The Twins’ Trip – “West Twin” East Face, Alpine II

High hopes and expectations for this planned 4 day trip to the Columbia Icefields ended in a hugely disappointing trip for me. I always like to stay positive, but this trip really bummed me out and left me feeling quite frustrated. I had strong and well experienced rope team members (Anton and Ian), but a combination of warm temperatures and hot sun slow our pace thus our camp was far from The Twins.  Original plan was for 4 days to summit all 4 twins (North, South, Twins Tower and West Twin) and the 2 Stutfield Peaks (North and South) and tick off six 11,000’ers, but in the end I only got up one summit, West Twin (11,024 feet, 3360m) and we left the Icefield on the third day, May 5.

Sunset on The Twins from camp

At the of end day one Anton, Ian and I sent up camp beside Vern, Jason and TJ.  These boys were only planning on West and South Twin since they summitted North and Twins Tower last year.  Early start on day two, long ski towards The Twins, over the shoulder of North Twin, down to Twins Col, then skied to East Face of West Twin.  JW blasted up the deep snow of the East Face and set an awesome track for us to follow.  Easily tagged the summit of West Twin, then quick descent back to the skis.

Nearing East Face of West Twin

Skied back towards the North Ridge of South Twin, skied to the bottom of a short, but steep glacier ice slope.  Took off the skis and changed to crampons.  Anton and Ian started up the slope, with the plan to protect this section with a running belay protected by ice screws.  Vern, Jason and TJ were slightly behind us, approaching on skis. About half way up the ice slope, Anton picked a line on snow to avoid the icy section, while the snow patch was covering a crevasse and poor Anton went for a quick ride into the hole.  



Where did Anton go?

TJ and JW used their rope and went to the rescue up the icy pitch.  Vern and I chilled on the flat snow terrain, while Ian held the top end of Anton’s rope.  Great effort by JW and TJ to build an ice anchor and get  Anton out.  Anton didn’t get a scratch, but poor guy spent two hours in the hole. We packed up and did the long ski back to camp. 

Once at camp, ambition from Anton (understandable) and Ian was gone to do the long ski back to the northern Icefield, so no desire to attempt any of the Twins or the Stutfield Peaks.  Ian hadn’t been up Mt. Kitchener, Anton hadn’t been up Snowdome; these peaks were close to camp and an easy ski.  I have been up both these peaks, so I had no partners to climb any of my objectives. 

Day three TJ, Vern, Anton and Ian skied up Kitchener, JW and I stayed in camp. Later in the morning we broke camp, then TJ, JW, Vern and Anton skied up Snowdome, then us 6 headed home. 3 day trip to get up West Twin, yeah.  It took a lot of effort to get 4 days away from home and the office, this trip felt like a waste of time for me.