Sierra Trip Reports

Locations: Plan “A” locations included the North Couloir on North Peak (12,242 ft.) and the North Couloir on Mt. Gilbert (13,106 ft.). Plan “B” locations included either the North Couloir on Mt. Gilbert or the Harrington Couloir on Mt. Thompson (13,494 ft.). Actual locations were the basin of Mt. Gilbert and Mt. Thompson.

Dates: Friday Night, October 29 – Sunday, October 31, 2010

Climbers: Nick & Jon (and Brandon for the first hour of Friday night!)

Photos: Nick (unless otherwise noted as Jon)

Synopsis: When travelling in the alpine zone, one’s plans are largely dictated by weather and conditions. Flexibility is the key in my mind. Set forth below is a chain of events that started with a plan developed over the course of the work week, weather monitoring, a change of plans and then further plan changes up through the entire weekend.

Ultimately, this TR is mostly an account of our plan changes and a bunch of scenic pictures – as alas, nothing was actually climbed. Would I depict it as a “failure” of weekend, absolutely not. Any weekend spent in the High Sierra after a beautiful coating of snow is amazing, regardless of what is accomplished. Therefore, this TR is an account of a great weekend, in cool area I had not been, and depicts some mountain decisions that I am proud of. It always feels good to know that you recognized unfavorable conditions and made the decision to back down.

Plan “A” was originally for Jon, Brandon and me to drive up from the Bay Area on Friday afternoon to Saddlebag Lake and camp Friday night, climbing several of the North Couloirs on North Peak on Saturday. Over the course of the week, we monitored the weather, which was calling for 2-4 inches of snow over the course of 11 PM – noon on Saturday. Our concerns were going to be (i) road closures and (ii) wind-loading by the southerly winds of the top snowfields in the N-facing couloirs. We knew going in that we may back-down. Following North Peak, Brandon would head back to the Bay Area, while Jon and I headed on to Bishop to climb the North Couloir on Mt. Gilbert on Sunday.

Unfortunately, we got a late start on Friday due to work schedules and did not leave the Bay Area until around 7 PM. Right at the exit on I-5 for Highway 120, I noted to Jon that we should check to make sure Tioga Pass had not yet been closed as a preventive measure. After calling, we found out it was. Immediately, our plans to climb North Peak came to an end (as well as a quick route across the range to the High Sierra).

Due to the closure, Brandon had to go back to San Francisco because he could not spend both Saturday and Sunday in the mountains.

Jon and I decided to drive on Highway 88 to Carson Pass and camp at the pass. We got up there around 11 PM and set a quick camp and decided that due to the further length of driving all the way down to South Lake outside Bishop (for the approach to Mt. Gilbert), it would be highly unlikely we would be able to climb anything on Saturday. Sunday was the likely goal to climb Mt. Gilbert.

Nonetheless, on Saturday morning we awoke at 5 AM and got on the road early. We figured we could at least have a good hike on the approach up to Gilbert to scope conditions for the next day.

On the drive down 395, the High Sierra was basked in the remnants of the Friday storm that was looking to clear by around 11 AM. Here, Mt. Morrison (12,268 ft.) looks imposing in dark clouds in the early morning sunlight. Photo: Jon

We were getting excited as the far eastern slopes of the range only appeared to have received a dusting of snow. Carson Pass had not received any the night before. We realized, however, that further into the Mt. Gilbert zone could call for more snow.

After stopping for some coffee and pastries as Schats in Bishop, we made it up to South Lake (approx. 9,700 ft.) and packed our gear for the approach hike by 10:30 AM. Although we realized this was way too late of a start to actually get in and climb the couloir, we took our ice tools, rope and rack regardless in the off chance we could at least climb a couple of pitches. Although this likely just added unnecessary weight to the approach, at the time it made sense.

Here Jon crosses one of several bridges on the initial approach to Mt. Gilbert/Mt. Thompson on the Treasure Lakes/Bishop Pass trails. There was ½ inch-2 inches of snow on the trail. Note that most of the snow would melt out down low by Sunday.

Unfortunately, due to that same snow, the approach to Mt. Gilbert took much longer than anticipated. Once you break off the trail, it is essentially endless bolder/tallus/scree hoping to the basin. Typically, there are more easier slabs to climb up (which we would do on Sunday). With those slabs covered in snow, we resorted to a very slow movement through boulders/tallus.

Here Jon is working up some slippery boulders. Fortunately, the weather looked like it was clearing!

I would like to stress that in order to rock a day-trip up to the Mt. Gilbert or Mt. Thompson to climb the couloirs, I would highly recommend doing it when there is not snow at the lower elevations. The travelling through the tallus when ½ buried in snow is very slow going. It is slippery, and you can’t really step between boulders as sometimes it is unsupported snow bridges between rocks that you plunge down into. Just wait for the snow to melt – then you can walk up slabs and otherwise travel through the tallus rather than on top of it.

Upon reaching the lower basin, our first views of Mt. Gilbert and Mt. Thompson came into play – it did not look appealing. Bluebird skies gave away to cloud cover on the actual peaks, and the second you crossed the crest the wind picked up tremendously.

It was actually funny – 50 feet down the tallus slope it was calm and blue skies. You got over it and the wind coming down from the crest was around 40 mph and cold. Here I am giving the double thumbs down on continuing (standing at around 11,000 ft.). Photo: Jon

Jon and I chilled for a bit and decided the options. Although we brought our climbing gear, we had realized at the parking lot it was a pipe dream as a result of having to drive down from Carson Pass in the early morning. Our goal on Saturday had been to hike up to the aprons and take a look at the couloirs. With the high winds and zero visibility up high, that plan was thwarted. After waiting to see if there was any chance it was dying down, we decided the best move was to head back down to the parking lot (which would take about 2 hours from our location) and in the process try to scout a better approach for the next day (as the weather was supposed to clear).

On the way down, the cloud cover and high winds made for some pretty awesome views in the surrounding peaks. The Evolution sub-range of the High Sierra really offers some peaks reminiscent of the Alps. Photos: Jon

Getting back down to South Lake at 9,700 ft., the view up to the upper reaches of Mt. Gilbert and Mt. Thompson at 13,000 ft. showed the remaining clouds and winds howling. I was pleased with our decision to save the energy for Sunday and come back down. Photo: Jon

Given that it was only around 3 P.M., we headed down to Bishop for some early Mexican food. The weather was supposed to clear on Sunday with no wind. Given the length/difficulty of the approach with snow, we planned to camp in the parking lot at South Lake and get up at 3 AM with the goal to starting to hike at 4 AM.

We got to bed around 7 and woke up on time. The early morning was actually not too cold at 9,700 ft. and the skies looked totally clear. The wind also did not appear to be blowing up high. We moved quickly and confidently that we would climb today.

Although not sure if I was angry or just motivated at this time of the early morning. Jon captures my anger/frustration/commitment/motivation/whatever this face is…. Photo: Jon

We got to our high point from Saturday and the winds were non-existent and no clouds. Having made it up to that point in about 2 hours, time was going OK as well. The sun was starting to rise in the East.

Moving higher up continued to be a slow moving process given the snow on tallus, but we continued on (and the sun continued to rise). Photo: Jon

The early morning light on the High Sierra granite was beautiful. The sky was blue and the winds were calm. Photos: Nick

We finally reached the upper basin and got our first look at the North Couloir on Mt. Gilbert (on the left) and the three couloirs on Mt. Thompson on the right (with the far right couloir being Harrington).

We continued up, with the tallus and couple of inches of snow creating a moon-like scene. Breathtaking. Photo: Jon (third)

Unfortunately, as we got higher, we soon realized that none of the couloirs appeared to hold ice. Looking at the North Couloir on Mt. Gilbert, it was clear that the middle portion had melted out and contained rock/mixed climbing in the middle. Jon has experience ice climbing – I really don’t. I didn’t feel that getting up into mixed terrain this deep in would be a good call. Not to mention, our assessment was that even the lower portions appeared to be just a dusting of snow from the recent storm on more or less rock. While we thought about getting a couple of the lower pitches in, it did not look promising.

On the other hand, the three couloirs on Mt. Thompson appeared to be mostly snow and much shorter. It was lower angle snow slopes with some ice couloirs above. They did not appear to top-out, as the upper portions had all melted out and were rock.

So we realized that anything we climbed would not go all the way, and in all likelihood was either not ice, or had buried ice. We decided that the left-most couloir on Mt. Thompson had dedicated rappel stations, so that would at least make the descent much quicker than building V-threads. So with that info, we thought it was the most reasonable objective given the conditions.

Looking at the three Mt. Thompson couloirs, with the left-most turning out of view behind the rock.

Looking back at Mt. Gilbert from another angle, showing the true 50-60 degree pitch of the couloir. With the right conditions and ice, it would make a very fun, moderate alpine climb. I definitely intend on going next year, but more early in the season before the ice melts out.

As we approach the apron on Mt. Thompson to climb up to the base of the couloir proper, we noted that the middle couloir actually appeared to have ice. It was not a lot, but appeared to be peaking out from under a dusting of snow. So we shifted our goals again, realizing that this was the only option. We could at least get a couple of pitches of alpine ice.

However, as we approached the apron, the snow started to develop a very hard wind slab that sounded extremely hollow. Although it had only snowed 2-4 inches, the storm on Friday night had delivered 50 mph winds. So we knew windloading was a concern.

We dug some pits on a 30-degree slope and got horrible results. The windslab was rock hard (the hardest I had ever felt) and about 6 inches thick. It was sitting on top of absolute sugar, faceted-snow. We were digging hand pit isolations, and were getting failure of the wind slab on the facets w/out even fully isolating the column. Jon stomped out a mini-rutschblock, and that failed on isolation as well.

We quickly assessed that although a failure would be hard to initiate, the slab was propagating on the weak layer very easily and any slide could be very big.

Here is a shot of Jon with one of the several hasty hand-pits we dug. He lifted out the wind-slab that failed when only isolating 2 sides. The windslab was extremely hard and dense. Photos: Nick

And it was failing on sugar facets. Photo: Jon

After some discussion, we realized that digging deeper pits and running tests, the wind slab would be easily failing on all of them (ECT, CT, Shovel Shear, etc…). The results were not good. Given the suspect snow pack, we just decided to call it a day and head back down.

Here I am after digging one more small hasty pit and checking out the layers. Isolation failure again. Photo: Jon

So we headed back to flat ground, grabbed some food and joked about the sequence of events this weekend. Photo: Jon

Heading back down, the lower elevations around 10,000 ft. were starting to melt out. Treasure Lake in the background.

One last look at the range from the parking lot at South Lake around 5:30. Photo: Jon

Ultimately, was it a “successful weekend”? My answer is YES. We successfully navigated the conditions presented and were safe and spent an amazing weekend in a beautiful area. I had an awesome time, without even climbing anything. The stars both nights sleeping at 9,700 ft. were incredible, and the approach, while slow moving, is a very good workout above 10,000 ft. And ultimately, it always feels good to recognize the flags presented in the snowpack, analyze them and make a decision to turn around. Jon and I both have no regrets of our decisions to bail.

We now have the approach dialed for next year’s alpine ice season – assuming it goes. I will definitely plan on heading in late August or early September. November was too late this year as the ice had essentially melted out and the winter season was approaching with the new cycle to drop snow for the season to melt into ice next summer.