Mt. Murchison - South Face, North Ridge 5.4

August 8 solo’ed Mt. Murchison. Serious mountain, and seriously FUN. This big peak has it all, solid rock for lots of freewheeling fifth class fun, evil steep loose scree above death cliffs and, with the conditions that I had, the need for crampons and ice tool. Big day out as a roadside, single day trip. 

Drove up from Calgary, left town a lot later than I had wished, but I had to join my boss for beers the night before, little sleep didn’t help my pace on the lower section, but once in the amphitheater, I was loving it.  The slog up the creek and then up through the trees is straightforward and goes fairly quick without any difficulties.  Once above tree line, head to the “amphitheater”.  Personally, I wouldn’t use this term to describe this terrain, just seems like a cliff to me, or maybe something like “steep slopes and ledges in the drainage”? Not important I guess, Andrew, Vern and Steven all used this reference, so I won’t dwell on it.

Nearing the cliffs, I purposely chose harder, definitively 5.4 to 5.6 routes on the right side of the amphitheater to avoid the steep scree choss on the left side. This cost me time as I did retreat a few times. The left side was more ledgey and had more steep scree slopes, but looked more a like a slog, so I choose the more solid rock with more difficult hands on climbing. 

View to amphitheater from creek.

Nearing tree line, view up amphitheater.

On the way up, I went through the lowest vertical band (yellowish?) way left,
beside the flowing water.in drainage (not visible).
On the way down, I ended up in the middle, probably behind the tall tree, and I downclimbed more
to climbers right, On the way up, probably mostly climbed just right of tall tree. 

My ascent line was right of centre, once above the yellow band. 

The flat high shoulder (bivy location), view towards the Lyell Icefield, I was there just a few weeks prior.
On our hike out along the Glacier River, had a great view to Mt. Murchison.

From shoulder, view to Kaufmann Peaks (left double summit) and
Mt. Sarbach (right). 

View south to towers on south outliers of the Murchison Massif.

On the shoulder looking towards the summit block (summit out of view behind)
and the big loose south face.

Summit block and the south face. Big snow/ice gully hidden behind the closest rib.

View into the snow/ice gully. I gained a lot of elevation just left of this on a rib.
Lots of cairns on the rib, crossed ice gully in section with no ice, visible in this photo.

At the flat high shoulder (bivy site) I left my second tool since I could see the big SE face was mostly dry. I carried two tools, a few pitons, some slings and cord and a 40m skinny rope. Up the SE face I avoid the big gully as it was mostly water ice, big rib to its left was a moderate scramble. Slog to col was straightforward. I would guess there are endless variations to ascend this big loose face, so I choose the most direct line, diagonally up to climbers right, aimed for the scree gully that gains the col. This gully is only slightly larger than others, but the upper section is all scree to the col.

Once across the major snow/ice gully, more moderate terrain towards col.
Mostly steep rock or slab, overlaid with loose scree, with most sections of only scree.

View to col.
The double pinnacle is a great reference to know you are on track to the col.

From the col to the main SE summit was fun, again I picked solid fifth class lines on the ridge. The bump before the main summit block was covered with a big snow cornice so I traversed below to the “crux” 5.3 ish summit access gully. I think most people would take this traverse line.

Typical terrain on summit ridge.

Getting close to the summit block, 

View to north summit with Glacier Lake in the background. 

After scoping the final section below the summit, there is a ledge below the standard 5.3 gully (which tops out near the summit). Looking up, to climbers left of this gully, is a deep gully system, then a wet gully slightly more left, that goes up to the ledge, with scree slopes below. Well the scree slopes were covered in water ice, I was lazy and didn’t put on my crampons, picked the narrowest section of the ice, traversed more right, below the summit gully.  I had hoped to the access this ledge below the summit gully by climbing through a rock band, tried several 5.6+ ish lines, on excellent rock, but retreated since the final moves were overhanging.  I returned to the water ice slope.

Crossed the narrow section of ice to reach this scree slope.
Tried to scramble this lower band on 3 separate lines, but backed off.

Wet gully I ascended is on the far left in the photo.

Water ice sheet below the gully.

Put on crampons, used my hammer ice tool to climb up the ice sheet to the wet gully.  Maybe 25 metres on hard solid ice; with serious ice runout down the steep slopes. The wet gully was sketchy, but not too crazy. There was a new rappel sling on the top of the wet gully. Then a traverse on the ledge to crux standard gully and up to the top. This gully is solid, good holds and straightforward, maybe 5.3? Noticed the rappel anchor above this gully as well, then a short walk to the top. Just under 9 hours up.  

Standard 5.3 summit gully.  Easy to scramble up..
Tougher to downclimb, I had the gear to rap so I used it. 

After 5.3 gully, simple walk to the summit.

View south to beautiful outliers on Murchison Massif.

Summit cairn and view to north summit.

North summit.

Read the register, lots of friends and famous climbers, couldn’t add my name since THERE WAS NO PENCIL!  I guess I should carry one.

Summit Selfie.

First page of summit register.

Steven Song's entry.

Vern and the crazy Pole.
I didn't add the text to Vern name ;-) 

Nugura !

Proof of summit ;-)

I did 3 raps from the top, taking advantage of the two in place rappel slings and one last rap at the bottom of the wet gully to avoid the water ice. Ran down to the col, blasted to the bivy spot, retrieved my other tool, then picked the least steep line in the fading light in the amphitheater. 7 hours from the top to the car; miserable last few hours in the dark; the final tree section seemed a lot longer in the dark. Great day on a beautiful pile of choss. 

In place anchor above the standard 5.3 summit gully.

In place anchor above wet gully.
The sling looked brand new, I would assume from the summer of 2019.

Last (3 rd) rap station above ice sheet.
Did this rap since I found an easy flake to sling and I could avoid all the ice.

Last view of summit block from summit ridge on descent.