Ptarmigan Traverse

Posted on June 29, 2017 by evejakubowski

I’m not sure I could be happier. Maybe with a steak in front of me

Starting up from Cascade Pass

So you all know my ski talents. Or lack thereof. I joked earlier today that I should be in TOO (Turns On Occasion) or TS (Turns Sometimes) instead of TAY (Turns All Year). So given those ski skills, of course skiing the Ptarmigan Traverse sounded like a great idea. I had wanted to do the Ptarmigan Traverse since I moved here, in fact it’s crazy how simple it felt after so many years of dreaming about it. Working at REI, a customer had mentioned it to me, probably chuckling at the young starry eyed grasshopper in front of her who only knew hiking and had never seen the Milky Way and got scared driving forest roads because there were psychopaths out there, man. And here she was, with years of mountaineering expertise, pulling up pictures of the Ptarmigan Traverse, on top of the world, sparkling blue glaciers and green valleys and nothing for miles besides you and the scenery and the stars. I set her up with her new hiking boots, wished her well, went to the back room, and wrote down everything I could remember her saying. In fact, I think this is how I discovered Summitpost. So I put the Ptarmigan Traverse on my to do list, a far off dream for years ahead if I still lived in Seattle.

Ants climbing Sahale

Distance: Roughly 35 miles
Elevation Gain: No idea. Highest point is 7800ish (Col next to Spire Point). Take note that there’s way more up and down than I expected – this wasn’t a “get up high and traverse flat” it was a “get up high, HAHAHA drop 1400ft, HAHAHA climb 1400ft, HAHAHA drop 700ft, actually go up 200ft, no really now drop 400ft, HAHAHAHA GOT YA back up 1400ft ” marathon
Weather: A million degrees and sunny always
Commute from Seattle: 6 hours if you include both trailheads
Did I Trip: Actually no, I don’t think I had any spectacular wipeouts! Must have been a boring trip.

Almost at the pass!

Well, a week ago, I tossed the idea to JT. Ptarmigan traverse? 3 days? Totally doable, shut up, I’m out of shape, no I’m not trying to climb Dome at the end, no I don’t want to start up at 10pm, our last trip resulted in us being overdue can’t we just have one solid normal trip at least to prove it’s possible again? I can’t write two “we got stuck out overnight” blog posts in a row. Luckily, after extensive bitching and threatening to bail right then and there, he obliged to a “normal” trip. 6/24-6/26, time to make it happen!

Looking up at Cache Col across Cache Glacier

First, let me give you a small piece of history. This traverse was initially completed in 1938 by four members or the Ptarmigan Climbing Club, who took 13 days and actually went south to north, from Dome to Cascade Pass. They never published it. No pictures, no written account, nothing. In 1953, five climbers wondered what could be south of Cascade Pass, and did the same traverse in the opposite direction, knowing that there was a route that went IF they could find it. And now there’s me, sitting on my couch with Google and Facebook and a GPX track on my smartphone and my satellite messenger beacon is also a GPS with great maps and I’ve never really stared into a void wondering if a route goes, because I know that yes, it does, and hundreds if not thousands of people have already done it and I have decades of beta at my fingertips.

We started up around 5am on Saturday after spending hours dropping off cars at each trailhead. Seriously, dropping cars off is my primary stressor before a traverse. Who knew? Anyway, at Cascade Pass, the road was gated around 2 miles from the trailhead. Surprisingly no one was checking for overnight permits: the National Park now requires permits via a lottery system, and apparently even trailhead camping is not allowed. Lucky for us, we were heading south, leaving the Park almost immediately after Cascade Pass. We walked the road to the parking lot, and from there we were able to head straight to the pass on skis, though that won’t be the case for long. We needed to boot the steeper sections (I don’t have ski crampons), and wow I felt like crap. I announced that if I didn’t feel better by the top of Cache Col, I’d be bailing. JT gave me plenty of shit. Hey, you’re only as good as the weakest member of your party and that’s ME. So I have the power right now.

JT skirting the cornice

Well, spoiler alert, we got to Cache Col and I felt fine, minus the five seconds where I nearly shit myself as a ton of rocks fell off the face next to us (and into a moat, as I ski-ran across the slope away from it). Unfortunately, I was starkly aware of the fact I seemed to have regressed in skiing abilities. Okay, so the skis were relegated to training weight. The only thing worse than skinning steep slopes is the awkward downhill traverse with skins, which I promptly gave up on. This meant there was a lot of booting in my near future, starting with the downward traverse to Kool Aid Lake. It’s still amazing how much faster this passed with snow cover as opposed to talus fields like the previous year.

Traversing to Kool Aid Lake (out of frame on left) and to Spider-Formidable Col (just right of center on the horizon)

Wiping away my tears from stumpy numb hands on Red Ledges (yes I’m kidding… about the tears)

We had already been through the first third (ish) of the Ptarmigan Traverse when we did Formidable last year, so nothing was too exciting besides Red Ledges. Last year, they were an easy scramble. This year, they were steep snow, which was great (sarcasm) because I had no waterproof gloves. Yeah yeah, don’t say anything. I legit wasn’t expecting steep snow. Which is funny, because for some reason I had brought an ice tool and not an ice axe. JT eventually was nice enough to give me his whippet since he had an ice axe and a pole, but for a while, I had the two extremes. Ski poles, and an ice tool. No bueno.

Looking down Middle Fork Cascade River Valley from Kool Aid Lake ish

We were past Red Ledges quickly, and carried on towards Middle Cascade Glacier. Why isn’t there a North Cascade Glacier? There is a South Cascade Glacier we’ll reach later, and a Middle, but no North? Who named these?! Middle Cascade Glacier was nicely covered, and we skinned to the Spider-Formidable Col with a plethora of water breaks and breathers (aka me stopping for 90 seconds because I’m tired and sweaty and sunscreen is wearing off and I can’t drink and skin uphill at the same time or I run out of breath because I’m out of shape).

Le Conte Lake in August 2016

Getting to Spider-Formidable Col seemed to fly by, probably because we were familiar with the area. I was disappointed that Le Conte Lake was still frozen, and not boasting its spectacular blue color from last year. Yes, Le Conte Lake, at the base of Le Conte Glacier, which is on…. no, you didn’t guess it. It’s on Old Guard. Le Conte Mountain does not host Le Conte Glacier. Shitty namers, keeping us on our toes. Also, there’s a trail that comes up that valley called Flat Creek Trail, which amazingly stops short of Le Conte Lake. Think of the views from that lake! When (okay, if) I get rich, I’ll sponsor that trail. Jeez.

The traverse to Yang Yang

I expected Yang Yang Lakes to be like a 30 minute downward traverse from the S-F col, but psych! It took hours of booting across steep slushy slopes in the baking sun. Oh, and I also got to self arrest on the way down the col thanks to snow balling up in crampons (I clearly wasn’t whacking them enough, and don’t even mention that skis should be on my feet, I have no chance in narrow chutes yet) so everyone thank JT for his whippet. We finally crawled into some shade and marveled at where we had come from. Okay, let’s get to Yang Yang and reevaluate there. We figured to do a three day we at LEAST had to be at Yang Yang night one.

Coming up the mellow ridge above Yang Yang, Formidable and Spider in the background. We came over the col just right of center

Camp! Spider Mountain in the background

We reached Yang Yang around 5pm and decided yeah, we’d get to the ridge above it and camp there. The ridge had looked super mellow from a distance, so we skinned up to a small couloir, booted up the steep (it wasn’t really steep, just too much for skis) part, and topped out on a gorgeous rolling ridge with patches of talus and heather at the base of Le Conte Peak. We set up camp on a small cluster of talus with a stunning background of Mt. Formidable and Spider Mountain. I can’t put into words how content I was. Tired, satisfied, blown away by the views, cozy in my down quilt, there is nothing better. I always have this annoying urge to run in circles or knock out a ton of work or start huge projects and it’s always hanging over my head, except when I’m wiped in the alpine. We laid our wet gear out to dry, enjoyed our dehydrated meals, tried to rehydrate our poor battered bodies, and went to sleep. I managed to wake up for sunset and again to get a glance of the Milky Way (new moon = amaaaaazing stars). I slept through sunrise, and we got a lazy start around 7:30am.

Traverse to the Le Conte Glacier, imagine Le Conte Lake all blue!!

Ascending the Le Conte Glacier

The next section of the traverse took us east of Le Conte and up to the base of Sentinel and Old Guard, where we wrapped slightly east of the peaks. The Le Conte Glacier last August had a small ice step (or so I was told – the group was in a whiteout and I have to wonder if they just didn’t skirt it enough). Regardless, the picture on the left hides a huge ass crevasse with a huge bridge over it (the obvious center rise) with basically a small ice cliff on the right when it’s all melted out. This time of year, with all of the snow fall this winter, it wasn’t even noticeable.

Approaching Old Guard (left) and Sentinel (right). Hard right here, then left around the base of Sentinel (don’t go between them)

From the base of Sentinel and Old Guard, we traversed south and dropped down onto the South Cascade Glacier. Cue nerd out: this glacier is super cool. We found a few cameras and some measuring equipment. This glacier is one of the most studied glaciers in North America, having been consistently measured since the 1950’s. They have daily stats, which are immediately recorded and available to the public! The average temperature the day we crossed was 65 degrees (aka “Fucking Hot”). There’s a research station at the terminus (the second hut was taken out by an avalanche in 2000), but I didn’t know that as we crossed it, thank god (I’d have wasted hours going to check it out). There’s a “trail” that connects back to Middle Fork Cascade River (which is a “trail” that goes down the drainage below Kool Aid Lake and the Middle Cascade Glacier, shocker I know) and eventually to the Cascade River Road, but I put “trail” in quotes because routine maintenance stopped in the 70’s and a huge wildfire took out what was left in 2003 (despite some attempts in 2001 to rehab part of the trail).

Smoke from the 2003 fire, taken from Dome (Source)

Prior to that (now we’re talking 1950’s), there was a 14 mile trail that connected to Siuattle River Road (PDF warning) that required you to climb up to 7,000ft just south of the hut, hop over the ridge, and then trek out via the Downey Creek drainage, similar to the Ptarmigan exit now but meeting Downey Creek further east. That was replaced by the aforementioned South and Middle Fork Cascade River Trails in the 60’s, which at the time made it only a several hour hike from Cascade River Road to the glacier. I originally assumed the trail was how everyone accessed the glacier – you’d think with such a heavily studied glacier, there would be a well maintained foot path. But it turns out this glacier is large and flat enough to land a freaking plane. I’d love to find out whether researchers still schwack up the South and Middle Fork Cascade River Trails nowadays. The trails seem to get more and more wild each year without maintenance and foot traffic.

Looking down the South Cascade Glacier, Baker back right

Zoom in, and check out the ridge just above the lake to the left!

Going by coordinates, I think I should have captured the research station in this pic, but I don’t see it anywhere! Maybe it was taken down and it’s just the cameras and measuring sticks (I’m sure there’s a fancier name) recording everything. I can’t find confirmation or recent pictures of the research station, so I’m not sure it’s still current. EDIT: I think I caught it in this pic to the right!! On the ridge to the left above the lake. I found a post on WTA suggesting it was operational as recently as 2006, have not seen anything else more recent. This article in the Seattle Times in 2009 came out when the glacier had effectively shrunk in half over a 50 year time span. Interestingly, back to the PDF linked above, a perfectly preserved tree was found as the glacier receded which dated back to ~5000 years ago. This suggests that the glacier was as small ~5000 years ago as it was in 1958, but it was rapidly advancing at that time, fast enough to shear and store a tree trunk for the next few centuries. I wonder how old the oldest ice in this glacier is. (Also, the fancy name for the measuring sticks is “measurement stakes” so I wasn’t too far off.)

Enhance! Top left!? Maybe they’re rocks and I’m just overeager.

Elephant Head and Overdrive Peak over White Rock Lakes, traverse on the right in center, col on the right is what we’re aiming for

Anyway, JT was not enthused by my nerd out, and we carried on. The col here is a mellow approach with a short, steep drop down to White Rock Lakes, which easily compose the coolest camp area I’ve seen in the North Cascades so far. Unfortunately they were still frozen over too, but the views of Dome (mostly obscured by Elephant Head and Overdrive Peak) are spectacular. You gotta camp here if you do the traverse. The only bummer was the discovery of an abandoned blue bag, complete with human shit inside which I only discovered after accidentally flinging it everywhere. I joked last year about wanting to be the Patron Saint of Alpine Shits because I have such enthusiasm for the human composting toilets, and I guess that includes packing out all alpine shits as tributary to the Mountain Gods. So I plopped it in a ziploc and carried on my way. Looking across the hills to the next col we had a brief “holy shit, we traverse THAT?!” before we thought about when we looked back at Spider-Formidable Col and it looked insane but was pretty mellow up close. Okay, so it might look ridiculous, but when we get closer, it’ll be fine. And it was! It was actually incredibly mellow.

Traverse is mellower than expected… we probably could have skinned

Looking back at White Rock Lakes (just above center line) and the col just above

From White Rock Lakes, you drop down a few hundred feet and traverse to the Dana Glacier, which you ascend to the second huge col to the right of Overdrive Peak. It may be mellow, but it takes forever. For. Ever. For starters, it’s several hundred feet taller than the col that you crested to get to White Rock Lakes, and on top of that you drop DOWN from White Rock Lakes as you traverse to the base of the glacier. We skinned some, we booted some, we skinned more, we booted more. JT shouted back to me “careful, we’re crossing running water under the snowpack!” “Yeah, neat, you can tell because of the change in texture!” It was an obvious difference, which usually means something hollow. I got closer, and laughed again. “You can also tell from the hole where the first guy fell through.” Someone had a beautiful full fledged ass deep posthole. Thanks for finding it, man. Also, speaking of shitty glacier names, the glacier on the left (between Elephant Head and Dome) is the Chikamin Glacier. Chikamin peak is nowhere near us! At least Le Conte Glacier is kind of near Le Conte Mountain!

JT admiring Glacier Peak from just east of Spire Point

We switched back to skins, and after what felt like a few hours of skinning sloppy slidey warm snow and baking in the sun and sweating and sun-burning and wondering if I was putting on too much sunscreen to even get tan we finally reached the col next to Spire Point. Holy shit. I forgot Glacier Peak existed. Oh my god. It’s glorious. Everything is glorious. JT started scrambling up a spire to our left while I lazed around below. 2 minutes later I was following him, because shit I wasn’t missing out on views. This was our last chance to be on top of the world. Better take advantage of it.

JT clicked into his skis for the way down, ready to shred. I booted a ways, and then stopped. What the fuck, I could ski this. But maybe not that next hill? Was it worth the transition? Nah, I’ll keep booting. Crest the next hill. Okay I can ski this too. Shit now I’ve missed two slopes I could have skiied. But not that next part? Is it worth the transition? Well I don’t know about the next part so nah. Keep booting. God dammit this was skiiable too! Where’s my confidence?!? Where’s my “fuck it let’s just do it” attitude?! By that time I was at the top of a short couloir I knew I wasn’t skiing, so I accepted photography duty, and agreed to get a video of JT tearing it up while I simmered with regret.

JT tearing it up in a couloir above Cub Lake

It only took us like half an hour to get to Cub Lake. Once again we laid out all of our wet gear, JT set up shop in the shade, I laid in the sun, we enjoyed meals. I blew bubbles and napped and tanned while JT did ski runs and tried to convince me to be fun. Shut up, this is as close to beach tanning as I’m going to get, let me enjoy my sun naps. We camped on snow right next to the outlet of the lake.

Except sun naps turned into sleep, and I woke up to JT having a bad dream. Or being attacked by a bear, or abducted by aliens, I didn’t know. I debated whether to throw something or shout or actually get up (we established that I’m lazy) and I settled for shouting. He woke up, and within minutes we saw some weird ass lights in the sky, so it was probably aliens. I went back to sleep. JT didn’t. If they’re determined they’re gonna get me anyway so I might as well get a good rest and give myself a chance of survival once they’ve caught up.

Surprisingly good views from Bachelor Creek before it gets miserable

We got another lazy start around 7:30am after I woke up at 6:30 with Ghetto Superstar in my head, and booted it up to the pass above Cub Lake. Ski boots are great on steep heather (seriously). Cue immediate fuckup with my GPS app that led us way too far left and resulted in a steep forest traverse which wasn’t bad for me, but JT was trying to ski and ended up booting through trees. Oops. When you hit the saddle, follow your nose, not your GPS. There’s one mellow way down into the drainage, and that’s where you should go. Luckily we backtracked quickly and picked up the trail, which led to one of the more miserable exit hikes I’ve had.

Plenty of practice after Stuart a few weeks back

The Bachelor Creek Drainage would be MISERABLE without a bootpath. I laughed at first, because I was like this isn’t a bushwack, there’s a trail the whole way! But as you drop in elevation, the vegetation gets taller, and thicker, and soon those “beautiful clear alpine meadows” turn into “stifling meadows of death.” Thick bushes on either side, trees to scramble under and over at the same time, skis getting stuck on everything, bugs sticking to your sweaty face, nature sucks. After what felt like an eternity (I think the Bachelor Creek Drainage is actually only like 3 miles) we finally started seeing signs of civilization. A log had been sawed into pieces to reveal the trail! We must be getting close. The trail is getting more heavily worn. Oh my god another sawed log. Holy shit!! It’s Downey Creek!! There’s a legit bridge to cross over Bachelor Creek to start heading south! I died with happiness.

Holy shit. A sawed tree AND A BRIDGE!

Not literally. What we actually did was walk right past it, stop in our tracks, and realize we were both out of water and should probably fill up. We dropped packs and carried water bottles and bladders back to the stream junction where we filled them, chugged, filled them again, and lay on the ground savoring the nectar of the gods. JT switched to trail shoes and I glazed over watching his repeated futile attempts to click his ski boots into his skis sideways without taking the skis off his pack. I finally started walking because I couldn’t watch, and my feet hurt, but I knew I was better off in ski boots than trail runners. Bring on the pain, baby. Around this time I also realized that the flip flops I was so excited to wear were actually in JT’s car, not my car. Shit. I announced it to him but he didn’t process my pain. Probably too busy wrapped up in his own brain.

After all that, JT doesn’t want to get his feet wet

The 6 miles of the Downey Creek trail went surprisingly fast, and were quite pleasant. You don’t spend much time along the river, but you wander through thick green jungle, over streams, past tons of different types of vegetation. Everything is so lush and alive! Including the spiders, which like to make webs across the trail, to capture their favorite meal which is obviously humans. JT mistakenly assumed I was scared of spiders and started warning me of spiders. No, I don’t care about the spider. They can chill. But if they start building a web, the friendship is over. Built your shit three feet to the left please because I am the destroyer of dream webs and I don’t care how perfect it is. I even accidentally ate some. That’s right, I can EAT your HOME.*

One more from near Kool Aid Lake

Sunset over Baker

It’s not really fair of me to complain about the Bachelor Creek exit, because the rest of the exits are worse. And Bachelor Creek used to be worse. A brief list of alternate exits:

Middle Fork Cascade River: A bushwack down from the Kool Aid Lake/Middle Glacier section of the traverse. Trail was destroyed by a wildfire in 2001, not maintained since then, and never got to the real head of the valley anyway, so have fun.
South Fork Cascade River: A bushwack down from the South Cascade Glacier, which apparently used to be pleasant. From there you can either follow “the trail” to meet with Middle Fork Cascade River, or take the ancient exit, which is schwacking up and over the ridge south of the glacier and dropping into the Downey Creek valley, where you will at least eventually encounter the Downey Creek trail.
West Fork of Agnes Creek, from White Rock Lakes or Dome. It’s tempting on a map. Here’s a quote from 1953. “If anyone is interested in obtaining information on hanging valleys, waterfalls, slide alder, whip willow, and the latest beaver dam projects on the West Fork, we will be glad to inform him on such matters.” And here’s a quote from 1980. “From where our party entered the alder thicket to where we got onto viable trail took 16 hours, working very hard to traverse a distance of a little less than 4 miles. To make forward progress, we had to ascend the alder branches and jump from branch to branch about 6 feet off the ground, periodically falling out into the devil’s club below.” 4 miles, 16 hours. A quarter of a mile an hour. Babies crawl faster than that. And I doubt it’s better now, with another 30 years of thick Cascades brush growth. Nature sucks.
In conclusion, the best bail plan is to either finish the traverse, go out the way you came, or get injured and call a helo. I put those in order of preference from best to worst.

Looking down at the eventual W Fork Agnes Creek valley

Okay, back on track. I had insisted on leaving my car at the Downey Creek trailhead, because I love the feeling of getting back to my car. And this was a perfect one. You pop out on the last few feet of trail and can see the glimpses of yellow through the trees. There it is!! My car! Yay! We dropped our bags next to it and I struggled out of my sopping wet ski boots. We only took 10 minutes to revel in our weekend before hopping in the car to drive all the way back to the Cascade Pass trailhead, where we’d get JT’s car.

The drive back wasn’t so bad, even with my granny driving. My strength is traffic and cities and being a dick, okay, not forest roads. I’m getting better but I’m not there yet (and the better I get in forests the worse I get at cutting people off and deciding I need to make a turn across two lanes of traffic 50ft before the turn, so I’m getting worse at traffic too). At the pass we swapped gear, I took off towards Seattle, JT caught up within minutes, and I politely pulled over to let him pass against all desires to go 1mph for a few minutes to see how long he lasted. You’re welcome.

View of Dome from a short scramble near Spire Point

Oh, by the way, I was back in Seattle by like 10pm. So we had an awesome, epic trip that still went smoothly, no complications, no overdue notice, no snow ledge bivvy, no helicopters. Just sunburns and nosebleeds and amazing views. Shit, we were even out before dark. So let it be known that casual trips are possible!

*And then cry about it in a nightmare later when I’m home.

Torment Forbidden Traverse

Posted on September 17, 2016 by evejakubowski

Left to right: Eldorado, Klawatti, Austera, Primus, and Tricouni above Moraine and Primus Lakes

If you had asked me in February, “Eve, if you can only climb one peak this summer, what would it be?” the answer would the the Torment-Forbidden traverse. Because I’m a cheating bastard and that’s two peaks. I’d settle for just Forbidden, but let’s be real, the traverse was the true goal. I stood on Eldorado almost exactly a year ago (I wrote this a few weeks ago okay don’t get technical with me) staring at Forbidden asking what is that, and how do I climb it.

Torment on the left, Forbidden on the right

Well a few weeks after Eldorado, I started trad climbing. My old REI coworkers were laughing at me because until a year ago, I swore I’d never be into rock climbing. A few months after Eldorado, I started leading trad. 9 months of putting pennies aside, I got a full rack. And June came and went, and then July, and August started, and I began to think Forbidden wasn’t going to happen. I had had a decent climbing season, not as much rock as I wanted but plenty of successful trips. My shredded hands and sunburned face could attest.

I mean the forest was pleasant

Enter Connor. I had gotten to know Connor going up Olympus, and between bringing surprise cupcakes for his birthday and pitching my favorite single wall mountaineering tent (okay, my only tent) in a fucking jungle I guess I qualified as a passable climbing partner. He’s been checking off every route on the 50 Classics list he can get to, and the West Ridge of Forbidden is one of them. And the full traverse… well, that’s even better. Before I get into the more-filler-less-beta description, go check out Steph Abegg’s blog. That’s what we ran off of. She has step by step instructions that make it very hard to get off course.

Pleasant waterfall

We got a lazy start on Saturday morning (this was back in mid-August), hitting the trailhead around 10am after McDonalds gave us the wrong sandwiches on our way out (I wanted TWO sausage egg and cheese sandwiches, not one, dammit) and an awkward parking job on my part trying to fit into the trailhead lot. Nothing like a big bright yellow SUV parked diagonally on a bank out of line next to everyone else. We started hiking and I was already dragging. I don’t know if it was the heat or the sun or the dehydration or what but my legs just weren’t responding to my brain’s pleas. I’d put the approach right up there as third after Snowfield (first) and Eldorado (second) with class 3 tree roots and narrow boot path and interesting (read: filled my boots with water) river crossings. Oh, and tons of bugs that would stick to you if you were sweaty. Bastards. I also had on my fresh new Smartwool socks (take II, they did not do so hot on Formidable), hoping the compression would help with my calf issues. No luck. Or, my calf issues would have been debilitating that morning without them, who knows. Either way, I can assure you that they look great when you roll up your pant legs because it’s hot out.

Meadows and slabs and an awesome cloud

The Throne looking out at Johannesburg

We broke above tree line (finally!) and my mood picked up a bit. Not enough to get the legs back up to speed, but at least we were drifting through meadows looking at Johannesburg and Mixup and Magic and Sahale and could see the entire traverse ahead of us, a ridge of rock poking out above quickly softening glaciers. And we found the Boston Basin toilet everyone talks about! Add it to the list of Classic Craps of Washington. I haven’t made much progress towards my future as the Patron Saint of Alpine Shits lately but this was a step. I snapped a picture and we continued on, across talus that eventually gave way to the slabby sort of rock that used to be covered by glacier.

Crossing the glacier, looking up at Torment

We didn’t take many breaks, wanting to get to the rock climb ASAP. I was hoping I’d be faster on rock than I felt slogging across talus and snow. We reached the foot of the glacier and saw a group of four way ahead of us. Shit, we have to get ahead of them. Connor took off. Well, my legs are still in bed in Seattle, so you go ahead and do that and I’ll catch up. We didn’t deem it necessary to rope up, though there were a few small crevasses and snow bridges and a groan or two. Luckily when I reached the base of the gully that leads to the notch, the group of four was still getting their gear prepped. Connor hopped up to the notch, I waited until he was out of the gully (it was pretty loose) and started up myself. A few fourth class moves, a few pebbles knocked down on the guy below me (who unfortunately came up immediately behind me until he realized he’d just be peppered with small rocks) and we were in business.

Awesome pic of the team behind us

We switched into rock shoes, flaked out the rope to 30m (60m rope), and started simulclimbing. Connor led. I assumed we’d alternate leading until I realized how much faster it’d be with him leading rather than my newbie ass, plus with simulclimbing there wasn’t a blatant need to swing leads like when you’re doing things pitch by pitch. Honestly, the only move that felt harder than a 3rd class scramble was the first move up from the notch, which follows a ~15ft crack. After that, it’s basically all scrambling. For once, my navigation was on point. Connor led, and I directed. So I’m useful for some things, like beta, and boiling water, and taking photos.

Connor leading, mostly a scramble

From the top of the crack that marks the start of the route, you basically follow a series of ledges to the left until you’re dropped into another nice, loose gully, this one whiter than the first one (I don’t know why that sticks in my memory). Head up and right to another dip in the ridge (rap slings were a good cue), and drop down onto the southeast face and follow more ledges to the saddle between the two summits. I honestly think we might have been following a different route than planned, because there was very little ridge involved, mostly face traversing. But it was quick and painless, so I didn’t complain. I snapped a few pictures of the team behind us, excited about the views, forgetting how they’d consistently get better and better as we went.

Connor coming up to the summit, Forbidden on the right

THE SUMMIT ON THE LEFT IS THE TRUE SUMMIT. No one just straight up said that!! They said “the south summit” or “the higher of the summits” and bullshit like that. It’s the one on the left, okay? And you can’t tell from below. Connor ran to the one on the right, I didn’t trust it, I pulled out the topo but they’re so freaking close on the one I had that I couldn’t tell which was “the southern summit.” I figured we’d divide and conquer and stand up and see who was taller, so I went left.

Nailed it. I get up to the top and boom, there’s an old school summit register in a brass pipe. I whipped it out and signed it and got ready to head down and meet Connor, thinking he was waiting until his head popped over the ridge. Sweet, summit break! And we had made good time since hitting the rock, too. The two summits are very comparable, I honestly would not have been able to tell which was the true one without the summit register. We had some water and snacks and soaked in the views, checking out Forbidden which looked so much taller and sharper and darker in the distance.

Forbidden from the summit of Torment

The joys of rope management

Wanting to reach the only decent bivvy spot, we moved on quickly. We dropped down to the first notch, where we knew we’d have to rappel down to the glacier, and probably deal with a moat. Great, Connor can go first. Quick tip: Use the rappel sling on the far side, not the one immediately on your left when you reach the notch. We swapped to mountaineering boots. I donned my crampons as Connor rapped down, and had just finished tightening the straps when I head “you should probably get your crampons!” from below. I hear some shuffling and some kicking and I peek over the ridge, just as I see an ice tool come over the edge of the moat followed by a bare hand grasping at the snow. Like when zombies dramatically dig out of their graves one hand at a time, Connor climbed out, sans crampons. “Off rappel!”

Rapping into the moat

Great, so I’m going to be swung over the moat to the snow, like I read in Steph Abegg’s blog. Can’t say I’ve ever had to do that before. Should have read more closely. I clipped my axe to my harness and started down, scraping crampons on rock. Swinging over was awkward. You need to get a few feet below the edge of the snow or else when your partner pulls the rope you just go up and not across and you’ll hang above the gap, and need to move horizontally along the rope. I was also facing backwards, which wasn’t elegant, and had used a prussik rather than an autoblock (out of habit since that’s how I learned, yes this habit is now broken), which makes it much tougher to slide down the rope and nearly impossible to slide across. So you can imagine just about how awkward this was. Reference Figure A below if you need a visual. I finally dropped low enough to be dragged over to the snow and got a good hold with my ice axe, but couldn’t balance since I was fighting against the prussik, which was still holding me farther up the rope. Eventually I just had Connor grab me and hold me above the snow until I could undo the damn prussik. So yeah, awkward sequence, but you know what? Now I know how to do it, and it’ll be 5x faster the next time around, and I’m never using a prussik again. Another quick tip: you can avoid the moat scenario by scrambling class 4-5 ledges on the south face of the traverse, but hey, this was probably the most useful stretch of the trip for me in terms of learning new things, so I’ll give it a 7/10. Would have been a solid 8.5 with an autoblock.

Figure A

We traversed to the next moat, and alternated between moat and snow and rock for a while. Getting across the first moat had taken up a lot of time, and switching between snow, dropping into moats, and climbing back up on rock was slow going. We eventually came around a corner and saw the steep snow traverse, which would have to be nearly front pointing. I regretted leaving the pinky rest on my ice tool, since it would make plunging the shaft a pain in the ass (are we still doing phrasing?) but the snow wasn’t too steep, so I hoped it wouldn’t be an issue. Connor asked if I wanted to rope up, but on something like that, if you fall you’ll just take your partner with you unless you’re taking the time to set pro. So nah. If just I die, I’ll haunt a crampon or something instead of a house so I’ll still get to go up peaks. Watch out guys.

Traversing below some hanging snow

The snow traverse was slower going than I expected. More tedious than anything. There was one brief icy section, but most was soft enough for nicely kicked steps and the ice tool stuck well, I ended up using the pick more than the shaft. Halfway across the traverse I thought to myself ugh, please let there be a bivvy spot at this notch. Huh, I must be tired if I’m hoping for a bivvy spot. I knew the ideal bivvy spot was at the next notch, but we had used up so much time rapping across the moat that I didn’t think we were going to make it. Turned out we could have made it by dark if we had tried, but apparently I was tired, and since I didn’t know how long it would take, I was ready for dinner and bedtime.

Last light on Boston and Sahale from the bivvy

Well, we found a bivvy spot on the south side of the ridge. It wasn’t great, a little narrow and a little slanted, but it’d do. I started boiling water as Connor set up the perfect gear nest hanging from a cam. The whole rack, our helmets, no critters were getting into that shit. We flaked out the rope as a ground cover like on Formidable and I whipped out my new Nemo down quilt. It arrived at my office minutes before a meeting the day before the trip, and it was like Christmas. My face lit up, my boss started laughing, I dashed for my keys to tear open the box and unpack my new toy and told everyone all about it. My boss actually offered to get me the sleeping pad that pairs with the quilt after she saw how thrilled I was running around the office with the quilt, only to be stopped in my tracks by a meeting to sell fashion product to our friendly local online retailer (the opposite of me sleeping on a rope spread out on a rock with just a quilt). But the quilt is amazing. It’s a 30 degree quilt, so not for winter, but damn I’d have been in heaven if I had it on Formidable. And it weighs a mere 19oz, which is about the weight of the sleeping bag liner I had used on Formidable.

Dome and Glacier in the backdrop, Formidable center, Mixup and the Triplets in the foreground. Can I wake up to this every day

With my bare feet wrapped in my new favorite toy (new Smartwool socks still needed to dry and smelled worse than Connor’s dinner) I dined on Thai Curry while Connor suffered through some vegan mac n cheese. He claimed it wasn’t that bad but I took a single bite and I think I’d have rather gone hungry. Sorry vegans, it was $1 at the grocery outlet so I’m sure there’s better version of vegan mac n cheese out there. I felt like a princess with my $12 dehydrated meal. Luxuries. Should have brought myself some wine.

I had been hoping to catch the meteor shower, but I only saw one single shooting star. The moon was too bright for us to even see the milky way. At one point I swear something ran across my arm (this was after I listened to something shuffle around for a few minutes) but I never did find it. John’s twin 50’s turned into twin 47’s after they bivvied on Torment the weekend prior and woke up to a rat chewing through their gear. I’d fuck up anything that tried to munch that new down quilt. That rat would probably taste better than the vegan mac n cheese. And then I’d cry.

Rocking the new socks

The quilt was awesome. Toasty warm. The strings that turn it into half a sleeping bag were a pain in the ass, but made it easier to tighten up gaps if I realized my arm was sticking out, or felt a cool breeze on my leg. And it’s super soft. With that and the new sleeping pad, I’m pretty set for lightweight camping next summer. Now I can potentially be comfy cozy and not shiver bivvy all of the overnight climbs where I don’t feel like carrying a full overnight setup.

I finally committed to waking up around maybe 7:30 am. We made coffee, packed up our gear, and put our still slightly wet socks back on. We had to backtrack to the notch to drop down to the north face of the ridge to continue the traverse, and of course as soon as we reach the next notch, there’s a glorious bivvy spot right there that’s huge, flat, I mean shit, it looked like it had been swept. I groaned and we continued on.

More traversing

The rock sections of the traverse weren’t technically challenging, just exposed. It’s mostly a fourth class scramble, and I knew the rock was supposed to improve as we got closer to Forbidden. I never though exposure bothered me, so this was a reality check. There were definitely spots (especially downclimbing) where I was slow and cautious, and I remember three sections where I was straight up uncomfortable. It’s been a loooong time since I pushed my comfort zone on anything, but I remember standing spread out like a starfish trying to traverse a section of rock and realizing shit, this feels awkward. And then I looked down. Terrible idea, most of the traverse has hundreds of feet of exposure beneath you, and tipping backwards would unquestionably be fatal (sorry mom). Then I looked at Connor. “I’m… uncomfortable.” He looked at me and laughed and just said “okay, so go back and find another way.” Oh. Huh. Don’t mind if I do. And it really was that simple, and totally snapped my downward spiraling thoughts of “oh, I’m uncomfortable, oh, look at those hundreds of feet of air below me, oh, what if my arms and legs get tired in this position, oh god are they getting tired right now?!” Soon we reached the notch that marks the start of the Forbidden climb, where we stashed our boots, extra gear, and laid our (still wet) socks out to dry.

And more traversing

Starting up Forbidden was exciting. I mean it’s a classic after all, and there were several other parties up there, and I loved where we were and we had been making such good time and we were passing everyone and then bam. We hit my second spot of discomfort, which was likely more performance anxiety than anything. Any of you who have come to a climbing gym with me (or even rock climbed with me) know I get in my head about things, especially when others are watching. I’m sure I’ll get over it eventually. But here comes this guided group of three who step aside and let us pass. And it was the notorious Airy Step at the beginning of Forbidden. Not technically hard, but a little exposed. I stepped across, and though I logically knew it was an easy move, it’s different taking a step with a 6″ drop compared to a 600′ drop beneath you. Connor tossed in a cam, I farted around trying to figure out how to get past my mental block without using the cam and laughing at myself for being pathetic because this whole situation was so stupid, and finally decided fuck it, I can’t sit here deliberating while all four of these people stare at me and I used the damn cam.*

Connor on the sidewalk before rapping to the official start of Forbidden

After that it was mostly cruising. I think we made it notch to summit in 45 minutes, maybe an hour. Again, besides a 5.6ish crux, most of the climbing was 4th or 5th class scrambling There was a slight bouldering move where you drop down just before the summit, but it isn’t difficult, in fact it was probably one of my favorite moves of the entire climb in both directions. It just felt very fluid going in both directions, which is always the feeling I’m after. Before I knew it, we were on top, looking out at the Eldorado massif and Torment and Johannesburg and Formidable and Sahale and a world of peaks I haven’t even come close to touching yet.

Connor on the summit!

Amazingly, we had the summit all to ourselves. We took a long break to savor the scenery, we had perfect weather and ridiculous views and it’s easy to take it all for granted and I had to remind myself where we were and what we had done. Even just two years ago I had no idea any of this existed, or was accessible to the average person. Especially the weekend after Formidable, two amazing climbs in such an incredible area. I wasn’t exhausted enough on Torment/Forbidden for it to really sink in (my legs had decided to join me on Sunday at least, after a rough Saturday), but those views are some of the best I’ve ever had. Did we sign a summit register? I don’t even remember.

Summit selfie!

We started down. I was anxious about downclimbing. I think it’s similar to my issue with slabby climbs, I just don’t trust my feet. I know logically it’s better to stand up straight, but when it’s exposed I try to keep my center of gravity low, which usually results in my shoes not getting full purchase on the rock. The more of it you do the easier it gets, but I hadn’t been doing a ton of rock climbing this summer. We rapped the crux and two other sections (rap slings are abundant) and it took us longer to get back to the notch than it took to get to the summit. We collected the gear we had stashed (socks finally dry! Woo!) and decided to rap the gulley (mostly my decision, I think) rather than down climb. Rapelling is tedious, but I was mentally done with downclimbing, and there was a group below us ready to be pelted with rocks if I knocked anything down. There are rap stations the entire way, and we ended up downclimbing a few steps at the bottom to reach the glacier. I had my last awkward moment here, knowing there were steps below my foot but not being able to see them with nothing to grab with my hands. If I have a handhold, I’m happy to hang off it. If I don’t, it’s hard to trust that my foot is going to land on something. This is me downclimbing. I’m uncoordinated, what if my foot is an inch too far to the left? I laughed at myself again, rolling my eyes at the stupidity of the situation. “You have like three huge stairs right below your foot!” I heard Connor yell. Suck it up, buttercup.

Connor rappelling back down, Eldorado and Moraine Lake in the background

Dropping onto snow was a relief, since from there on out I’d know exactly where my feet were going and it’d be quick easy moving. Except for when I fell on my ass. We crossed the glacier quickly and were back on slabs. Despite my slow ass downclimbing, we had once again caught up to the group in front of us, who had a huge head start since we took so long on the summit. I gave myself a quick reminder that I only felt like a shitty climber because I was comparing myself to a guy who crushes 5.13’s before breakfast. We continued down and the other group followed us, which was amusing because we had no idea where we were going since we had come from Torment, not the standard approach. I whipped out the topo and got us back on track – you head slightly southwest on the slabs below the glacier and the wrap southeast to get back to camp, you can’t make a beeline from glacier to high camp. We cruised across talus, then meadows, crossed the same river that previously filled our boots with water, drowned our boots again, and floated down the trail that I had been dragging up the previous day. Why did I think this was so bad? It wasn’t even that steep! And the bugs had disappeared.

Sahale looking tempting, if only we had more time

The only real event on the way down was running into park rangers, who of course interrogated us to see if we had overnight permits. They asked where we were from, what cars did we have (I worried that I had gotten a ticket for my shitty conspicuous parking job in my obnoxiously awesomely colored car), did it have Washington plates? Did we have radios, did we have cell service up on the traverse (I didn’t even check! Who would check that?!). We had been snacksturbating about KFC and taco bell and hamburgers, your questions are getting in the way of my food fantasies, dammit!

Cruising through meadows in the afternoon light

The rangers finally carried on, and we hustled back to the car where my great parking job was no longer surrounded by cars and I confirmed that I did not receive a ticket for being a borderline douchebag (it wasn’t that bad really). We changed into flip flops and stuffed our stinky boots into the trunk and hopped in the car, ready to rush to KFC. Except… I am a slow driver on forest roads. Yeah, look at my car, 4wd, I know. It doesn’t matter, it has a hard time on washboard sections and skids out easily, so I go slow. Like old lady slow, even when KFC is on the line. Watch out Paul Walker, here comes granny.

Not a bad peak to stare at for a whole traverse

We made it to KFC with 8 minutes to spare. I was ready to rush in the door (“should we call ahead?!”) but Connor insisted on drive through. Okay, I dragged you into McDonalds yesterday, fine, we’ll do drive through this time. We pull up to the window. “What is the most pieces of fried chicken you could put in a bucket?” She went over to count what they had left. “We could do…. 8.” “You’ll get sick if you eat 8 pieces.” “I’ll take 8! And a famous bowl, and a large soda.” She gave me more than 8 pieces. No, I could not finish the bucket. Yes, I felt sick around piece #7. And I couldn’t help but notice the contrast between tearing apart fried chicken and devouring a famous bowl and the mellow notes of Jack Johnson playing in the background.

Cute cairn near Boston Basin high camp. Mixup, Triplets, Cascade Peak, and Johannesburg in the background

I could have gone to sleep right there. Amazing weekend. Perfect weather, successful gear test for my new quilt, plenty of new tricks learned and a crash course in downclimbing, boots that I should have hung on slings from my bathroom window so the stench didn’t permeate my entire apartment, and great company, all wrapped up with a bucket of fried American joy and a pile of failure in a sadness bowl.*

*I googled it to try and find a picture. None did the exposure justice (or I am a wimp, or both), but the first one I found was a woman who also clipped into a cam. So, there’s at least two of us.

**No one’s going to get that reference, but I cracked up immediately thinking of it when I realized what Connor had ordered. Also, the Famous Bowl is not only the top selling fast food item in the USA, it is the top selling fast food item in the world. So KFC got something right, piling all of their various meals in a ~~trough~~ bowl.

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.

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

Hidden Lake Lookout

Posted on April 5, 2016 by evejakubowski

Hidden Lake just after sunset. True summit on left, Sahale and Boston center, Johannesburg on the right

“I just broke my collarbone. Again.” That’s the text I received from Sam at 8am on Friday, 12 hours before we were supposed to be skinning our way up to the Enchantments. Well, I guess that’s out. I waited a few hours to confirm that there was definitely no way he was going to be able to pull off a “who-needs-a-damn-collarbone-anyway” miracle, and around 4pm we admitted defeat and I settled on joining Tony, Kacie, Cheryl, Dave, and Quinn at Hidden Lake Lookout.

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Clouds moving in and out along the ridge (Photo credit: Kacie)

Distance: 11 miles
Elevation: 4200ft gain to the true summit
Weather: 40’s and cloudy, teens overnight, 40’s and sunny
Commute from Seattle: 2:30
Did I Trip: I postholed, I slipped, nothing epic unfortunately. Dave had a full body posthole. The joys of snow covered boulder fields. Tony wiped out on his skis but no one saw. We only know because he lost his ski crampons. Sneaky bastard.
GPX files here (summer trail to ridge and true summit and lookout) and here (direct ridge from road to lookout). Both are dropbox, let me know if you’d like an old school map of if the link gives you issues.

I got to the trailhead around 11pm. Well, to where the road became impassable due to snow, at least, which was about 2 miles from the trailhead. Tony’s bright yellow FJ was parked and so was Dave’s truck, so I pulled over, pitched the tent, and got cozy. I didn’t sleep, because I was anxiously awaiting the arrival of Quinn and Kacie. The other three had left for the lookout Friday morning, and were already up there.

Hiking up the road to the trailhead

Quinn and Kacie got to the trailhead at 3am, because who needs sleep. They napped (or tried to) for two hours, and we got up and had a snack and were moving by 6am. We had a feeling that the other group might have just gone straight into the forest from the cars (at the switchback on the dirt road around ~3000ft) since I had sent them a map detailing such but frankly it looked like a pain in the ass and I’m lazy, so I figured we’d take the winter route I knew.We headed a quarter mile or so up the summer trail (which was a brutal, postholing, snow-bridge-collapsing endeavor) and left the trail at 4000ft to head south-southeast-ish (that’s an intercardinal direction, I swear). The snow in the forest was patchy, and the undergrowth slippery. I stared at a three foot tall mossy rock for a solid five minutes, knowing if I slipped with this pack on my back I’d be crabby about it. Kacie had a more in depth stare down with a tall log. I was happy to hit snow solid enough to kick steps, and Quinn broke trail for much of the way as Kacie lagged behind fighting a sleepy mental battle with herself (Tony nicknamed her “Night Rider” because her travel seems most efficient at night) and I tried to mediate between the two of them so we wouldn’t get too far apart. Prints are easy to follow in snow, but better safe than sorry.

Forest opening up

The most sustained steep section of the climb was in the forest. There was still avvy danger, but we lucked out with snow conditions. It got flat enough around 4400ft that I switched to skis and Kacie and Quinn strapped on their snowshoes. I took off on the skis, floating across powder and zigzagging through trees and around slopes. Sunrise was a mental boost (Kacie proclaimed so herself), and as usual I started to flip out when we started to get views. “Look at that RIDGE” “Look at that avalanche debris across the valley!!!” “GUYS turn around and look behind you when you get to this spot!” I’m surprised they didn’t want to punch me in the face as I pranced around them on skis. Tripping over half of my kick turns probably made them feel better.

LOOK at that RIDGE GUYS

As we got higher the blue sky got lower and lower and I knew it wasn’t the ridge – do I crush their hopes now, or later? Finally Quinn caved and asked. “Is that the ridge?” I laughed. “Nope!” But I knew we’d be reaching a flat section, so I told them to hang tight and we’d take a break there. I dropped my pack, slathered my white-Seattle-winter face in sunscreen (living in Seattle in winter is like being a mushroom in a forest), and grabbed one of my few snacks. Honey Stinger Waffle and chicken salad leftover from lunch, yeah baby. Not together, jeez. Who do you think I am? I have standards.

“don’t sit no go stand over there”

Quinn caught up first, and before he could sit I told him to “go stand over there so I can get a pic.” He obliged. The pics I took the rest of the day were better. Sorry Quinn. He was low on water, but I had 3 liters and as usual had only drank like half a liter (I’m in a perpetual state of dehydration) so I tossed him a liter. My other waterbottle was full of a combo of salty Watermelon Gu tabs and Peach Iced Tea by Crystal Light. Disgusting until I was thirsty and needed salt, and then it was glorious. Quinn didn’t want to try it. I offered him sunscreen as well, but he insisted on working on his base burn. I get it, I get it. Any color is better than pasty. Even lobster red.Kacie caught up next, and soon enough we saw a skiier! “It’s Tony!” Kacie said. “TONY!!!” I yelled. “No wait, it’s Dave?” Kacie said. “DAVE!!!” I yelled. “Wait, no it’s Tony.” “Dav- TONY?!? TONY!” Followed shortly by Cheryl rocking her snowshoes. I honestly didn’t think we’d see them until the lookout since we had taken a different route. Yay, friends!

The Traverse

I followed Tony skinning up a shortcut to the saddle while Quinn and Kacie followed Cheryl along the tracks they had made the previous day. I snapped pictures in every direction. Getting close to the saddle, Tony laughed quietly and said “wait until you see the traverse. Kacie’s gonna hate it.” Okay, I mean how bad can it be? “Cheryl did it right? So Kacie will be fine, it can’t be that bad.” “Cheryl hated it.” We crested the ridge and bam, a classic flat steep 45 degree face sloughing off its snow in the afternoon sun. Oh, good. Well, everyone would get a taste of mountaineering at least.

Cheryl, Kacie, Quinn coming up the final ridge

We waited for the others to catch up and I debated whether to ditch the skis and put on boots and crampons or push the comfort zone and see if skis did the trick. Who am I kidding, I’m trying the skis. I have to know if I can do it. Tony went first with his skinny skis, and I followed with my fat ass powder skis. I could fit like one ski in both of his tracks. So it was one tiny baby step at a time, while laughing at myself because this whole situation was ridiculous. I did slip once, but miraculously caught myself and managed to balance well enough to get back on track. I met Tony and Dave at the other side of the ridge, and we snapped a few pics of the three snowshoers behind us.

Cheryl on the traverse the next morning

Quick tip, you generally want to spread out on slopes like that in case something does go wrong. 1% chance something happens, but if that 1% comes to fruition, you don’t want it taking out your entire team at once. Tiny chance, huge consequences. That’s how I look at mountaineering hazards. But I figured now wasn’t the time to tell anyone that, and chances of an avalanche were low. As for falling, at least there were no rocks below the traverse. Well there was one, so just aim your fall well. Tony will ski down to you while I tumble and curse behind him.

Talk about pushing your comfort zone. Cheryl cried off all of her sunscreen (no, not actually) and Kacie glared at the snow with lasers and disdain I didn’t know human eyes could convey. Quinn didn’t even notice he was on a slope. Once we were above the cornice on the other side, we scurried up to the lookout, dropped our gear, and devoured snacks. Kacie asked me if we had just crossed what I would call “a zone of danger.” I mean, I guess so. But how would you phrase that? A slightly more than risky zone? Dare I say… the danger zone?

We’d be good slave laborers, digging toilets

Dave eventually mentioned the pit toilet. There’s a pit toilet? With a five-star view? Did you know about the 50 Classic Craps of Washington? Why aren’t we digging it out right now?! Somehow everyone either rallied to humor me (I love digging and I think secret toilets are hilarious) or they were legitimately excited about it. Or maybe they saw the practicality in not needing to use blue bags. We all grabbed our shovels and ran down the slope, using a picture on Cheryl’s camera from summer to triangulate the location of the toilet. We got to the spot and everyone started digging. “I GOT THE EDGE!!” Dave shouted. We surrounded him and frantically dug and two feet later there was a toilet. It had been maybe 5 minutes. We all look at each other as if to say “what now?” Tony started hurling snowballs from above. Back to the lookout!

Is it a posthole if both your legs punch through?

Hidden Lake Peak on the left, Eldorado on the right

Cue another few hours sitting on rocks in the sun, snacking, sunburning, postholing in the snow, whining about Eldorado. Come on, Eldorado. Get your head out of the clouds. We met Gabe, a lone splitboarder who came up to the lookout only to find he had to share it with 6 barbarians. He boarded down to the lake to escape us. We timed how long it took him to get back up. He left at 3:17. No one checked the time when he got back. Crap. (Gabe turned out to have a ton of alpine experience in incredible places, Peru being one of his favorites. Ecuador and Bolivia are overrated. Take note, anyone who likes beautiful fluted peaks with steep snow and ice, I wish I had written down his peak suggestions).

Ask me how many pictures I took of my tent

I pitched my tent, freaked out by the swarm of mice in the lookout. I hadn’t seen them or heard them, but supposedly they had kept everyone awake Friday night. I panic when I hear mice around my camping stuff, because obviously they must be chewing through my bag or my tent or my food or the foot of my sleeping bag and shitting inside of whatever they just destroyed with their tiny mouse teeth. I knew I wouldn’t sleep if I stayed in the lookout. Also, I like putting my tent in awesome places. i tucked it next to a rock hoping to help block some wind.

Probably too many

We ate dinner and waited for sunset. I had some Mountain House Chili Mac which I highly recommend (I mean it’s hard to screw up chili mac). Kacie and Cheryl fell asleep. Cheryl let out maybe three snores, which was enough for a not-quite-awake Kacie to mumble a not-quite-coherent “who why snoring ugh god so LOUD” which she claimed to not remember saying when we told her. Of course once sunset came, we all burst out of the lookout for a photo spree. There is nothing like sunset or sunrise in a place like that. I took over 200 photos. 5% are cool pictures of people, 10% are identical photos of the lake, 25% are my tent, and 60% are Eldorado in various stages of cloudiness.

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The lookout at night
(Photo Credit: Quinn)

After sunset we hung out in the lookout, boiled water so everyone could sleep with hot water bottles, Quinn took some night pics, and I was in bed soon after. Not as cozy as I thought. Should have brought my sleeping bag liner. I have generally lost any motivation to keep my toes warm in my sleeping bag. You eventually get to the point where you realize okay, they’re uncomfortably cold, but they aren’t going to get hurt, so I’ll just doze. And so I dozed, and had stress dreams about work. Who dreams about Bogs fucking up Nordstrom POs in the mountains?! Can’t my subconscious do better than that?

Admiring sunrise

I had set my alarm for 6:30am, which was supposed to be 20 minutes before sunrise. Public Enemy woke me up, and it looked light outside so I frantically unzipped my tent and started snapping photos. Gabe (eventually renamed “The Gabe”) was standing on a rock overlooking the lake right there and I’m sure was less than pleased to see my bleary face squinting out at the light. I didn’t have contacts in, I put my boots on and ran around outside tripping and slipping all over the snow and ice in and out of postholes and obstacles I couldn’t see. But I got some cool pics and finally calmed down enough to put in contacts.

The fateful sunrise pic, featuring Eldoardo far left and Johannesburg far right

I had a healthy breakfast of Clif banana maple oatmeal (it’s actually delicious) and a double espresso clif shot. Breakfast of champions. I’m a morning person, and the last thing I need is caffeine. I ran up to stand on the big rock to get a good picture of the lake, finally nailed it (got Eldorado AND Johannesburg in one shot), and promptly dropped my camera off of the cliff.

Yeah. A ~200ish foot cliff. And I stood there, watching it descend, listening to it tap off each rock, getting farther and farther away, “clink…. clink……clink…….tap……….well…fuck.” I walked back to the lookout with a deadpan expression on my face. I brought this upon myself. Why didn’t I zip my pocket. Why did I stuff my pocket with socks, not leaving enough space for the camera. You always zip your pocket. You never have socks in your pocket. I’d rather have dropped my phone. I thought I could see it laying down below in the snow at the bottom of the slope, so I figured I’d go on a rescue mission once everyone was moving. I packed up all my stuff and paced in circles while everyone else patiently had breakfast.

Looking across the traverse at the true summit (phone pic)

I somehow convinced most of the group to check out the true summit with me. Quinn had boundless energy, I knew he’d be in. Tony would want to ski down from it, so I figured he’d be in too. Cheryl and Dave I wasn’t sure, but they were in, and as soon as Kacie heard she’d have the lookout to herself, she declared she was opting out of the true summit and was going to enjoy having time to just be.

I decided on boots and crampons for the traverse on the way down. It was much more icy in the morning, and I’m very comfortable on almost anything in boots and crampons at this point. Skis, I’m like an awkward duck. Quack quack. Quinn and I headed across the traverse first, and went on Operation Camera Rescue while we waited for the others. I walked across in crampons and turned around to front point to drop down lower towards what I thought was the camera. When I turned around to front point, I realized Quinn was wearing microspikes. On a 60 degree snow slope. In light hiking boots. “Do you know how to self arrest?” “Well.. maybe, sorta.” I stopped where I was and laughed. What else can you do? We were just on snow, no rocks, so I mean… it wasn’t the WORST place to learn how to self arrest. I showed him the basic position and he kind of backwards hopped down the slope self arresting on his stomach. Hey, it worked.

Well what I thought was my camera turned out to be a stick. You’ve got to be kidding me. I was pissed. All I needed was the memory stick! I debated going lower to check out a small black patch, but it was probably just another branch, maybe I should climb up and check the rocks above us. As I was traversing back to our starting point, I saw a shiny square. Something metal. Something metal, labeled with bright red letters. “SONY” it said. Sony! Yes! Battery!!! Ahh! I snagged the battery and looked directly below it at the black patch. That HAS to be the camera. Or pieces of the camera. Shattered dreams. I front pointed extra quick to drop down to the camera (too icy to glissade, I prefer my tailbone intact) and there it was! Scraped, dented, but memory card intact, and the craziest part is I put the battery in and turned that fucker ON AND IT WORKED. I was like soccer announcers celebrating a goal. In my head I was running around with both hands in the air “GOOOOOOOOALLLLLL” but all I could was awkwardly front point and stumble over to where it was mellow enough to run back to everyone.

To the true summit!

Dave and Cheryl were down from the lookout and ready to go. Tony realized he left his ski crampons at the lookout and we waited another 20 minutes while he went back up to get them. I debated between leaving my stuff at the saddle, or bringing everything and skiing down. I thought I saw some easy slopes, and again, who was I kidding I had to try it. I hadn’t used these skis downhill at all yet, they’d been training weight and glorified snowshoes for the past few months. It was time.

We skinned almost the entire way, but had to take the skis off for the last few feet below the summit. I stuck them back on my pack because we had some steep ice. Too lazy to don my crampons, I kicked myself a staircase through the crust. It was an exhausting 15 vertical feet. Balancing with 55lbs on your back kicking steps thrice with each foot because one kick isn’t hard enough to make a full step and you don’t have your axe out to arrest with so if you slip you’re just toast. But we pulled ourselves up onto the summit and spent probably two hours taking pictures and relaxing. Everyone needs a pleasant summit once in a while.

The lake from the true summit. Johannesburg, Hurry Up, Spider, Formidable, Old Guard, Sentinel, Dome, Glacier, and I’m forgetting a few in between

PEANUT

The snowshoers headed back first, and Tony and I hung out with two skiers and their adorable dog Peanut, who was in doggie heaven. When he dies he’ll go right back to that spot. He was flopped over in his owner’s arms while she scratched his belly and his tongue lolling out one side of his mouth. She’d stop and he’d just lazily nudge her with his paw, half asleep, “why’d you stop??” They had set up camp at the base of an avvy slope in the Sibley Creek drainage we had avoided when they saw a huge avalanche on a slope that they thought was done sliding. Be careful no matter how it looks, folks. We spent a while chatting with them and schmoozing with Peanut before deciding it was time to head down ourselves.

I booted it down those first 15 feet to where the slopes were easy. Green circle slopes, get at me. I kept the skins on like training wheels. The first two or three turns were about as awkward as you’d expect. I had a slow motion fall, and once that was out of the way, it was all better. I actually made a few decent turns. Big, slow, snow-plow turns. Hey, you gotta start somewhere. My quads were on FIRE. Which this morning I realized probably wasn’t me being “out of shape” as much as it was the 45lbs on my back. I’d make a turn or two and have to stop and move my legs to relieve my quads. Skiing muscles are a thing, apparently. A thing I really need to develop. I’ll start doing squats and wall sits at my standing desk.

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Coming down the bunny hills with a sun halo (Photo Credit: Tony)

Tony showed me a video of myself at dinner after the hike. I burst out laughing. In my head, I was going so fast and turns were crazy because I’d go even faster for a split second as I pointed directly downhill briefly until I completed the turn and dug in my edges. And Tony’s video was like watching a slow motion skier showing how to do the pizza. One inch a minute, perfect snowplow, cautious timid turn. But you know what? It’s still faster and way more fun than snowshoeing or hoofing it. And there’s nowhere to go but up(down?)! Huge, huge thanks to Tony for waiting for me three or four times while I inched my way down the slope. It was freaking awesome and I can’t wait to do it again. I’ve got the skiing fever.

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One more because I’m proud (thanks Tony!)

We beat the snowshoers to our meeting point by a few minutes. We thought they might be ahead of us since we spent so much extra time on the summit, but the tracks were old so we knew they hadn’t come through yet. We hung out there for a bit once the whole group joined, giving Tony enough time to build a snowman. I swapped skis for boots since I wasn’t sure I could handle the forested section (I think I could have done the beginning up high where it was still wide enough) and started the postholing journey down.

Postholing isn’t bad once you’re in a rhythm of postholing. It builds character. The worst is when one foot sinks two feet and the other only sinks a few inches. Or when there’s a crust that occasionally holds but most of the time fails. If it’s all evenly deep powder, it’s doable. I trailed the snowshoers, giggling when they slipped or fell, embracing the misery of postholing. Tony had disappeared into the trees on his skis. I just plunge-stepped slowly down the slopes. It’s awkward to fall when you have skis on your back. Don’t risk it.

One more of Eldorado

We were down in a little over four hours. Back at our cars I had a half lb of cheddar cheese, Tony had pretzels, and Quinn donated some beef jerky. Perfect smorgasboard of post-hiking snacks. Oh, and Rainier beer. Yes.

On the way out, we stopped at Train Wreck in Burlington for dinner. It’s not quite on the way back to Seattle if you take rt 9, but it works if you take i5. And it’s worth the extra few minutes. I recommend ordering several plates of cheese curds and whatever burger has the pico on it. Or the regular burger and add avocado and cheddar. Just make sure you get lots of cheese curds, because they were the best curds I’ve had since I moved here from the Midwest. We also discovered that Kaliber is a great non alcoholic beer (made by Guinness, apparently) – Dave had been talking about it for the whole trip and the waitress totally lowballed the delivery. “We only have Kaliber, sorry…” as our faces all lit up “Yes!! That’s what we were hoping!” and did I mention the cheese curds? Next time I go I’ll just get three plates of curds for myself and nothing else. Maybe five plates of cheese curds. And a Kaliber.

One last look at the lake

Drove home, hit traffic at exit 190 because you can’t drive around the greater Seattle area without it even at 9pm on a Sunday, and eventually pulled into my parking garage, surprisingly wiped. Showered, straight to bed. I had a pound of buffalo chicken at 9am the next morning because I was ravenously hungry at work. That’s recovery right there. Gorgeous, successful weekend with good company, and I think everyone got to expand their mountain horizons whether it be the dicey traverse, learning to self arrest, or showing off their recently perfected pizza slice on their new favorite toys.

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New favorite toys (Photo credit: Quinn)

Eldorado via the East Ridge (Standard Route)

Posted on September 10, 2015 by evejakubowski

Looking back down the glacier at Mt. Forbidden

“What is your favorite peak to climb in the North Cascades and why?” was the question posed, and a wise, well-spoken man answered. “Uhh you mean, ‘what is your favorite mountain to climb, and why is it Eldorado?'” I knew about the knife edge ridge, and I knew the peak had a cool name. At the time, I didn’t really know where it was, or how to get there, or what it would entail, but I knew it involved that damn ridge, and I knew it’d be awesome. And when the opportunity arose (John didn’t mind going back for a second time) in August, we managed to pull together a group of four for a two day trip, and before I knew it, I was about to climb one of the first glaciated peaks I had ever discovered in Washington. Climbed 8/22/2015-8/23/2-15.

Distance: ~7.6 miles round trip
Elevation: 6800ft gain (yeah that’s right), 8876ft highest point
Weather: 50’s and hazy
Commute from Seattle: 2:30, longer if you’re slow on gravel roads like me
Did I Trip: I don’t think I did. Take that, Eldorado.
GPX file here (summitpost, easy find)

Eldorado from camp through haze and wispy clouds

John and Christina drove out Friday afternoon to secure permits, and I picked up Sam and headed out after work. The weekend started off with the usual buttload of traffic, and me taking inventory of everything I could have forgotten in my head. Ice axe? Got it. Crampons? Yep. Sleeping pads? Yes I can see them from here. Boots? Probably, I mean how could you forget boots. Headlamp? Check. Wait, did I forget boots? No, you’re just being paranoid. Oh you have to be kidding me, stop worrying. No? Fine, pull over and check the trunk [I pull over to the shoulder of the highway] just to double check AND WHERE ARE YOUR BOOTS YOU SCHMUCK?! Yeah, that’s right. We turned around and went back to Seattle. Through 6pm traffic. I hated myself. And there were my boots, innocently sitting next to the front door, looking up at me longingly with puppy eyes wondering why I had abandoned them. How could you.

So we arrived at the trailhead after dark and met up with Christina and John. I popped up my Nemo tent and went right to bed after having a beer, because why not. I had bought approach shoes (by which I mean minimalist trail runners) and packed plenty of unnecessary goodies since I expected an easy climb. We were planning on potentially bagging Dorado Needle too, but that didn’t happen. Oh, and my coworker hilariously suggested we try Johannesburg as a day trip the day before Eldorado. Anyway, I didn’t know how much the trail would kick my ass. Learn from my mistakes and research the approach hikes, folks.

Down to business

The trail gets right to it. It felt like a bushwhack. You cross a few logs going across a river (hope you have good balance with a 50lb pack) overgrown with branches, and pop out in thick woods on the other side. The trail is flat for like 500ft, and then it starts climbing. And climbing. With plenty of rocks and roots to hop over. One log was tall enough I thought I could jump onto it, but the weight of my pack pulled me back and luckily Sam was right below me to push me back upright before I fell backwards on my ass off a 30 inch tall log. Yeah, I gotta work on that core strength. And balance.

I have no pics of the boulder field so here’s the pretty meadow above it

After just over an hour in the woods, we came up to the boulder field. The boulder field from hell. We’ll get to that part. For now, it was my turn to carry the rope, appropriately nicknamed The Green Monster: 9mm, 70m, and clocking in at just over 9lbs. Yes, it’s a rock climbing rope. Add that to your 50lb pack and tell me you’re happy. Suddenly I found myself regretting the 20oz of southwestern-style -chicken, three avocados, and full pound of cheddar cheese that I had in my pack. Come on man, you’d have been fine with goldfish and granola and a dehydrated meal like usual, but nooo, your cocky ass brought a fucking feast. Buns and thighs, baby, working on those buns and thighs.

John and Christina on our lunch rock, Johannesburg in the background

And why’s it called the boulder field from hell? I mean it’s not really that bad. Scrambling is fun (if you can call it that), trail finding is fun, seeking out cairns is fun, and these cairns are actually pretty well made and artsy.. but after 30 minutes, where was the glacier? Where was the peak? Everything looked the same. We were making no progress. Johannesburg loomed in the background, which was cool, except the view never changed. And it didn’t feel like we got higher. The boulder field didn’t end. It just. Kept. Going. That’s why it’s from hell. Because you’re lugging 50+lbs of gear, in minimalist trail runners, sweating profusely because you only brought long sleeves and pants, because you’re an idiot.

Coming backwards down the gully

Finally, after an eternity of identical rocks, you hit trail again, and switchback steeply up a hillside into a gradual meadow. Blueberries!! Blueberries everywhere! Game changer. I felt better. I was double-fisting berries left and right. We took a nice long lunch break above the trees, where I tried to eat as much chicken and cheese and avocado as possible, because fuck if I was carrying that shit for the whole trip if we were in for more neverending boulder fields.

Slabby rocks, haze moving in

From the basin where we had lunch, you gain a small gully on climber’s left that then descends steeply to the valley where the glacier begins. Dropping over the ridge we got our first view of the glacier, and damn was it a good feeling. Going up the valley involved a bit more light scrambling along some rolling slabs of rock flattened by the glacier long ago. It’s pretty cool imaging where the glacier used to be (and a bit sad). There’s plenty of running water there, so we filled up. It’s line-of-sight/path-of-least-resistance to the terminus of the glacier on the right (the side that has a snow finger and isn’t completely broken up). There’s a “swiss cheese” rock that we used as a landmark, a black rock full of holes that, if you didn’t guess, looked like swiss cheese. From there, we aimed for the lowest snow finger, put on our boots (my feet have never been happier to put on stiff ass boots), roped up, and got moving.

The crevasse that blocked us

Sam and Christina were both new to glacier travel. It made me realize how desensitized to certain things I’ve become. When I first started, Eeery crevasse was new and awesome (and a little scary), stepping over them and looking at how the ice was falling and the bright blue color was a whole new experience. At this point, stepping over a crevasse is like walking over a crack in the sidewalk. Shrug. We did pass what we thought was a groaning crevasse, which was unsettling and eerie. On the way down we determined that it was running water, but the first time you hear the noise as you take a step, it’s unnerving. We moved across it quickly.

John and Christina hanging out at camp

We did get sidetracked by one huge crevasse spanning a large section of the lower glacier. We had to backtrack completely, where we found a decent snowbridge to cross. The route at this time of year hugged the rocky ridge on the right very, very closely once we were past the first few crevasses. Like within feet of the rocks, with a few stretches on exposed ice (flat, don’t worry). Once you pop out onto the plateau with Eldorado in the background, it’s a straight shot to the ridge if you’re aiming to camp on the rocky shoulder below the summit. Which you should be, because it has the best views, running water, a short climb to the summit, and… wait for it….

“Due to unusually high use and lack of helicopter availability to empty toilet, this receptacle is out of service for the time being.”

A composting toilet!! WOOO!! I thought Christina was making fun of me when she told me there was a toilet, but there it was in all its glory, with a five-star view of the face of Mt. Forbidden, whose west ridge I’ll climb someday. And I will gaze out at Eldorado, and wonder if there is some majestic crapper looking back at me.

Don’t get too excited, because it was out of order. Due to overuse. That’s right. Overuse. Too much poop. Stop shitting, Washington. Take it from Chris Traeger. I walked dejectedly back to my tent. Oh, and the smoke and haze from wildfires dominated the view and you could barely see Forbidden, and you’d have no idea Moraine Lake was down below if you weren’t looking for it. So we had a useless toilet with no view. So really, just blue bags and smoke. Can’t win ’em all, right?

Throne “view”

After a relaxing afternoon at camp, mostly chilling and eating and whining about the views, I went to bed early. My last summit day had been fairly late (~5am wake up on Shuksan) and we were planning on 3am for Eldorado. You guys, I got the best night of sleep I’ve had in like months. Even including the times I’ve slept in a bed like a normal person. I was unconscious, cozy, comfortable, had the whole tent to myself, it was so wonderful.

Mt. Forbidden and Moraine Lake hidden by haze

I woke up feeling refreshed and still cozy, and hopped out to mooch off someone’s stove to make tea and wait for everyone to be ready. My gear is almost always packed the night before, so I can have time to enjoy my tea. And damn, did I enjoy that tea. I could see the entire milky way, a strip of dense stars, which I’ve only seen once before in my entire life (and that was peeing in a field on the side of the road in the middle of nowhere in Eastern Washington, so it was easy to top). And I sipped my tea, lying on a rock, gazing at the stars, listening to Come and Get Your Love playing from Sam’s iphone in the distance. Okay, I might have requested it. He tried to skip over it and I demanded that he put it back on because I had started laughing as soon as I heard the first few measures. Come on, cheesy upbeat music when you’re on a mountain wrapped in puffy layers at 3am looking at the milky way, waiting to start trekking up a glacier? It’s perfect.

Sun beginning to rise

We started off with me in the lead again. We knew there’d be an impassable bergschrund eventually, but I didn’t know when or where, so we hugged the rocks until it was plainly obvious. By which I mean right freaking in front of us. I had missed the ideal turnoff onto the rocks. In my defense I saw it, and asked about it, but we kept moving thinking we couldn’t be that close to the schrund. So unless we wanted to backtrack, we were on to plan B: a six inch thick snow finger, if you can call it that, which ran for five or so feet to the rocks. More like a diving board. I prodded it with the axe. Welp, we’ll go quickly. It’s early, it’s frozen, we’ll just avoid it on the way down. There was one near miss that involved some teeter-tottering, but we made it. And that was how I almost ended my team at 4am climbing Eldorado.

Just a small several foot jump, that’s all

Sunrise!

Once on the rocks, it was an easy class 2 scramble back to rejoin the snow. We weren’t going to scramble all the way up, hell no, we wanted that knife edge ridge. We took a quick snack break back on the glacier to watch the sun rise, and started up to the ridge.

Coming up to the ridge

The ridge is a dream. I was worried it’d be flatter now because of all the use over the summer, and it was, but it was still only just over a foot wide, with more than enough exposure. You slip, your teammate better hop off the other side (no I’m serious, that’s what you do). I savored every second crossing it to the rocks at the end. I’m not sure my whole team felt the same way, but I live for that stuff. You’re on top of the world. Where’s the helicopter swirling around me to take a crazy panorama while I stand there with outstretched arms, and we can throw in some awesome background music? A Go Pro won’t cut it, if I spin around with that I’m guaranteed to fall off the ridge.

Setting up anchors

This side wasn’t steep enough but damn was the background nice

We took a very long break at the top to take pictures and set up some practice ice climbing so John could test out his new ice tools. It wasn’t as steep as it looked, but that meant we could practice pretty safely. We set up an anchor with ice screws at the top so we could belay the entire thing, and took turns getting back up to the ridge from a starting point we chose. I had John lower me (I’m better at that now, I’ve finally figured out what being perpendicular to the rope feels like) before climbing back up. After maybe two hours, John and Christina went to see if you could scramble all the way back (the answer is yes!) and Sam and I roped up to head back down the glacier. We met back up on the rock by the impassable bergschrund, and took the glacier back to camp (easier than rocks).

Time to head down

Another long break at camp followed by the hike out, which I was dreading. That boulder field was going to be miserable and I knew it. At the base of the glacier I didn’t know what would be worst. Back to the minimal trail runners, or stick with the mountaineering boots? Both choices kind of sucked. I went with the trail runners.

Even before hitting the boulder field, I stopped to wonder what was going on. My feet hurt. Were my socks painfully bunched up somehow, or was all of the skin sloughing off of the bottom of my feet? I didn’t want to know the answer, so I didn’t look. Being absorbed in my feet misery I failed to collect blueberries, or even notice them. On the boulder field, it was me vs. my brain. The epic battle inside my head. It wasn’t on par with the last stretch of Paradise at Rainier a few weeks prior, but it was tough. I don’t even know why. It’s not a long climb, or that physically demanding, the boulder field is just damn tedious. Sam hopped along ahead of us, while I lagged behind relying on him to find the route because I wanted to just space out until the boulder field was past. We took a break after hours (maybe, in my head it was hours) and I whipped out the emergency Gu. Yeah, like my running snacks. I keep some caffeinated ones just in case, and it was time. I hadn’t needed one on a single climb this summer until now. I pounded one and Sam and Christina split the other one since I only had two. It kicked in after maybe 20-30 minutes, and I was feeling much better. When we hit the forest I knew it was only a matter of time.

It would have been gorgeous if not for the taunting stream

“This is where your torture begins” John said after a while. I had just noticed I could hear the river! We must be getting close! I asked what he meant. “We can hear the river so we’re close!” He laughed. That’s the torture. You just listen to it and realize how not close you are, and how little progress you’re making. And as usual, he was right. When we finally did reach the river, I chuckled because I knew crossing those logs would be damn hard with how shaky my legs were feeling, and how my feet were protesting any sort of involvement in my life. But we made it across, dropped out packs at the car, I dibsed the trailhead bathroom first (hell yea) followed by Christina, who had looked exhausted but excitedly exited the bathroom and proclaimed “EVERTHING IS RIGHT WITH THE WORLD!” We ran to take a dip in the river inspired by two other climbers who had just beaten us back to the trailhead. Painful and relieving at the same time. I hobbled in on my half-skinned feet, half crawling while pathetically trying to avoid sharp rocks, and Sam and John joined. John literally just sat down. Clothes and all. Plopped his ass down in the river. There’s nothing like water after an exhausting day. It was a flashback to taking a dip in the ocean after a long run in Breezy Point. Just dreamy.

One more for good measure

Except the I had to drive three hours home before a real shower and bed. We said bye to John and Christina, and by some miracle, avoided all traffic. flipping through the photos the next morning, I couldn’t believe it. Sometimes you get saturated with views and forget just how amazing it is where you are. And then you look back at pictures, and are just stunned by what you did. That’s how many of my trips are. I don’t remember anything without the pictures. And instead, I can sit here scrolling through my own pics, making myself jealous. Great trip, great people, can’t wait for the next one! I hope no one’s sick of come and get your love yet.

Sourdough Mountain/Stetattle Ridge and some Bad News

Posted on February 4, 2015 by evejakubowski

Capital “B” capital “N” type Bad News. The blog will most likely be on hiatus for a while due to a lack of transportation. I was unfortunately rear-ended (sandwiched between two cars) on i-5 a few weeks ago. Sadly, I had been on my way to climb Mount Saint Helens. What I thought was a fender-bender ended up being two new bumpers, a new trunk, new side panels since the back of each was warped, and a new seatbelt, which apparently added up to a totaled car (sorry folks, I’m not exactly driving a benz out here). And the bastard who hit me drove off when he realized the extent of the damage. So here I am, shackled to the concrete jungle on account of some bum who is probably freely whizzing around in his bigass SUV with nary a scratch on his shiny, chrome grill.

Anyway, my priorities are out of line and last Friday I caved and rented a car to take advantage of the sunny weather. Really, it had to be sunny and gorgeous for the first two weeks that I had no car. But hey, I’ll put part of my retail paycheck into a rental if it means getting out on a great day once every week or two (to think I used to be out there 2-3 days a week, damn). What I forgot was that renting a car leaves me at their mercy: if they open at 8, I get a car at 8. I can return it first thing the next morning and have it count as one day, but I can’t pick it up the day before, use it the whole next day, and return it first thing and have that called one day if that makes sense. So I had to either leave after 8am or be back by 6pm. Okay, I’ll leave at 8am, that’s the safer choice.

So, 8:05 I stroll into the Enterprise a few blocks away and luckily they had a car ready to go, which apparently is rare. Sweet. And the woman who helped me was the daughter of my college chemistry professor back at Northwestern! She saw my last rental was in Evanston and we chatted. Ha, small world. Anyway, I’m sure I looked hilarious walking down the street with my ice axe, snowshoes, microspikes clipped to my day pack, the works. It was game time. I dropped everything in the trunk of a shiny new Hyundai Elantra and got behind the wheel and realized shit, there are no gears, how do you know if you’re in drive!? Does something on the dashboard light up if you’re in drive? What do I do with my left foot? Nothing? Oh, no, the light up letters are next to the stick, okay. No clutch, just… put it… in… reverse… and now drive… and… that’s it. Great, I was on my way. Aside from instinctively trying to downshift the first few times I came to a stop light (and every time I exited a highway), it was smooth sailing. No left-foot-braking over here.

Could be a summer trail

I arrived at the Sourdough “trailhead” around 11am, which was maybe four hours later than I’d have liked but hey, rentals. This was only the beginning of my problems. I found the sign for the trail, but where the hell was the trail? Someone had told me to “just start walking and you’ll intersect with it” so that’s what I did, until I was still bushwacking after 15 minutes and turned around. The trailhead is to the right of the building! A solid 100ft from the sign! After that wasted half hour, I was eager to get moving.

It was unbelievably warm and sunny, and I wondered if I’d even need the microspikes. Snowshoes were certainly overkill, but I wanted to put my new day pack through some rigorous activity. I’m product-testing a new pack for REI (which has been less fun than I expected now that I have no car) so I figured I’d keep the snowshoes.

Sneak peeks of views!

The trail was up. And then up some more. And again. Turn a corner, more up. Much of it looked like second-growth forest, and between the sun, the ridiculously warm weather, and the green, it could have been a summer hike. I expected to go off trail around 3800-4000ft, so I was keeping an eye on elevation gain and topographical features. You get sneak peaks of the surrounding mountains, and boy did it look spectacular. I couldn’t wait to get up to the Stetattle Ridge. Alas, after weeks of no hiking and sporadic running, I am not in marathon shape anymore! My ass is slow. And I lost the snowbaskets on my hiking poles. But it was great to just be out again, especially in an area I was so unfamiliar with. I had done hikes that got me close to North Cascades National Park, but I had never been within it! I didn’t know any of the surrounding peaks.

View from my tea spot

My unfamiliarity led to a classic rookie mistake. Rather than following the maps I had laid out of the winter route, I found a bunch of footprints and decided to give those a shot instead. They’re more likely to have experience with the area, right? We’ll just see where they go. Well I imagine that eventually they ended up at a saddle between Sourdough and the ridge I was aiming for, but I didn’t have the time to find out, and they got tricky to follow after a bit anyway. These guys had been post-holing alone a relatively steep slope through trees the entire way, I can’t even believe they made it as far as they did. When I hit my turnaround time, I headed back to the boundary between the national park and forest and sat on a log looking over a valley for snacks and some tea since I clearly wasn’t going to make it to the actual ridge without descending in darkness. Which I considered, but given my luck thus far, I probably shouldn’t push it.

Hiking in the day pack

Plus, my day pack was not impressing me. At all. In fact, it had gotten quite uncomfortable. Yes, I overpacked it by every definition of overpacking (the snowshoes were strapped onto the outside with an ace bandage because I was “resourceful” aka “too cheap to buy a real pack or bungee cords or cut my 50-yard-rope”) but I didn’t think it’d be that bad. It was probably the snowshoes that pushed it past its limits, since everything else fit inside. But the thin straps were digging into my shoulder and the hipbelt did nothing with the weight of the pack besides keep it from bouncing up and down when I hiked. The chest strap pulled the weight forward which was nice, but it was still centered on my shoulders, and I was starting to feel it. But it’s more versatile than the pack I’ve been using, at least, which doesn’t have any outside straps or hip belt or chest strap.

When I first stood up from my snack I was discouraged. Bummer to go all that way to not make it to the top, but you can’t win em’ all, and I’ve had some great hikes out here. The way down went much more quickly than the way up. Well, quickly at first, until I realized a song was popping into my head. “Ey yo Vanilla! Kick it one ti-” No. No! I did not come here for this! It was worse than hustling down Alta Mountain with “It’s Raining Men” in my head and that was pretty bad. Luckily I was down in about an hour and a half – if I had known, I’d have played around a big more at the top – and this fancy rental had an ipod jack (whoa) so I could listen to anything I damn well pleased. And clouds moved in as I was descending, so I don’t feel like I missed out on much. I managed to snap a pic of the day pack in use (okay, I could have tried harder) but I’ll have to take it on a few more excursions. I took it for a few runs in Seattle and it was actually fine for those, though I didn’t pack it with much at all. But this time, I was relieved to take it off back at the car. Though I couldn’t help but think it should have been my Accord waiting at the bottom.

I will definitely have to head back to the Stetattle ridge area if the weather clears up again, maybe in early spring. I’ve seen pictures of groups snow-camping up there, and it looks absolutely incredible. For now, it looks like we have a solid stretch of rain ahead of us, so maybe I will find some cute cafes to read in and have to live vicariously. Or I’ll be the chick arrested for bivvying in the arboretum.

Have Tent, Will Travel

Trail running, mountaineering, and the occasional wipeout

Category Archives: North Cascades National Park