baker

Coleman Pinnacle

Date: March 17, 2016

Participants: Rob Janousek, Geoff Zenger

Difficulty: 3.  Easy skiing, but summit scramble sketchy in current conditions.

Report: It’s been a while since I’ve written a trip report.  A trip to Peru, the last few months of Brittany’s pregnancy, selling a condo & buying a house, renovating said house, surgery in December, and the birth of my daughter in January all conspired to limit the number of peaks ascended in recent months.  Nonetheless, a look at the forecast earlier in the week spurred me to book a vacation day and hunt for someone to go on a mid-week trip with me.  I’ve hardly done any uphill in recent months and expected to go for a short tour in the Mt. Baker ski area backcountry, but conditions were good, one thing kept leading to to another, and by early afternoon I found myself standing with Rob atop Coleman Pinnacle.

We set off in Rob’s Delica from my place in Coquitlam just past 6:20am, and after a quick stop at Tim Horton’s we crossed the border at Sumas where there was no line up to speak of and we quickly made our way to the Mt. Baker ski area.  We started skinning from the Heather Meadows base area at about 9am, and made our way up towards Artist Point.  We had been expecting soft powder but to our amazement the whole trip up to Artist Point was atop a thick crust that must have developed on the previous day due to the sun.  Our weather was perfect all day, cool (hovering around or just below zero and nary a cloud in the sky)

The crust combined with an existing track meant that the climb to Artist Point was quick (just under an hour), and from there we reached our main decision for the day, whether to descend to the bowl below us to the east and make an attempt on Mt. Ann or whether to head around Table Mountain and see where we ended up.  Due to the crust we chose the latter and hustled around Table Mountain as quickly as possible in order to minimize our time spent under the south facing avi slopes that had apparently spent their previous afternoon sloughing prolifically.  By 11 o’clock we were on the backside of Table Mountain, where after a few peeks at the map and surrounding terrain to determine that we would be able to return to the car in the evening via Herman Saddle, we decided to ski down the slopes below us and make our way up Ptarmigan Ridge.  Amazingly, behind Table Mountain there was no more crust and the snow from there on was a perfect powder on top of a good base.

The ascent of Ptarmigan ridge from the basin below Table Mountain to Coleman Pinnacle is a superb tour.  It is varied but never overly challenging, at times requiring some routefinding, such as one steep step that was avoided by ducking onto snow slopes on the right and regaining the ridge a little later by skinning up through a gap in the cornice.  A couple hours after leaving Table Mountain behind we were standing on the ridge below the pinnacle with a conundrum on our hands.  On one hand, the summit was so close, but temperatures had risen throughout the day and the direct ascent of the summit from the ridge would have required kicking steps up a snow slope of very questionable stability.  Rob saved the day by noticing a gap in the cornice that we could use to tour around the west side of the peak on steep shaded slopes, which we did, and soon ended up on the ridge just to the SW of the summit.  Here we took off our skis and stopped for lunch.

The pinnacle itself holds some significance for me because it was the destination of one of the two BCMC trips that I had to cancel when I became extremely sick in the Winter of 2013, and I was extremely pleased to be so close to its summit as we finished our lunch.  In good firm snow conditions the ascent of this SW ridge would be trivial, but for us it had a bit of excitement.  The snow to the side of the ridge crest was too sugary to be any good for step kicking and so we ascended the ridge directly on a mix of snow and rock.  Nothing too hard, but slippery enough to keep the blood flowing.  Nonetheless, after a 5 or 10 minute scramble we were standing on the summit with gorgeous views all around!  We were on the summit at around 2pm.

Back at our skis we took off at around 2:30 and we decided to make a slightly traversing descent down the bowl below the pinnacle to the west, making our way down to the basin below Table Mountain, from which we would ascend to Iceberg Lake and up to Herman Saddle.  The ski down was superb with many of the best turns I can ever remember, and with only a couple minor annoyances due to descending a bit too low at a couple points, we made quick time to our low point.  From the low point it is straightforward to ascend up to Iceberg Lake, but was extraordinarily exhausting for me because I was accumulating snow on my skins and I’d forgotten to pack skin wax.  Eventually it hit me that maybe Rob would have some and I borrowed some of his, but by that point my thighs were pumped.  From Iceberg Lake we found a skin track up to Herman Saddle (thank you!), and the route was straightforward yet slow due to my tiredness.

In good conditions, you could probably make it from Herman Saddle to the parking lot in about 5 minutes, but it took us a little longer than that because the horrible crust that we’d encountered in the morning was found once again.  The ski down to the valley bottom was simply terrible and not really any fun at all, but we made it back to the van at 5:30 sharp for a total round trip time of 8 hours, 30 minutes.   Coleman pinnacle is one of the best tours I’ve done and it was only made better by the perfect weather.  Many thanks to Rob for heading down and being great company for a mid-week adventure!

Continue ReadingColeman Pinnacle

Tomyhoi Peak

Date: June 27, 2015

Participants: Alex Le, Geoff Zenger

Difficulty: 3 (solid 3rd, some exposure, never exceeding 3rd)

Report: Saturday was forecast to be the hottest day of the year… what could be a better idea than to do a long day hike with plenty of elevation gain to a beautiful scramble?  Apparently we were the only people who thought this way, as the crowds that I expected to see up at Yellow Aster Butte and Tomyhoi Peak never materialized.  Tomyhoi was one of the remaining “3 star” Matt Gunn routes that I hadn’t climbed, and aside from severe water loss due to the incredible heat (I went through 5 litres of water and was still dehydrated), we had an amazing day.  Tomyhoi is a great scramble in a gorgeous area.

A few delays led us to not leave my place in New West until about 7:20am, and this meant that by the time we hit the border crossing, the line was long (45 minutes), and so we didn’t make it to the Yellow Aster Butte trailhead until nearly 10 o’clock.  Note that the Twin Lakes road has degraded somewhat from the “excellent 2wd” condition described in Gunn’s book.  It could probably be done in most 2wd vehicles, but a few rough sections could make some people being uncomfortable and I was happy to have brought my Jeep.

We set out from the trailhead at about 10 and the day was already terribly hot.  The switchbacks up the initial slope went quick enough, although we had some confusion before the turn off to yellow aster butte.  The guidebook says to “look for a trail that goes off to the left” and at one point we thought we saw a trail heading left, but it turned out to just be a minor spur to a campsite.  The actual trail to yellow aster butte is very well marked with a big sign and obvious when you get there, just minutes before the trail reaches the pass at the end of the valley.  From the turnoff, it was quick going on the traverse to yellow aster butte, and just as we crested the knoll where you see the route down to the tarns and the ridge leading to Tomyhoi itself, it was apparent how amazing the views on the trip were going to be.

From this knoll there are amazing views of Shuksan and Baker, and the ridge from here down to the tarns and up towards Tomyhoi are extremely pleasant and varied.  It took us a bit under 2 hours to the tarns where we had lunch, and from there about 2 hours to wander up the ridge (pushing the pace, really) to the subsummit (with a bit of annoying up and down along the way).  The subsummit is quite nice, but from there the true summit looks very intimidating!

We scrambled down loose ledges to the col between the subsummit and true summit to get a look, and fortunately from the bottom it doesn’t really look so bad.  There’s a groove up to the left, then one from there up to the right, and it’s only from the top of that groove to the top of the ridge (perhaps 8m total) that the going gets quite difficult with decent exposure.  Luckily, this hard part is on the most solid rock of the day and neither of us had trouble ascending it.  For comparison, I’d say that the route is comparable to Sky Pilot, although probably a little easier.  Above this crux, the summit was easy to attain and although it’s a tiny summit, the views from the top were great, with plenty to see in both the US and Canada.  Total ascent time: 4 hours, 45 minutes.  Total water consumed on ascent: 3 litres.

The descent through the scrambling part was challenging for Alex as it was his first true scramble route, but with a bit of guidance and coaching he made it down safely and without too many frayed nerves.  From the subsummit down to the tarns went quickly even though the temperature was still scorching, but a quick dip in the tarns cooled us down and from there it was a tedious and tiring descent back to the car for a total round trip time of about 8 hours, 30 minutes.

In all, Tomyhoi is a fantastic trip and well deserving of the 3 stars that Gunn gave it in his guidebook.  You spend very little time in the trees, so almost the entire ascent is through the alpine, and the trip has plenty of variety including places requiring routefinding and a really nice scramble to top it off!  Sure, I went sweated out at least 6 litres of water over the course of the day, but that just meant that we were lucky enough to be up there on a day where we could have it all to ourselves!

Continue ReadingTomyhoi Peak

Mt. Baker North Ridge

Date: May 28-30, 2015

Participants: Brittany Zenger, Geoff Zenger, John Minier (guide)

Difficulty: 5 (snow and glacier ice to 70 degrees)

Report: As you drive along the Trans Canada Highway from Vancouver to Hope, when you’re passing through Abbotsford Mt. Baker dominates the horizon, and straight in the centre of your view is Mt. Baker’s North Ridge.  This frequent view, combined with both Alpine Select and Beckey’s guide to the North Cascades calling the North Ridge a classic must-do route had led me to gaze at the route for the past few years and want to climb it and return once again to Mt. Baker.

Prior to this trip, we’d only climbed with a guide once before, but given the described difficulty of the North Ridge (extensive climbing on exposed 45+ degree snow slopes and a 30-40m 70 degree ice wall) I sought out a guide to lead us up the route.  I ended up booking John Minier through Mt. Baker Mountain Guides for our wedding anniversary and we lucked out as he is a great guide!  If you’re looking to climb something in the North Cascades I highly recommend checking him and his guiding service out.  They were very helpful in arranging the trip, and he was a great guy to spend 3 days with (even cooked us delicious breakfasts and dinners!).

We began our trip meeting at 7:30 Thursday morning at the Glacier public service centre for a gear check and to divide up our group gear, and once that was done and we’d picked up a hot drink from one of Glacier’s coffee shops we headed up to the Heliotrope Ridge parking lot.  The trudge up to Hogsback was the usual one, but the trail is in good shape, and although the upper rock was already full with a large party, we found a couple nice tent platforms not far below it on a dry rib and were able to set up camp off the snow and on dry land.  Here we had a relaxed afternoon, did an hour or two of mountaineering practice (ice axe arrest, short roping technique, etc), had a tasty dinner, and headed to bed just past 7 for an early rise the next day.

John woke us up at the unholy hour of 2am, and after choking down a few mouthfuls of oatmeal and suiting up, we were set to head out to Mt. Baker’s north ridge by 3:30am.  It took us about two and a half hours to climb up to the Coleman glacier and cross it to the start of the north ridge.  If you look at the route description for the north ridge in Alpine Select, you’ll notice that it suggests two routes: an easier route by going around the ridge to the Roosevelt Glacier and up to the ridge from there or a steeper route straight up through the “hourglass” from the Coleman Glacier, and we took neither.  The Roosevelt Glacier is currently blocked by large crevasses, and the hourglass has a large crevasse blocking all progress.  Instead, we crossed a bergschrund and ascended snowslope about 100m to the left of the hourglass and after two short pitches on steep snow, short-roped the traverse over to the top of the hourglass and from there up to the ridge proper.  On the ridge itself we took a break before ascending up moderate snow slopes to the base of the infamous ice cliff, which we reached at about a quarter to 9.

Looking up at the ice cliff from just below it, I immediately knew how happy I was to have hired a guide (John) rather than attempt the route myself.  Although the ice itself goes at an easy AI3, the exposure below is substantial and the ice itself is far more challenging (i.e. rotten) than anything I’ve previously experienced on weekend ice climbing trips to Lillooet.  The total route length from our bottom belay to a safe belay stance atop the ice cliff is probably about 65m, and if you’re willing to stretch the rope could probably be done (just) in a single long pitch, but we did it as 3 short pitches, which took us approximately 2 hours to fully ascend.

Until this point, we’d had great weather all morning, but shortly after finishing the ice cliff the weather socked in and we ended up with very limited visibility.  Luckily there were some tracks to follow and we made our way up the moderate yet very exposed snowslopes to the final serac band, eventually winding our way up to an anchor station below the final seracs.  Here the normal route trends left, but it turned out that it was a mess of serac to the left, and we ended up having to ascend the steep exposed snowslopes to the right of the seracs which led to the summit plateau across which we wandered, eventually reaching the main summit of Mt. Baker (Grant Peak) just past 2pm.  It was an exhausting but totally exhilarating climb and I was very happy that from this point back to our camp we just had to descend the easy Coleman-Deming route that we’d already done years ago.

On the descent, the Roman Wall was a complete mess of mush.  I was postholing on most steps past my knees (although one of the deeper post-holes turned out to be straight into a small crevasse high on the wall) and although it seemed like it was taking forever, we eventually reached the saddle between Mt. Baker and Colfax Peak and were greatly relieved that the snow on the Coleman Glacier was in much, much better shape for the final descent down to our camp.  We finally reached our tents a bit past 5pm, totally tired, and happy that we’d decided to stay in camp one more night and not push on to the cars.  In camp we settled down to relax, dry our soggy feet, and enjoy another great dinner and eventually headed to bed at a much more reasonable hour than the night before.

Saturday night we had a lazy morning in camp eating a delicious breakfast of pound cake and jam (try it!) and eventually set out for the cars at around 9:30.  The hike out was uneventful except for running into a number of groups of friends heading up for a day or weekend of skiing on the glacier, and a bit past 11 we were back at the cars where we sorted out the group gear again, said goodbye to John, and left Mt. Baker once again for a big meal down at the North Fork Beer Shrine!

In all, this was a fantastic trip, one that I’ll always remember.  Mt. Baker’s ridge was a much more difficult route than I expected it to be.  I always knew that the ice step would be a challenge, but I didn’t realize how full on the rest of the mountaineering would be, and in the end, it stands out as the most difficult snow/ice mountaineering route that I’ve ever done by a good margin.  To finish off this trip report, thank you once again to John and Mt. Baker Mountain Guides for their outstanding service.  We couldn’t have done this trip without you!

Continue ReadingMt. Baker North Ridge