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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Topic Author's Reply - Feb 25, 2007 - 11:25pm PT
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Things were starting to feel kind of big: big sky, big space.
At one point, the ridge drops through Buchanan pass and a trail is crossed, It felt still pretty darned remote though.
This is what this section looks like at sunrise, early springtime, from a road on the east side, with Sawtooth in the center and my bivi on Algonquin Peak, along the ridge to the left:
Looking back north on the rolleys:
Looking west in the vicinity of Buchanan Pass:
Sawtooth:
All the photos are pretty bleached and rough; they were sort of dark and I had to extract what I could.
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Topic Author's Reply - Feb 25, 2007 - 11:29pm PT
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Paganmonkey:
Nope.
Clue me in Bro!
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Topic Author's Reply - Feb 25, 2007 - 11:45pm PT
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OK, so the weather was clearing.
I started to view some more challenging terrain ahead, maybe for the next day.
It was like a gift; after all, the fell walking was cool, but I wanted some rock.
It also looked and felt like the perfect trap, kind of like a spider's web.
So this is Paiute's seldom viewed NW face coming into my sight,
Also, in the far right corner, that little blob of snow, is Algonquin:
(This's where Lisa & I were married 3 years later, but that's another story):
Then, 12 hours into it, I summited Algonquin; 12 sumthin' feeties.
I was at the end of the easy stuff.
I snapped this pic looking toward Audubon, layed out a black trash bag to melt water in the snow and went to sleep.
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WBraun
climber
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Feb 25, 2007 - 11:51pm PT
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"....layed out a black trash bag to melt water in the snow and went to sleep."
While the gardener worked effortlessly in the background.
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Topic Author's Reply - Feb 25, 2007 - 11:53pm PT
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Hahaahhaha!
Most excellent point my friend.
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paganmonkeyboy
Trad climber
the blighted lands of hatu
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Feb 25, 2007 - 11:57pm PT
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oh its just more of the same - grandeur and majesty everywhere you look ;-)
you can take 14 to cameron, hang a right on laramie river road before chambers lake - then take the west branch/rawah trail up to grassy pass from the south and come down on the numbered lakes and there's a sick ridge between south and north rawah. i'd been meaning to take a couple llamas in there from that ranch near ft fun for a decade now, ever since running into a SAR guy with pack goats on the way to greyrock (excellent climbing on and east of greyrock i'm told...) if you fish, the lakes used to be full, but i'm not sure the whirling epidemic didn't take the population down a bit.
camp lake is crowded - #s 2, 3, 4 and the twin crater lakes were mucho better imho...and the wall in front of lake 4 - not sure if there's anything that would go on it, but it's pretty shear.
i think the nokhu crags are a little too broken to have anything on them as a route, but still a formidable hike up and on from 14 - used to ski there from time to time too...
thanks tarbuster - way sweet memories this brings ;-)
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Jello
Social climber
No Ut
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Feb 26, 2007 - 12:11am PT
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Tar- you nail the heart of the matter, every time.
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Topic Author's Reply - Feb 26, 2007 - 12:15am PT
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Yah Pagan,
Cameron Pass is sweet viewin' fer sure: it's good to know there's more stuff adjacent to it to git' all rolled up in.
So are the memories sweet, eh?
The present, which contains our recollection of the past as well as our anticipation of the future -it's all we got.
...and then there's that gardener dude.
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Topic Author's Reply - Feb 26, 2007 - 12:17am PT
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Thanks Jeff.
'Nice to have you aboard.
I like ridin' your sloop too.
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bob d'antonio
Trad climber
Taos, NM
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Feb 26, 2007 - 12:52am PT
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Nice stuff Tar...now go buy my guide to the area.
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Prod
Social climber
Charlevoix, MI
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Feb 26, 2007 - 08:56am PT
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The "Roy" I used to know hated hiking, no, he f*#king hated hiking. It was just an ends to the means of a great piece of rock. Or in some cases the end of the con of me, to get me to follow him up some chossy obscure route that no one else would do with him.
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Topic Author's Reply - Feb 26, 2007 - 10:03am PT
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I know Prod (Guy), all troo.
And we did git' up some obscure stuff.
But this wasn't hiking; even though I was on my feet, putting one in front of the other,
It was like some bizarre fight or flight skyline steeplechase.
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Topic Author's Reply - Mar 1, 2007 - 10:50am PT
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...Back to the Colorado Indian Peaks Continental Divide ridge traverse from Wild Basin south to Isabelle Glacier.
The prior day was a good one.
I'd left the car at 7am and hoofed it pretty good to get a lot of beautiful, grassy, cross country ridge top scenery underfoot, arriving on top of Algonquin Peak at 7pm, right at the crown of the easy terrain.
The sky dawned clear, with a good view to the west:
And to the southeast my morning’s work in plain view;
A couple hours worth of 4th class ridge work leading up into Paiute Peak’s NW face:
In the far background are, left to right, Navajo & Apache, with the prominent sunny snow saddle between (actually Navajo Glacier's upper lip); they are connected to the ridge in the foreground by the continuous and well defined crest of the Continental Divide.
Panning south I could see Cascade Creek drainage, where the Crater Lake Cirque, home to the popular Stettner Route on Lone Eagle Peak is bounded by a rocky and glaciated east west ridge now in plain view.
From left to right are Navajo Peak, Navajo Glacier, Apache Peak, Apache Glacier, Peck Glacier, & Hopi Glacier (Hopi in full sun). The prominent sunlit tower dead center is either Limbo or Iroquois, with Lone Eagle's sun-scraped summit straight below:
I really had just a rough idea how far I could make it this day, but I really wanted to get up on that cool snow saddle between Apache & Navajo. First I had to navigate the ridge to Paiute, get up a reasonable break in Paiute’s NW Face, then discover Mt Toll’s North Ridge.
As you can see by the red line, er, I didn’t quite get to continue on to Apache & Navajo; more about that in a bit…
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Topic Author's Reply - Mar 1, 2007 - 01:49pm PT
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From mid way along the dragon's back ridge leading up to Paiute,
Looking back along my path past the bivi on Algonquin, towards Wild Basin, Meeker & Longs in the far background:
The rock ridge was varied; mostly 4th class. I jammed a 70' 5.7 crack to regain the ridge when I mistakenly followed a grassy ramp too far around a corner. At one point I down climbed a short overhang and then hanging from jams, let go to free drop down onto the path below. Just past that, getting around a tower, I needed to downclimb a 5.6 OW.
One of the towers along the way:
Paiute's lower NW face was split by a nice 3rd class cleft which went very straight forward; then to top out I opted for an icy chimney, which required a section of fingerlocks mixed with a spicy mantel right at the extraction point. When I topped out, I sucked in some sharp air, looked over the edge back down toward the ridge and viewed a perfect 3rd class v-slot which I would rather have used...
The top of Paiute offered an excellent view of my next challenge, which would be the N Ridge of Mt Toll. The question was, which of 3 prominent lines?
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Topic Author's Reply - Mar 1, 2007 - 10:26pm PT
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Given that I was shod in comfy "Blue Meany" Robbins boots and burdened with a 30 lb pack, I needed to savor the cruise factor, going wherever possible up the most direct and easiest path.
So I chose the middle of the 3 lines on Mt Toll, between the 2 sunlit buttresses, just right of the continuous snow gulley, where I could tip toe up the perfectly flat 5th class granite.
I now know the standard 5.6 N Ridge route to be the Buttress on the right, but at the time I figured it was the choppier looking buttress on the left.
Once over the 5th class on Mt. Toll, I hit my stride back on the routine 4th class terrain and stopped to take a shot down my path:
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Mimi
climber
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Soothing to the soul Roy. Glad to see you're in your element big time right now.
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Topic Author's Reply - Mar 1, 2007 - 11:34pm PT
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Yah, that sums it up nicely Mimi.
This 2 day section on the divide was lush, lonesome, and compelling; I never saw any tracks or traces. When I was forced to leave by the weather, I felt torn away from my place and I just wanted to stay up there on that fertile edge: moving quickly, making choices, being careful…
This last shot shows what is perhaps the top of Shoshoni’s West Face, climbed by Jello & referenced by him upthread. I had scant opportunity to know what lurked beneath; after summiting Mt Toll, then romping over Pawnee Peak, the weather was gathering again and my swiftness was urged, but at times, when I passed above features like this, I would peer around the edges and sense the uplift of air speeding up the vertical rise from way below.
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Zander
Trad climber
Berkeley
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Tar my friend,
You have made my day! Thank You.
Zander
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Jello
Social climber
No Ut
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You have completely nailed the goodness and adventure, Tar. You brought me along on the whole traverse.
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Topic Author's Reply - Mar 2, 2007 - 12:17am PT
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Hey Zander & Jeff what nice things to say.
Cheers,
Roy
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