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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Topic Author's Reply - Jan 11, 2010 - 11:14pm PT
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Misha, great trip report and absolutely wonderful weather! I'm not sure I've ever been in Canada and had to worry about getting clouds in the sky for those big mountain shots!
And what's with all the North Face pictures at the end? Third time's a charm!!
Great images and a great story too. Inspiring...
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Jeremy Handren
climber
NV
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Jan 12, 2010 - 12:29am PT
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She's a bigg'un.
The plan was to camp at the col, cruise the Fuhrer ridge, romp down the Kain face and stroll back up the glacier to the comfort of the tent, before sauntering back down under the North/Emperor face the day after. Unfortunately, late in the evening of the next day I realized my mistake. After a 20 hrs of great but exhausting climbing, up to the summit and down the Kain face and then slogging up half a mile of waist deep mashed potatoes on the glacier, I stood, dripping wet, at the base of a 200' high serac band separating us from the comfort of the tent. I don't know how I missed it, but there it was, the head of the glacier was completely blocked by this huge and ugly looking serac.
Given that I was having a hard time putting one leg in front of the other,it didn't seem like the best time to attempt a grade 6 pitch, and the terrain looming above my head looked pretty ill. A maze of evil, dripping ice blocks, overhanging sheets, and huge ice fins towered above in the late evening gloom. I picked the cleanest looking line and started up. Luckily the soft summer ice made for fairly quick progress. About halfway up a long vertical section I noticed that the placements started to feel a bit hollow, but I pressed on hoping for what looked like a ledge at the top of the steep section. " A Bit Hollow" soon became holy sh#t whats happening! My tools were breaking right through the ice. It soon became apparent that I was climbing a huge shard of ice that had broken off from the main serac. With about 6 feet to go to the top of the ice sheet I had no option but to try and and continue up, hoping that the ever thinning sheet didn't just crumble under my weight. After a terrifying series of delicate moves I found myself hooking my tools over the top and looking straight down the other side into an inky blackness. The sheet of ice that I had been climbing for the last 100ft was no more than a few feet thick at best, narrowing to just a few inches where I now teetered on my front points. A hasty and flamboyant move over the top of fin and a bit of tension from my partner allowed me to lean accross the void and plant a solid tool in what appeared to be a more solid sheet of ice on the other side. After a quick adrenalin soaked surge of activity I pulled onto the perfectly flat glacier about 50 yards from the tent. We were cooking up a nice hot brew in no time.I don't think I've ever had a quicker transition from utter terror to domestic bliss.
Its been nearly 20 years, and I can still remember that awful feeling as I realized what I was climbing. In fact, that was just one episode of several, getting of that Mountain was a frikken epic.
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10b4me
Ice climber
Ice Caves at the Sads
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Jan 12, 2010 - 12:47am PT
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Ed, local, and Jeremy great stories.
Robson was one of my goals bitd also. probably not achievable now.
Ed, you should have submitted your tr to Alpinist.
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Clint Cummins
Trad climber
SF Bay area, CA
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Jan 12, 2010 - 01:45am PT
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My wife climbed the Kain Face when she was in high school (around 1974), with her dad, 2 brothers and one of their friends.
Her mom stayed in the campground, and had a bear encounter when a bear tripped over one of the peg lines in the dark and fell onto the tent, collapsing it! The bear had bad breath, too! :-)
And a couple of my college climbing friends disappeared when attempting the Wishbone Arete in summer 1984. There was a search, but no trace of them was found. It's a huge mountain.
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J. Werlin
Social climber
Cedaredge, CO
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Jan 12, 2010 - 11:43am PT
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Great thread Ed.
I was up there with my partner the following year (maybe early August 1986) with the same plan as you: Forster Hut/Wishbone. This was the last stop on a glorious two month road trip, ticking some of the easier 50 Classics. Yosemite, Sierra, Tetons, Winds, and a few days before a stormy ascent of the North Face of Edith Cavell.
After two months of rice and beans I was down to a wiry 125 lbs., but emotionally thin from the trials of Cavell. Up at the hut the weather rolled in and we waited out the day, still hoping, subsisting on a old can of refried beans we found in the hut so as not to deplete our "altitude" rations.
Day three we opened the door to 3 feet of new snow. Time to bail. I took an unroped bouncer coming down the rock terraces, landing startled, stuck to my waist in the snow. Lower still, at a rest break, my red Joe Brown helmut came unclipped from my pack and took its final ride into the mists.
edit: your pics brought back great memories. Thanks Ed.
Sorry, no pics from me. My partner has the slides.
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Cloudraker
Big Wall climber
BC
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Jan 12, 2010 - 11:54am PT
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Ian Welsted on soloing the Emperor Ridge (2004?)
http://www.gravsports.com/Aerobic%20Pages/peaks.htm
Emperor Ridge Notes
Here's a time for your huck-fest page, more as a challenge than as a record time (I'm curious if it is, and thought you might know) as I'll explain. Left Berg Lake trailhead at 3:20 am on Monday, July 26th, at the bottom of the rock of the Emperor ridge (bottom of route) at 10 am, at summit at 6:30 pm, in a whiteout. My idea had been to do it car to car in 24 hours, but I'd never been down the normal route, so I had to sit it out til it cleared a bit. Started down at 3 am on Tuesday, got to the car at 12:20, making it 33 hours round trip. Elevation gain same as your trip up the normal route. Notes: 33 hours minus 8 and a half hours on the summit is about 24 hours. Also, I didn't know the route, so I carried extra gear including protection which I didn't use. Someone going light, knowing the route, and lucky with the weather could definitely have a "good day out in the mountains".
I don't know if you want to post this, but I thought that 24 hours on one of the supposedly "technical" routes was a good challenge.
Also, in the hut book on the normal route (Ralph Forest is it) John Ionescu wrote that he had done the north face in 15 hours car to summit, which is the same as my time and doesn't seem that unreasonable. I was pretty messed at the time so maybe I read it wrong, but I'm pretty sure that's what he wrote. Anyways, if you have a sec maybe get back to me if you know what the established speed time is.
Cheers
Ian Welsted
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Mighty Hiker
climber
Vancouver, B.C.
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Jan 12, 2010 - 12:02pm PT
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I believe that Will Gadd has done it in fairly quick time from car to car, but don't remember how quickly, or the route. It's written up somewhere.
I think it was part of a trip where he did Robson, zipped south, then did Assiniboine, all in a few days.
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Topic Author's Reply - Jan 12, 2010 - 12:23pm PT
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The log in the Forster Hut is classic reading... we were feeling bad that it took us so long to get to the hut, that is until we read some epics in the log where people took 3 days, getting lost on the way up.
I still love the memory of the entry that went something like this: "After recovering from a broken bone climbing injury incurred when a plate of rock slipped out from underneath me on this mountain. I decided to get back on the horse and solo the SSW Ridge. On summit morning as I was following another team, I heard the voice of God as I reached the top of Little Robson: 'Bob, you're being an as#@&%e!' I took that as a bad sign and descended."
There must be some great mountain literature to mine out of those log books. Are they available somewhere from the Canadian Alpine Club? It would be a great read.
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golsen
Social climber
kennewick, wa
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Jan 12, 2010 - 01:12pm PT
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Cloudraker. While that was an awesome accomplishment I am sure it says Emporer Ridge, not face.
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Cloudraker
Big Wall climber
BC
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Jan 12, 2010 - 04:27pm PT
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Golsen, yes my mistake thanks for the heads up.
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Wayno
Big Wall climber
Seattle, WA
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Jan 12, 2010 - 04:42pm PT
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Nice thread, Ed. Robson is an awe-inspiring peak. I happened to meet one of the first ascensionists of the Wishbone Arete just last October. Don Gordon lives here in Seattle and I chatted with him for several hours about climbing and the Wishbone. His stories were fascinating and as I recall he wasn't sure how he and Sherrick made it up that thing. Don is great guy to talk climbing with. He hasn't climbed in years, but he lights up when he talks of those days.
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Fritz
Trad climber
Hagerman, ID
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Jan 12, 2010 - 09:26pm PT
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My thanks to all that posted stories and photos. Robson was on my North Idaho "Wish List" from 1975-1980. We would work ourselves north up Highway 93 and turn around when we saw the weather was wrong.
Two of us made it to Jasper once: when we hitch-hiked up from Columbia icefields to see a buddy in the hospital, that we had rescued from the glacier near Mt. Athabasca. He broke his ankle over-jumping a crevasse.
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kunlun_shan
Mountain climber
SF, CA
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Jan 12, 2010 - 10:26pm PT
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Robson was the 1st peak I ever attempted. It was 1980 and a fellow ski patroller and I were interested in climbing, but we lived in Kamloops, BC, didn't know anyone who climbed, and the only "real peak" we knew of was Robson. It was 1980. I was 21, and my partner was a few years older. I'd acquired Chouinard's "Climbing Ice" the year before, had read it multiple times and practiced frontpointing and French technique on a few roadside water ice trickles. Dan borrowed an axe and crampons somewhere, though I don't remember if he had ever used them before. From Kinney Lake we started up the toe of the Great Couloir and eventually onto rock towards the SW ridge. It was a gorgeous sunny day and we enjoyed the easy rock and our first real climbing. We had no guidebook and didn't realize there was a trail to the Forester Hut (can't remember if we even knew about the hut at the time). After about 12 hours of ascending steps in heavy leather mountain boots, hauling 50-60 pound packs, we exhaustedly bivouacked and pitched our tent on a ledge behind a big rock near the top of a spire just below the final short ridge leading to the hut. When we awoke the next morning it was snowing and we decided to head down. We got absolutely soaked and I dropped my pack trying to pass it onto a ledge during the downclimb. We watched it tumble and disappear into the clouds below with tent, camera and all my gear. Dan thought it was gone forever, but I couldn't resign myself so easily to losing everything, so we kept descending in the direction it had fallen, and to my amazement finally found the pack. It was shredded enough that I never used it again. My pack had stopped just before it would have vanished into a huge hole created by the waterfall flowing into snow near the bottom of the Great Couloir. I had a Chouinard alpine hammer tied to the pack with 1/2 inch webbing and amazingly the hammer had somehow lodged, broken the webbing and stopped the pack, just as everything started to spill out. We also discovered the trail on the way down.
A month later we were back, this time with a guidebook. We beat our time to our previous bivy spot by about 7 hours, and made it to the the hut in totally socked in conditions. The next morning we headed up onto snow and ice, but after only a couple hundred feet turned around as it was impossible to see the route. The only thing I remember about the downclimb was we had slightly better visibility on the short narrow section of ridge just below the hut. On the way up we didn't realize how exposed that section was, but on the descent could see enough that we crawled across it.
I can't remember if my 3rd attempt was the same summer or the next. I teamed up with another pro ski patroller. John was an expert skier and superb athlete, interested in becoming a mountain guide, and thought Robson would be a good start. We made fast progress as I was now familiar with the beginning of the route. We climbed the very short chimney to the ridge just below the hut and as John arrived I said, "Look over here!" He stood up, peered over the edge at maybe 3,000-4,000 feet of exposure, quickly sat down, and in a few minutes decided he'd had enough. I was left alone. I later discovered he'd made it back to the highway in near record time, started hitchhiking, and was back home in Kamloops by 2am. I continued on, spent the night in the hut, and had an early start around 5 the next morning. I left a note in the hut with my sleeping bag saying where I was headed, and a few words for family and friends in case I didn't return The snow was firm and made for easy climbing. Dawn broke and I could see for hundreds of miles. In a short time I was on top of Little Robson, but the Schwartz ledges had lots of snow and I had little experience. I was sure I would die if I continued. By the time I started to descend clouds had built, there was a bit of an inversion, and the snow turned soft. It was a scary descent with snow sticking to my crampons. I made it down alright and stumbled along the final section of trail in the dark. I guess I didn't even have a headlamp. It was so long ago that only certain details remain. That winter I ski patrolled with 3 people who had spent the summer teaching climbing at Yamnuska (one went on to summit Everest). They took me waterfall ice climbing and introduced me to belaying and vertical ice. Kind of crazy that Robson was the first peak I was on. Luckily I was young and survived.
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'Pass the Pitons' Pete
Big Wall climber
like Ontario, Canada, eh?
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Jan 13, 2010 - 12:39am PT
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Great stuff, thanks guys!
FortMental - welcome to McTopo, eh? Who are you, by the way? Excellent photos and story.
Has anyone on this thread actually summitted Robson??
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guyman
Trad climber
Moorpark, CA.
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Jan 13, 2010 - 01:35am PT
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FortMental... good shots.
I have tried it one time, all good fun. My partner was on his 4th try... he said it was predictable that the rain would start to fall when we hit the parking lot. The approach could be one of the best backing trips ever, waterfalls, milk-white rivers, bears and a hut to dry off in!
We bivied at the Extinguisher, and while going down to the "shitter" I realized that there were monuments to people who had died on the Mountain, several of them, I stopped counting at like 75. That was a very sobering thing to see and something I had never seen on a mountain before. Something I will never forget.
We got up past some really crazy ice falls but the weather was not with us. It would go to full white out every day at like 2pm. We went down when food/fuel ran low.
Someday I will be back.
good post...
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guyman
Trad climber
Moorpark, CA.
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Jan 13, 2010 - 12:08pm PT
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Thank you for the shots.
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nutty g
Mountain climber
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Five of us were fortunate enough to climb Robson via the Kain Face on our first attempt on Aug.23,1983. We had sunny weather for 5 straight days--beginners' luck, I guess. After a nine hour drive from Montana, we spent our first night bivying on the shore of Kinney Lake. Next day we made it to the lower Robson glacier and the third ,to the Dome. Third-classed the Kain the next day in perfect weather, although we belayed the face on the descent because of deteriorating snow/ice conditions.
When we first arrived at the Dome, we were surprised to see a lone skier descending from the Roof! He got to the top of the Kain, and we thought: boy, this is going to be interesting!! But after peering down the Kain for a while he ended up removing his skis and front-pointing down to our camp. Carrying only a light day pack, it was none other than Peter Zvengrowski(sp?), better known as "Peter Peru" and his exploit was written up in the Vancouver Sun as the "first ski descent of Robson"--part of it, anyway. Late that afternoon he left us to try a direct ski descent of the Dome in the general direction of Berg lake, but returned at sunset, visibly shaken. He had become spooked by the increasingly steep and exposed terrain, and had had to place a screw, remove his skis, and crampon back up to our camp where he bivyed that night before skiing out the Robson glacier next day.
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nutjob
Trad climber
Berkeley, CA
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Bump for good stories, pretty pics.
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