As the climbing got more difficult we realized that we weren’t avoiding a gendarme but rather an entire mini-peak. Following Croft’s recommendation, we attempted to pass gendarmes by going on the left and at one point dropped off of the ridge on the left by more than 100 ft (Mistake #2). In the distance we spotted an even taller peak along the ridge, it must be our next objective: Mt Mendel. After going through some notches we finally arrived on top of Peak 13,360. Upon ascending the second gulley we noticed that there was an even taller peak just along the ridge. When we got to the top of the gulley we saw a ramp and then another gully leading to what looked like the real Peak 13,360. The gully is mostly easy 3rd class though it could possibly be blocked with snow earlier in the season and hence an alternative route can be taken just to the right, which also appeared to be easy. After setting up camp we had our dinner of hot soup and mashed potatoes with stuffing (Mistake #1).īy 4am we were on the way up the gulley to the top of what we thought was Peak 13,360. Arriving 7.5 hours after we left we were tired but relieved to have around 12 hours to recover and start the route. We did stop under a big overhanging boulder on the approach for lunch, but we still didn’t expect the approach to take as long as it did. We drove in on Friday night and the hike in on Saturday was pretty uneventful with a few threatening clouds but nothing materialized. As the weekend drew near the forecast predicted thunderstorms so we packed a tent to leave at base camp near a small lake below the first unnamed peak (Peak 13,360) on the ridge. We would hike in on Saturday, start the climb on Sunday, bivy on the route and on Monday we would finish the ridge, descend, break down base camp and hike back out to the car. Peter Croft cites it as his favorite climb and it is widely believed that not many people have done it in a day. An 8 mile ridge in the evolution range, a relatively remote region in the Sierras. I don’t know how it came up but the more we thought about it, the more we liked the idea. It wasn’t that they weren’t challenging, rather, it was that there were plenty of hours in the day to send them C2C. All of these recent trips made us confident, no…cocky, about these oft traveled Sierra lines. Finally my C2C trip with Scotty to do the Palisades Traverse (Thunderbolt to Sill) left us standing atop of Polemonium at 3pm with plenty of daylight to spare. First it was Nate and Charles with Sun Ribbon Arete, then Nate and I on Mithral dihedral which allowed us to return to the car before dark. However, a recent trend in our group of friends has brought the concept of car to car excursions in the Sierras into reality. If this were a couple of months ago, we would have been content with simply camping out somewhere in the Sierras and climbing a route. What should we climb? It was Labor Day Weekend so we had time for something larger than a typical weekend. As usual, monday came and I started to bother my roommate Nate about his plans for the following weekend.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |