We really did steal a day weather wise as we had good weather and even some sun and yet we drove back through rain at LL and Banff.  Nice to get both peaks and these are really two different scrambles. Walcott (North peak) is listed as an Easy scramble but the scree gully is very rotten and the rain this year has eroded the dirt which makes footing worse and the scree less stable. It also gets narrow and steeper at the top. Definitely need small parties and climb as clean as can or someone will get beaned which puts it in a different category than most Easy scrambles. The top of the gully intersects the side of bigger gully and has two big cairns with ribbons that you need to remember on the way down. We went left over a drainage to the main ridge which leads to the summit of Walcott. Three hours and 15 min for me which is fast for 1300 m.

The South peak - main Burgess summit - is the real prize - an overlooked fun Difficult scramble. Kane’s description is really lame and understated. We descended from Walcott on scree ramps to a bowl below the low point on the interconnecting ridge and then took a gully up to south side of the pinnacle. The correct gully is the third one from the left wall and it has a chockstone halfway up, the pinnacle at the top and several new cairns that we built at the bottom. We reached the ridge on the south side of the pinnacle which has the infamous narrow ledge on its west side. We then worked our way up onto the ridge which was fun difficult scrambling all the way to the summit. A bit loose but more and better scrambling than many of the popular well known scrambles. Back down the ridge and gully and then down into the bowl and cut up and across the bottom of the main Walcott ridge to come out just above the top of the descent gully.

Overall a great day, two peaks and glad to help Vern get his list down to one left.

My camera died so most are Vern’s pics which are really good! - an advantage to scrambling with a semi professional photographer!

Pics at Burgess Walcott  full screen slideshow is best

Verns Walcott and Burgess

Mount Bell NE Ridge has been in the back of my mind for the last two years because of Gary’s accident August 4, 2008.  He fell while we were on approach to the NE Ridge. He has limited memories from before the head trauma and is a new person.  Gary will never be able to do things like drive or ski but he seems happy with his life.

Myself - I needed to go back and do the climb.  Good friends Scott and Wietse agreed to come along on friday.  The forecast was something like 40 percent chance of scattered showers late in the day.  The first obstacle was being allowed to park at the trailhead as road construction prevented access.  This has to a record number of years to rebuild any stretch of the transCanada!  Eventually the flagman let us park on the side of the road.

I had forgotten the wet muddy conditions and loss and regain of elevation to O’Brien lake and next time I will try access a notch in the ridge from the Taylor lake junction. We went up the avalanche gully alonside the ridge and I had a moment when looking over at the accident site but we cut over to the ridge earlier and we started scrambling our way up.  We scrambled the ridge to the first steep step which we went around on a ledge to the left.  The NE ridge is alternating steps and easy spots and is very good hard quartzite to 5.3 and maybe 5.4 (aka as East ridge in some writeups)

As we approached the big steps we had a little shower and then could see a big storm moving in.  Quartzite is really slick when wet and the thunder and lightning was scary.  We retreated along the ridge and then bailed off the side as the rain and hail/sleet hit us.  We hid under an overhang as the lightning put on a show.  After things calmed down we bailed down a shallow scree gully to a grassy ramp that angled all the way down to the valley.  We came out between the 3rd and 4th of the four lakes that are in the valley. It is good to know there is an easy escape route off the ridge as there is no way off once you are above where we bailed.

Another rain storm as we went by O’Brien lake and then steady rain the last 15 min out to the car.  We will be back but only with a good forecast. 

Overall it felt good to be out there especially after I started climbing and leading some sections.  This was something I needed to do and I feel much more at peace with the mountain and myself.

Thanks to Scott and Wietse for coming on the trip and thanks to everyone else for the help and support over the last 2 years.

Pictures at Bell NE Ridge  use fullscreen slideshow.

Right click on largest version to save a copy

Scott’s Pictures

Wietse’s Pictures

Road trip to Black Hills SD.  Visited Custers Battlefield and Devil’s Tower on way down. Black Hills are centered around an igneous uplift and are higher than anything  else east of the rockies. Hard rock with large quartz and gold seams - great history - native american, wild west, gold rushes, and lots of great attractions.  We saw re-enacted gunfights in Deadwood - Wild Bill Hickock shot, museums, etc.  Mount Rushmore and the Crazy Horse monuments are larger than expected and impressive.

Natural attractions include Needles highway, caves, badlands, buffalo, wild horses, Sylvan lake, and Harney Peak.  We went up on Trail #9 for 3.8 miles and ~ 1500 ft ~ 2 hours and back on # 4.  Plan for early day as hot weather can be thunderstorm cycle.

Harney Peak  pics - use fullscreen slideshow

Devils Tower, etc. pics

Trad 5.6 rock climb with guide Mark Klassen and Kevin.  Not many good pics as we were concentrating on the climb and I creased the mechanical lens cover on my best small camera last week so had my old small camera.  A good climb with good positions on the rock . Lots of variety of type of climbing  -  friction, small edging or smearing,  traversing and one pull up and over.  Definitely a classic and well worth repeating.  It was 11 or 12 pitches. I kind of lost track but my favorites were the rising traverse pitch to the right which was full value sustained 5.6, the pull up over the slight overhang pitch and the long slabby corner pitches near the top. I could see several opportunities to go off route complete with old pins to follow. Everything felt reasonable for the grade and was well within our abilities but I would not have wanted to lead it given how little actual rock climbing I have done recently. I wore my rock shoes but my toes hurt and I would have liked something for better edging. Both Mark and Kevin had approach shoes.

Early start worked out well as there were two groups that climbed below us and we topped out easily before they caught up.

pictures at Ha Ling NE Buttress 5.6

Mark’s website Alpinism

Roy, Kevin and I along with guide Mark Klassen and assistant Kris Irwin did the North Face (Kahl route - alpine Grade III) on Thursday.  Solid day as we left the bivy at 2:30AM and were on top by 8 AM.  Good conditions as schrund was easy and only two pitches of easy ice just above the schrund. Double kick on the step kicking on the upper half was lots of work and would not have wanted to be up there later.  There were ski tracks from 2-3 weeks ago and a soloist from Chile went by.  Summit was just at base of clouds so limited view of bigger things like Ball but felt good.  We went down the ridge which was a little more complicated and slower than expected but safe.  The lower gully back onto the glacier is east facing and looked sloppy and then would still have to get by lower part of glacier.
Down the ledges above the waterfall(Nemesis) to bivy at 2 PM and out to car by 4PM for a solid 14 hour day. 

Mark did a great job planning and executing the day and the 2 AM start was crucial to summit success. Very good guiding by both guys which made for a great fun day without the stress.

Pictures at Stanley North Face  Full screen slideshow works best.

Mark’s website Alpinism

pics at Heart Loop

Took about 1 hour to bike to the bridge and campground - turn right on good path to the cabled food hangers (Bears) and then 50 m to come out onto the toe of a big avi path which is the end of the descent gully.  The big pinnacle is right above you and has steep ridges off it which you need to pass under in the trees.  We went right in the trees on a reasonable game path for 30 -40 min and then angled up across several small avi paths until we hit the big path in about 1 hour. Some bushwack but not bad if can find the game routes. 

The correct avi path is big and goes all the way down to the stream.  On the right (north side there is a low wall with trees on it.  We worked our way up staying on little ridges near the bottom of the gully on grass but avoided going up left out of the gully too early. We saw lots of animal signs but no human signs.  One softball sized rock came down which kept us alert.

Just before the wall ends on the right there is a drainage that comes in on the left with very jagged rock that allows access to the upper bowl. No cairn - somebody should build one.  We actually went a little higher to some snow patches and then traversed left on ledges around into the bowl(no easier).  We went up rubbly ledges (easy-moderate) and right to a ridge that lead up to the right end of the cornice and to the summit plateau (cairn)which was large and windswept.  Summit is 200m to right - some fresh animal tracks in the snow.  No register and too cold to linger so went SE and worked our way down to col at top of first descent gully.  A white goat looked over the gully edge and seemed fascinated with us.

Scrappy shale rock and debris lead down to snow. No joy as the deep freeze overnight, early start and cool overcast day meant we had to kick steps to safely get down the steep parts. The goat came down the steep cliffs above us and was always looking over the edges and followed us down which caused some rockfall.  The biggest was twice the size of my head but fortunately nothing hit us.  Eventually the snow  softened up and we could dig our heels in and even boot ski the final lower angle bit.

The gully leads out to same avi path that is beside the campground.  Great bike run out - back uphill a bit to high point by start of Brett trail and then 13 minutes out from there.  Eight hout RT despite the slow time on the snow and a 30 min lunch.

Very good trip with good conversations with Vern and with no route finding problems or scary jumps.

Pictures - use full screen slideshow Copper

We debated the stream crossing for Mary Barclay and should we just take bikes but decided how deep could it be - well - too deep and fast - so plan B became Limestone Mountain and the Lime Wedge ridge.

I was expecting more and better trail but okay bits - easy to lose as crossed 3-4 gullies - but easy to get to ridge.  Some moderate scrambling on crumbly rock but fun. On top in 1 hour and 40 min. 

Descent to the col was back a bit on ridge and then down a left hand gully and then down a ledged face. See pics - about 5 m of moderate on some black rock with good holds.

From col we went around to right on a trail and then up scree and slabs beside a small wall to top ridge in about 30 min.  good views.

Descent down scree to trees and back right around col. Descend drainage and then cut right at trees at end of wall on the ridge to regain ridge - some trail and cairns.

pics at Limestone - Lime Wedge   Best to use fullscreen slideshow.

Kevin, Aspen and I were looking for an easy snow free day which is hard to get this spring.   We decided on Gunnery becasue Kevin had looked at it on Sat as he and Wietse came back from a waist deep wallowing exercise on Pasque.  Gunnery is just on the North side of the road from Longview which junctions with # 40 . There are several hike routes but all start right at the road. It is about 550 m and 3-4 km RT.

We decide to take a faint hiking trail which starts near a drainage on the west side of Gunnery which leads to the col on the N side of Gunnery since we had Aspen(small dog) and we were scouting the best access route for SE ridge of Holy Cross.  Next time I will just do the SE ridge of Gunnery since it may have some scrambling and would be the most direct route - Note that it would make an easy evening execise objective.  We still had some ankle to knee deep snow in the trees above the col.

Holy Cross ridges looked very snowy and needs at least several weeks yet unless the weather gets really hot.  Burke and Plateau to the south looked very snowy as well.

Pictures at Gunnery

Saturday was forecast as showers but it was the day I could get away so I picked something easy from Andrew Nugara’s guidebook.  I was suprised at how good the trail was in the trees.  Good grade but steady uphill and basically out of the trees in a little over an hour. The ridge has some steps/outcrops but always a bypass trail if want to keep it an easy scramble. The final 200 m of scree is best avoided on the way up by staying to the right near or on the rock. At the top a small easy step to access the summit - cairn and register- 2:15 hrs.  The second summit is 300 m away and I went along the top of the narrow ridge in blowing snow and cloud. One 5m slabby moderate down climb - rest easy with 40 m elev drop to saddle.  Second summit is close to same elev.  To the west is another small summit 75 m awaywith some easy - moderate moves.

The north faces looked full on winter but route was dry all the way.  Snow pellets most of day but no rain.  As was driving out there was full pouring rain and wet snow at Baldy and Barrier Lake so I got very lucky.

Overall a good training jaunt - 4.5 hrs all in with lunch, leisurely pace etc and good trail in the trees so this could be done in an evening.

Pictures at Wasootch