I finally managed to get to sleep despite the best efforts of our chatty neighbours. A couple of hours later, at 6:15, I got up for the usual morning pictures. We eventually managed to rack up by 7:15 and were ready to depart. The sky appeared to be appropriately clear of threatening thunderclouds at the moment (better than two days ago!) Indeed, we actually got views today. Always a plus when climbing.
Two hours later, we were back at the Eye of the Needle, our previous highpoint; now we'd have new and exciting opportunities to get lost again. Since we were in the shade, I was trying to minimize weight, and I sometimes had to wait up for Dave, I was getting pretty cold. Jumping jacks can help in this situation, and I thought about it, but decided that the ledges weren't quite as wide as I would hope for. Instead, I did a couple dozen situps to warm up, which worked for a while. We also saw the helicopter again, now trying to hook something.
Our next checkpoint was the Upper Saddle, from which we should be able to see Exum Ridge and Wall Street. The book says "From here to the Upper Saddle one can simply take the path of least resistance... The best but intricate scheme involves climbing onto the crest of the main ridge... staying on the right (east) side of the crest for 200 feet, and then crossing back... to reach the Upper Saddle". After bumbling around for a bit and crossing some snowpatches, we eventually did reach the Upper Saddle, which is fairly obvious to identify. On the way to Upper Saddle we managed to reach the sunlight. I was thrilled about no longer shivering. Chattering teeth are definitely a minus.
From there, routefinding is pretty obvious through Wittich Crack. It's a big 2-pitch 5.6 crack, which somehow got lost for 24 years after its first ascent, perhaps because it is on the way to the most popular route, Owen-Spaulding, and people were just looking for the O-S. Somehow I forgot to take pictures while leading these pitches. This climb definitely called for a ground anchor; after setting one up, I climbed the moderate crack to a small cove. Since I couldn't tell where to go next, I set up an anchor and found some fixed pins to back up the anchor with. The problem was that the crack ended. I brought Dave up and we investigated our options: 1) continue climbing straight up into an overhang; 2) climb the 5.10-looking unprotectable blank face to the right; 3) oh look! we could climb up and then left on a traverse. Fishing around for the right guidebook photocopy, it suggested that left would work out too. Up and left I went. This part was amazing. Just when I thought I couldn't hang on to the traverse anymore, it ended and I could step out onto a huge ledge, hidden around the corner. I finally remembered to take pictures while bringing Dave up. "Hey Dave, I'm going to lock off the belay and take some pictures now!"
The book says that we end up in the middle of the Catwalk ("easy, but very exposed, 150-foot series of ascending slabs"). So there were indeed a bunch of slabs. We climbed the slabs---probably roped up a bit longer than necessary---but it wasn't completely clear which way to go. We did eventually find the Sargent's Chimney, which was low 5th-class. I placed gear, which was probably a good idea. From there it was almost easy to continue to the summit. We just had a couple of big blocks to walk over or around. We finally got to the summit at 3pm, which could be a problem for thunderstorms (hmm, we should probably be wary of thunderstorms!) but wasn't that day.
Ah, another summit. Views from the top are great, and I'm happy to be up there (isn't that the whole point?), but there's always the question of getting down. In general, the best thing is thinking about the views from the top while safely down at the parking lot.
This summit was actually not too tough to attain, since we had cleverly avoided getting hit by lightning, but it took longer to get there than I would have liked. It felt much less of a slog than Rainier, probably because it was over rock for the most part, not snow, and the altitude was not as much of a big deal. Routefinding was easier on Rainier, though, since we just followed the most common route through the glacier.
It being late, we didn't stay at the summit for long. The goal for the descent was to avoid covering too much new ground. This was mostly successful and we managed to recognize Sargent's Chimney again, which we rappelled down. From there we found the standard rappel point. You have to rappel to your right ("south"), otherwise a 60m rope won't reach the sloping ground.
We added an extra rappel (around a rock) on the way down, as an alternative to downclimbing some sketchy slabs. The rope almost got stuck at one point, but I managed to climb up (not far), redirect it, and pull it loose. Two hours later we were definitely on familiar ground: being able to see the way to the Lower Saddle is a plus.
By 8PM we were back at Lower Saddle. Now, recall that we had "portable toilets". Dave wanted to try using the portable toilet with the seat at the Lower Saddle. He claimed that the seat was pretty good, as was the kit, which contained everything that you would need. While I was waiting, I chatted with other climbers at Lower Saddle. We decided to avoid the glissade, since we'd be wet from the snow, and arrived at our tent at 9:30PM.
Since we didn't really eat any significant amount of food all day, the Mountain House meals were most welcome.
- 0603_valley_sunrise 2744 visits
- 0604_peaks_at_sunrise 4243 visits
- 0607_off_to_summit_again 2195 visits
- 0609_dave_working_hard 2374 visits
- 0614_lower_saddle_again 2350 visits
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- 0618_lower_saddle_from_black_dike 2437 visits
- 0619_hidden_mountains 2710 visits
- 0620_dave_eye_of_needle 2119 visits
- 0621_dave_plus_other_climber 2232 visits
- 0626_chopper_trying_to_hook 2173 visits
- 0629_dave_wittich_crack 2290 visits
- 0633_lots_of_views 2317 visits
- 0634_snowpatch 2175 visits
- 0637_dave_and_riverbed 2713 visits
- 0638_grand_summit_marker 2066 visits
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- 0658_sargents_chimney_rappel 1960 visits
- 0663_dave_rappeling 1893 visits
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- 0668_rescue_gear 1744 visits
- 0669_generic_mountain_scenery 4091 visits
- 0670_dave_pondering_descent 1957 visits
- 0672_dave_doing_awkward_move_again 1718 visits
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- 0676_dave_closeup 1675 visits
- 0677_peak 2092 visits
- 0678_more_wildlife 1890 visits
- 0680_alpine_vegetation 1845 visits
- 0682_middle_teton 1966 visits
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- 0690_vee_shaped_shadow 1848 visits
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- 0693_glissadable_snow_traverse 1952 visits
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- 0712_sunset_and_rocks 1936 visits
- 0715_back_at_tent 2253 visits