I had a cold and I had pneumonia and a partially collapsed lung, so I decided to avoid fucking it up further and actually went to see a doctor. the logical side of me flipped between either extreme. “It’s nothing, you’re just being paranoid, you’ve never been injured or had your lifestyle at stake so you’re freaking out” vs “IT’S BEEN A WHOLE DAMN WEEK AND YOU CAN’T STRAIGHTEN YOUR LEG YOUR LIFE IS DEFINITELY OVER LET’S STRESS EAT EVERYTHING IN THE OFFICE” (probably to my coworkers’ dismay).

I was going to explain it in words but this top notch MS Paint job is easier

We’ll skip the dramatic week of waiting for MRI results. The doc thought torn meniscus and MCL sprain. Best case was a few weeks of PT, worst case was surgery. And the answer was… just sprains! A bunch of obvious fluid and swelling, but everything was intact. Sprains are kind of bullshit, it’s like saying “well there’s swelling and this thing is unhappy but nothing technically needs repairing so.. good luck!” But it’s been getting progressively better almost every day, so I think I’ll be back soon. But for a few days there, I thought I was out for the season.

Watching the peaks around us get smaller and smaller

This trip was a perfect reminder that you can always be better. You can always be faster and stronger and there will always be people out there who can kick your ass without trying. Which is a feeling I love to have. I like being the newbie, the little kid, the weak link. Because it means I’m with ridiculously awesome people.

It was also a reminder that we’re not immortal. I didn’t realize just how many people I know who have had surgeries or long recoveries from mountain related injuries, be it a rock climbing accident, skiing, or just tripping on a strenuous hike or trail run. Nearly ever person I look up to in the Washington hiking and climbing community seems to have dealt with injuries and recoveries, Appreciate what you have, every day. We’re so lucky to be able to do things like this. And if you don’t have it, you aren’t alone.* This was just the beginning of the end for me. I have another 20 years to destroy my knees, and by then we’ll be damn good at knee surgery.

*And I’ll come hang out with you at Picture Lake. ADA accessible, killer view of Shuksan, hell yeah!

ADA accessible via helicopter

Enchantments Ski Traverse

Posted on May 6, 2016 by evejakubowski

Tony at the saddle next to Dragontail

Starting up on Friday night!

Yeah, I know, I don’t know how to ski. But I figured skinning couldn’t be that hard, right? This trip was back on April 9th-10th, when I had been on my skis like maybe three times, but you gotta learn somehow. Anyway, I think I’m the only hiker in Washington who doesn’t particularly care about the Enchantments. They’re pretty, I just like other areas more. I’m a hiker hipster, maybe. Guess how many applications the Enchantments had this year? 19,000 (source). As in, nineteen thousand. Can you imagine if they didn’t have a permit system? 19,000 backpackers, probably all between July and September given the snowpack this year. That’s 6,000 people per month, 1500 people per week, 200 people per day. Two hundred. Four hundred per day if everyone stays for two days. How do you preserve wilderness with that many feet padding through? That many campers, that many tents and hammocks, that many swimmers, that many creatures with bodily functions and eyes that can only spot so much trash. It’s actually amazing that it’s still in such good shape. And at $6/application, that’s $114,000 that I can’t find an official source on where it goes, but that’s a lot of money for (hopefully) the forest service/rangers.

So Tony and I decided to go in April. Ski traverse, before the trash hit, before people pee everywhere while the goats stand and watch and wait (if you’re lucky), before you find Gu tabs along the trail and bits of toilet paper topping small mounds of poo muddled with a stick but not buried because hikers couldn’t be bothered to go to the pit toilets. You get like a C- for effort. You thought about it, clearly. but that’s where you gave up? You can do better. Not to mention they built pit toilets for you anti-baggers. Blue bags should just be mandatory everywhere.

Distance: 21 miles (the road was closed, it’s only 18 if you don’t have to walk the road)
Elevation: I have no idea. 6000ft gain?
Weather: 50’s and sunny
Commute from Seattle: 2:30
Did I Trip: Yes. And I slid, and faceplanted, and smacked a tree, you name it I probably did it
Author’s Note: Almost all of the pictures between here and Dragontail are Tony’s. My camera suffered a bout of amnesia and corrupted a bunch while I sat on top of Dragontail as if to say “you dare try to capture nature’s beauty, you elitist asshole?” Yes. Yes I do.

We set off up the Snow Lakes trail Friday night 4/8 (this is a month overdue because I had to fight for photos) and hiked until we hit snow, which put us setting up camp just past the Snow Creek Wall around 1am. Good, cause I was tired, and it was windy and I’m starting to realize I might be scared of wind. I pitched my tent, guyed it out on trees (weird), left my pack and food outside my tent (apparently a no no while backpacking because of wildlife? put me back on a glacier) and fell asleep immediately only to panic over every cracking twig and branch swaying in the wind. Because wildlife.

Trying our hardest to keep skis on (Credit: Tony)

We got up around 6am, clicked into our skis, and started skinning up. There were bare patches where we’d have to take the skis off for a few minutes, and some steep sections where I realized I did not know how to do kick turns, and some icy sections where I wished I had trimmed my skins. We dodged trees, stepped over rocks and across streams, and finally came across a small, dark, gross looking lake. Nada Lake? Is that why they named it that? Because “nada” means “nothing?” Ha! Someone’s witty.

The real Nada Lake (Credit: Tony)

Five minutes later we came to the real Nada Lake, which is far more than nothing. In fact, it is quite large. We couldn’t skin across it (we tried, and immediately got sketched out by sinking into slush, water, and the creaking noises beneath us). The slope between Nada and Snow Lake was steep and annoying and directly in the sun, so it went from being 30 degrees outside to 90 degrees. At least, that’s how it felt. Breaking trail on skis is a thing, and we took turns with it. My kick turns were still weak and/or nonexistent. We had no cell service. I tried and failed to get Bruins updates (if they lost, they would not make the playoffs, if they won, they had a chance).

Looking at McClellan across Snow Lake (Credit: Tony)

Snow Lake, as it turns out, is also huge. Who knew? We took a long break (I think Tony legit boiled water) before continuing on. It was already 11am – that was slow moving. I’m an antsy impatient person, so after around an hour I started nagging Tony to get ready. And we were off!

By far the most solid snow bridge (Credit: Tony)

We skirted Snow Lake, conquered some complicated snow bridge creek crossings, and started climbing up to Lake Viviane. This part. Was brutal. Bushwacking, pushing past trees, we were following the summer trail and someone else’s tracks and both of those were terrible choices. There is DEFINITELY a good winter ski route up there, it’s just not what we took. There was one tree that was just… ugh. One of those stiff branchy ones that we had to push past on a steep slope and there was no good way to do it. I mentioned it to Tony once we had set up camp, no details, just “fuck that tree in particular” and he knew exactly the tree I was speaking about. I was covered in scratches. Whatever, I ain’t got time to waste ya damn trees.

We had some near-scramble sections, some steep snow where if I tripped over a kick turn (I was getting better) I would probably fall 20ft and tumble off a small rocky outcropping. We finally broke out of the trees and started switchbacking up the final 400 vertical feet. Tony hit a wall, and I started bombing ahead, announcing every good kick turn that I made. I took pictures of Tony. Tony leaning on his whippets. Tony staring into the distance. Tony looking miserable, framed by a tree. A selfie of me, smiling, because I’m a dick.

Prussik and Temple over Lake Viviane on the left (Credit: Tony)

I burst out onto a rocky shoulder overlooking Lake Viviane. Good news – we made it! Bad news – I looked back at Tony in the distance. We’d have to scramble down to the lake. And, in my ideal world, keep skinning a little deeper into the Core zone, because I didn’t want to have to travel as far the next day. I wasn’t sure what Tony had left.

I took a break on the rocks and waited for Tony. He arrived, clearly did not want to go on, but I whined and plead and force fed him a Gu. Don’t get me wrong, I was wiped too, I was just determined to not camp at Viviane. We had to at least get another half mile in or so.

I demanded a photo from Tony (awesome decision in hindsight) Skinning across Lake Viviane!

Plus, the skinning was easy! We dropped down to the lake and the snow was all consolidated and firm, not the sloppy backsliding slush we had dealt with all day where you put one foot forward, ask yourself if that foot will hold or if the ski will slide backwards, out from underneath you. So you place both poles firmly in the snow, slowly lean forward, balancing on that one foot, yes, yes I’m going to make it THE STEP WORKED only to have the snow collapse under you as you fall on your face and wonder why anyone thinks this shit is fun.

Tony perked up within maybe 20 minutes, and we carried on! I made him take a few pictures of me, which I appreciate 10000x more now that my camera files were corrupted. The last of the sunlight on Prussik and Tower was stunning, probably the most beautiful part of the trip. We did not quite follow the summer trail since skinning across lakes was easier, we followed the most mellow terrain. Somewhere around Inspiration Lake (which Tony had mapped, thinking it was Isolation Lake, which was our original campsite goal beneath Dragontail) we agreed to set up camp. I postholed hip deep around my freaking campsite, making sure everyone (Tony) knew how deep every posthole was with a string of foul language, shoveled the worst tent platform in the history of the Enchantments, and we made dinner. And Tony whipped out the wine, which I swear I felt after one drink. I barely drink. One glass of wine is a night. Eventually I decided I had to go to sleep and yes I got up like 90 minutes later to pee.

Prussik looking good Sunday morning (Credit: Tony)

I had some sweet pictures of my tent with Prussik and Tower in the background, never to be recovered 😦 “It’s all about the memories” everyone says, but some of us don’t remember shit without documentation, and I like to relive it through pictures and writing. I was upset for days. I spent all night running recovery programs. Set it up, go to bed, get up at midnight to check, get up at 2am to check, get up at 3am to check and ugh it didn’t work okay let’s find another one and get that running and then we’ll nap from 5-6am and then go to work. With laptop open in tow, still running its programs. Brutal event, but in googling tips and tricks, all the photo recovery requests are sob stories. It’s my wedding, it’s the first year of my son’s life, it’s my late grandmother, and I’m sitting here like well… it was scenery and some cool pics of my tent and one of Tony’s ass?

Easy skinning across mellow hills in the Upper Enchantments/Core area (Credit: Tony)

We woke up late again the next morning, maybe around 6ish. Sunrise and sunset were just okay, since we didn’t have much in terms of views being in a basin. We packed up and skinned over to Aasgard. I tried to convince Tony to do Little Annapurna but he wasn’t having it. Then we got to Dragontail, and I saw the wheels turning in his head. “It’s right there, I mean we could do it…” I didn’t want to push it, but you all know me. I wanted to bag it. I lugged my bag, my bag for peaks, all through the damn Enchantments, I needed to fill it with something.

Tony coming up the back of Dragontail, Teanaways looking short

I suggested maybe dropping our bags and just booting up real quick. To my surprise and elation, Tony agreed. So we dropped our stuff, I threw a water bottle on a sling over my shoulder, and started up. It was a simple walk up. We headed to the obvious saddle, and wrapped around the backside instead of following the ridge. There were a few boulder wells near the top, but nothing terrible. And honestly, the views were even better than I expected. Stuart and Colchuck look fantastic. It’s very cool looking down on how short the Teanaways look, especially after spending so much time there last March and April as I was still getting comfortable with snow. The west half of the Cascades was blanketed in clouds, making me almost wish I had chased elevation over there. But no, the Enchantments had been pretty cool so far.

Rainier, Stuart, and Colchuck

Tony just below the summit rock, Witches’ Tower on the left (I think)

Going down Aasgard was… yuck. Something called “boilerplate” for skiing. I had no chance, so I strapped the skis to my back and started to walk. I kept crampons on since it was icy at the top. Tony slowly passed me on skis, proceeded to get himself stuck near some rocks on the other side of the pass, backtracked, continued to ski, all while I plodded downhill watching Colchuck Lake get closer and closer. Finally we hit good snow and he whizzed past me whooping as I broke trail. I met him down below at the lake, and we skinned across to continue our descent.

Heading down from Dragontail, Upper Basin & McClellan in the background

Tony negotiating the boilerplate conditions

Most of you who have hiked with me haven’t seen me hit a wall. It doesn’t happen often, I can think of a few times, like walking the road after coming down the other side of Shuksan. Well, Tony had the luxury of witnessing a rare mental battle. We tried to ski down, until I remembered I don’t know how to ski and can’t dodge trees. So I swapped the skis for my mountaineering boots, and gave myself to the postholes. At one point I slid a short ways down a steep slope stopped only by my face meeting a tree, knowing it’d happen but with no way to avoid it. You know how much it sucks falling over with 55lbs (that’s over 40% of my body weight) on your back and skis sticking off your pack? A lot.The skis get stuck awkwardly, it’s tough to roll over or sit up, ugh. So that was total defeat. I finally looked up and announced that this was discouraging and demoralizing and WHERE WAS THE DAMN TRAIL WE HAD HEARD SO MUCH ABOUT.

Mandatory picture of Dragontail over Colchuck Lake

“WHY DON’T I KNOW HOW TO SKI” (Credit: Tony)

Well, luckily it was like 15 minutes away. I pulled my shit together and kept moving, and we found the trail shortly after my tree to face incident. I looked at the trail, thrilled and relieved, and took my first joyous step onto the well trampled snow only to posthole to my thigh and fall face first downhill.

Well traveled trail!

From there on out it was a piece of cake. We zipped along compact snow, the wooden bridge across the river was melted out, it was easy moving across easy terrain and I was back on track. We popped out at the trailhead, put the skis back on, and started skinning the road. We made it maybe 1.5 miles from the trailhead when we ran out of snow. Ugh. My feet were hurting, it had been a long day, why couldn’t the snow just keep going? I tossed the skis over my shoulder and started to walk. Tony and I chatted aimlessly, passing the time, occasionally mentioning the pinky toes we couldn’t feel in our ski boots or the toenails we were sure we’d lose or the blisters we’d have to deal with later.

Tony on easy ground above Colchuck Lake

We were back at the cars by dark, where I saw a note on my windshield. A note? No, a chai tea bag!! Surafel! I knew he had been planning on camping at Lake Colchuck because I told him to meet us at the top of Aasgard if he wanted, but we never saw him. Which was good, because we got to the top of Aasgard later than we had planned. But seeing that chai tea brought back all of the energy I had. We did it! We had just traversed the Enchantments, and even if it wasn’t technically winter, it was covered in snow. Honestly, the Snow Lakes approach would have been better with more snow.

Strongman Tony

We went to get brats in an abandoned-at-9pm-Sunday-night Leavenworth restaurant. Yes, they were delicious. We parked our bright yellow cars next to each other because it looks awesome. And eventually we made the long drive back to Seattle, where I got to fight for the corrupted photos I had lost.

Would I do it again? I’d go up and down Aasgard and bag more peaks and by the next time I ski that I’ll be better at skiing, so yeah, I’d do it again. But you know what the best part was? Even if there wasn’t much downhill, that trip took me from “what is a ski” to “I can get through most of this shit.” I’m still not great at going down, but over the past few trips I’ve been pretty happy on the obstacles I can skin through that I couldn’t handle before, and it’s all because I spent 12 hours each day on skis bushwacking, making kick turns, navigating snow bridges and slushy back-slidey snow and sidehilling. So a huge, huge thank you to Tony for pushing me through my first ski trip, and being a great tutor for all of the techniques he probably takes for granted at his level of ability. Next up, working on the downhills!

Have Tent, Will Travel

Trail running, mountaineering, and the occasional wipeout

Author Archives: evejakubowski