King Creek - WI3, 50m

March 5 got for a fun day of ice cragging with Laurie. The forecast was for really warm temperatures later in the day, so we parked at King Creek as the sun came up. Laurie is still new to ice climbing, and had never been to King Creek before; so I had to show him this classic ice venue. Laurie also got to do his first ice lead ever. Good times. I have also did my first ice lead in King Creek, I think in December of 1994? 

Bolts chopped on the rock route "King Rat" 5.10b

Laurie scoping out his lead on the main ice flow.

At King Creek there are three ice climbing spots; the main flow, the largest and highest of the three, about 50m tall mostly WI2, the cave area, typically a thin ice line into a cool cave. There is a bolted anchor in the cave. Left of the cave is short, but steep wall of ice, usually in good shape, just not tall, maybe 10 metres tall. The best climbing is on the "Scottish Gully", this gully is the furthest upstream, just beyond the main climbing area, passed a tight gap in the canyon. Laurie did a great lead up the main ice flow. He used the bolts on the top and brought me up; we both rappelled off the bolts. 

Laurie's first ice lead ever.

Looking good.

Rapping down the main ice flow.

Another group of two climbing on the main ice flow
as we left the canyon.

The "Scottish Gully"

Laurie rapping the gully.

After climbing on the main flow, we headed to the Scottish Gully. I lead up this fun 27m ish WI3 route. This the best ice climbing in King Creek, a really fun easy route. I brought up Laurie we rappelled off the route. Next we headed to the cave, I lead up this route, short, maybe 15 metres, brought up Laurie, then rapped down. Since the weather was forecast to get very warm, we left the canyon. Initially we had hope the warm weather would let us try to climb the rock sport route, King Rat, 5.10b,but some a hole chopped the bolts on the route. Fun day out, likely my last ice of the season. 

Inside the cave.

Rapping out of the cave.

"Mt. Barnham" from the canyon.

"The Blade"

Cool rock colours near the parking lot.

Big snow sluffs in the canyon from the hot later winter sun.

Corba Verde - WI3, 250m (ish)

View to Corba Verde

Friday the 19, got out for a fun day of ice climbing. I have never climbed Corba Verde and was keen to check it out. Way back in the mid 1990's Ian Hunt had spied this a new line for a first ascent, but we never checked it and the first ascent went to another team. Had to break trail to the base of the route. Doesn’t look like anyone has been on this route for a few weeks? 

Great view to King Creek and the mighty Opal Range.

Well getting geared up, Laurie is like, hmm, I didn’t bring a belay device? WTH. Okay we will make this work. I led up the first pitch, a solid WI3. Set up an anchor and had Laurie lower me. We then top roped the first pitch into submission. Worth noting; the exit off the ice near the top has open water and a big portion of the ice sheet at the top is undermined by running water and a huge 1-2 foot gap between the rock and the ice sheet. Pretty sketchy. Otherwise a great day out and we got a great pump from all the laps. 

Lots of trail breaking at the base of the route as well.

Getting closer

View back to Laurie at lower belay stance.
He had to move way closer once the top rope was set up.

Laurie's photo of me leading the pitch.

Top rope in place. 

OSWB enjoying the day out.
Photo by Laurie. 

Some of the scary holes in the thin ice sheet 
on the upper section of the route. 
Scary for sure.

Photo does not really show how scary the thin ice sheet was.
Thankfully, much of the thin sheet was right of my line.

Miller time, great day out. 

Boulder Pass Ski Tour

John enjoying the nicely packed trail near Boulder Pass.

February 5 John and I planned to ski up Fossil Mountain. Fossil Mountain is the north-eastern portal of the infamous Deception Pass, the high point just before the world famous Skoki Lodge. Fossil Mountain is a popular hike/scramble. Fossil Mountain was my third summit ever, way back in October of 1992 with my good friends Jock and Keith, and another dude named Dave. We spend the Thanksgiving long weekend camped at Merlin Meadows and ran up Fossil on our way in. Seems like an eternity ago. Have not been up Fossil since 1992, so it seemed like a ski ascent was a great idea.

John and I drove separately and met at the Fish Creek parking lot. John set a great pace up the ski out of the Ski Louise resort and we made great time to the Hidden Lake turn off. Weather started clear, but by time we reached Boulder Pass the wind was whipping and the wind chill was maybe -30C? Visibility was low to zero at the pass. We pulled the plug and skied back to our cars. 

Good workout and always great to hang with John. We will be back later this season for Fossil, Richardson or Ptarmigan.

Dark skies looking west. When we started you could see Haddo Peak, not now.

Best view we got towards Fossil Mountain from Boulder Pass.
The wind chill and conditions were nasty, not worth it.

Dolomite Peak Circuit Ski Tour

Great day of touring and a few turns on the wonderful Dolomite Peak Circuit with John, Colin and Mel on January 17. We had great visibility and even a few hot spots of blazing sun and blue sky. Fantastic day, we were about 6 hours for the tour, so much fun. The circuit circumnavigates Dolomite Peak with approximately 16.7 km of travel, over two high passes, with our second highpoint reaching about 2570 metres providing a trip gain of about 850 metres. As most parties, we parked one vehicle at the Mosquito Creek hostel parking lot, and drove the second vehicle to the Helen Lake parking lot and started our trip with a ski up Helen Creek. 

Once a few km's up the creek, the trees thin and you start to get great views. First high pass is just north west of Dolomite Peak giving great views towards Cirque Peak and the Bow Valley. 

John in Helen Creek.
Views start to open up.

Mel and Colin in Helen Creek.

The gorgeous Dolomite Peak from upper Helen Creek.

View to the Bow Valley with Bow Peak on the left and Crowfoot Mtn. on the right.

When we reached the first high pass the weather was calm so we had a quick snack and checked out the descent to Lake Katherine. We had a few nice turns as we descended to the Dolomite Pass area. Great views to Cirque Peak.

View back up to our ski down to Lake Katherine.
Standing on Lake Katherine when I took this photo.

View to Cirque Peak.

OSWB skinning across Lake Katherine.
Photo by Colin.

Mel and OSWB with Cirque Peak behind.
Photo by Colin.

After the lake, the wind picked up and the visibility was getting a bit lower.
A small drop just before the last push up to our high point just north west of Dolomite Peak.

Colin enjoying the downhill below the high point.

Heading down hill towards Mosquito Creek.

After the last high point was reached, we had a few good turns with great snow into the upper reaches of Mosquito Creek. The weather and wind flipped between nice and nasty a few times as we descended. We did one lap uphill to get some additional turns, but the cold wind sent us into the tree of upper Mosquito Creek. A well packed trail with tight trees took us back to the parking lot and the crowds of the highway. Very enjoyable day in the hills. 

John heading into the trees in upper Mosquito Creek.

Chickadee Valley Ski Tour

Impressive steep rock buttress on the north side of Mt. Whymper.

December 12 met up with my ole buddy John for a ski ascent. I was super keen to ascend Boom Mountain. Boom is a relatively short and straight forward ascent, so I thought. Super cold morning, at least it felt that way, when we left the parking lot it was -22C. I have never skied or hiked in Chickadee Valley before, so I was curious about this popular ski location. Since we left the parking lot just before 8am, it was quiet, but on our return, the parking lot was over flowing with parked cars. 

Shady and cold in Chickadee Valley.
Great views though.

Chic Scott's ski guide book has very basic beta on the ascent of Boom Mountain, but there are several easy to find on line sources. Generally, most parties will ski up the last avalanche slope (most westernly slope) to gain the gullies that break through the upper rock bands which guard the large flat summit plateau of Boom. The avalanche slope and the gullies are very steep, and don't look too inviting. John and I scoped these lines, but we agreed that the western end of Boom Mountain, just above a col, seemed to be the same angle as the regular route, and maybe a better option? Turned out we had to break a trail though steep trees and we had very slow progress in the soft snow was we plodded towards this col.

Gaining height and finally the tree begin to thin.
West end of Boom Mountain above.

Nearing the col west of Boom Mountain.

After a few hours of trail breaking, we eventually reached the high col west of Boom Mountain. We picked a line up the west side of Boom Mountain. We started with some steep skinning. Soon the snow had a very hard sun crust. Maybe 200 metres of skinning up, the snow became rock hard and too hard to skin up. Since we didn't bring ski or boot crampons, or an ice ace; we chose to bail. We stopped for a quick lunch at the col, great views to Mt. Quadra. On our descent, we got in one short section of excellent powder skiing just below the col. Below this slope, we found a ski track descending an avalanche slope. We followed this down to valley flats and quickly found our up track. No summit, but some great exercise and enjoyed a beer with John in the parking lot before heading home. Great day out. 

At col, looking straight up the west end of Boom Mountain.
I wanted to ski/climb up this slope to gain the upper summit ridge.

John starting up the lower slope of the west end of Boom Mtn.
Very soon the snow got rock hard and steep.

The beautiful Mount Quadra from the col.
I have wanted to climb the north face of Quadra for decades.
Hopefully one day.

The small patch of great skiing we had.

On descent from the col we found tracks dropping in this avalanche gully.

The impressive north side of Mt. Whymper.
There were at least two parties skinning up the big slope on the right.
And old ski tracks coming down from the cool small snow col just right of centre.

Cold day, mostly in the shade all day.
Temperature about -20C all day.

 

The Joker - WI3, 50m

Beautiful morning colours on the drive in.

Had a great day of early season ice climbing with Laurie at the end of November. I thought it was interesting, this year, the weather warmed up again in early November, and Laurie and I did a day of cragging/rock climbing at the Porcupine Creek crag in the first week of November and a few weeks later, some ice climbing. We headed to "The Joker" in the South Ghost. This route is typically a moderate WI3 and only one pitch, and in the dry conditions we had, super easy to approach. A nice easy breezy to start the ice season. 

View to route on the approach.

Nice and dry conditions for the approach.

View to the route, "Candle Stick Maker", not quite formed this day.
I did this route with Jason Wilcox about 10 years ago.

I have only been up this drainage once before, in 2010, I think late January, Jason, Janice and I climbed Hidden Dragon and Candle Stick Maker. On this day, we had dry conditions and really nice ice quality on The Joker. The hike was snow free and only a minor bit of ice on the trail. We easily gained elevation and enjoyed the warm late Fall weather. Got a great view over to Hidden Dragon and CSM  as we gained height, HD was climbable, CSM, not so much. 

Nearing base of route on approach.

View up the route from the base.

Once at the base of The Joker we geared up and I launched up the route. Well putting on my crampons, my beloved Scarpa Summits boots were showing their age. I loved my Summits, bought them in 2007. On their first trip, I summitted Mt. Brazeau; these boot have been up hundreds of summits and hundreds of ice routes. As I attached the crampon, the base of the sole on the toe came apart. I thought I would still do the lead and see how it went. Well of course, half way up, the crampon failed. I had to put in an ice screw, hang for a bit, reattached the crampon, and decided to continue climbing. Made it to the top without any more failures. Brought up Laurie and rapped down on the bolts at the top of the route. Fun day of ice, very sad about my Summit boots. I guess after 13 years, with about 5 years of very hard use, I cannot complain. 

Great day out in the Ghost. Love the Ghost, don't get here as much as I would like to. This was Laurie's first time ever in the area, I think it was cool he got to climb ice on his first trip. 

View down route as I lead up.
This is after my crampon fell off by boot, 
since my boot sole was falling off.

LK rapping off route. 

Good driving conditions in the South Ghost on this day.
Awesome day out.