A week in review
So this week was kind of a crazy, cool one. I think the last time I updated was exactly this time last week when I was debating climbing either Static or Buck Mountain. Well, I ended up deciding on Buck Mountain and I ended up going alone. My roommate was supposed to go but he never called back or showed up at the cabin. Soooo I woke up to the darkness of 4:30 am, had an egg and toast breakfast and took off for Grand Teton National Park!
The drive out was uneventful. I mused at being able to drive the entire way through town without having to wait at any traffic lights or see any tourists. I was going to buy the $50 Yellowstone/Teton Annual Park Pass but there was no one at the booth when I arrived, so I drove through for free (woot!). I saw a moose and some deer on the drive in as well. The drive to the trailhead was questionable in the mickeymobile, but I eventually made it (I pushed it to the limit, however) and parked around 6:15 am.
The trailhead I parked at was for Death Canyon (which looks awesome) but I was only on that trail for a mile or so before turning off and heading upwards on an unmarked but pretty well worn climbers trail up through Stewart's Draw. It meandered through a large, Grizzly friendly-looking meadow before heading up up up into the Tetons. It really did go up and up and up. No switchbacks or anything, just up. Very tiring. Eventually I found my way climbing up right next to a roaring whitewater snowmelt stream and the mist from the endless line of waterfalls was pretty refreshing. I pulled out my handy dandy notebo... er... filter and pumped some water into my camelbak reservoir for the hard part of the climb: the snowfield.
As I climbed higher, snow became more and more common until eventually it was all there was. At this point I sat down on the last dry spot I could see and threw on my rented crampons ($12 for the day at Teton Profiteering/Mountaineering!). I got them secured and then started the trudge up through the first snowfields in search of the elusive Timberline Lake, which sits in a bowl just below the 11,938 foot summit of Buck. I read that you wouldn't be able to see the Lake until you were literally on top of it, so it was more or less of a routefinding crapshoot. With the USFS topo, however, it wasn't too hard to find a landmark and then find my way up to the lake, which I found completely frozen with one huge crack running right down the middle. Immediately above the lake was a small 40-50 foot cliff, then a huge, steep snowfield and finally, the summit.
To get past the cliff and to the snowfield, I had to climb up this thin and super steep chute that connected the two. There were some older footprints heading up and down this chute, but they were mostly frozen over. I took a few pictures around the lake and then began kickstepping my way up the chute. Above me and to the right was a 20-30 foot cliff hanging over my head *gulp* with a huge cornice that looked just about ready to fall. I made it up as quickly and as safely as possible and rested on a rock as I checked out the rest of the climb.
I had a long (300 m or so) climb/traverse up and across this snowfield to the summit. It was definitely steep and, although there were a few rocks here and there, it was almost entirely snow. The best way to go about this is to avoid the rocks as much as possible. Although they are solid ground that you know won't slip you up, the warmer rocks melt the snow around them faster than the main snow melts. Since this snow is about 5 foot deep, this creates huge gaps (mini-crevasses called moats) around the rocks which, if you fall into, could be 4-5 foot deep and very very difficult to climb out of. There are actually deaths every now and then from solo climbers falling into these gaps and not being able to climb out. Sooo steer clear of the rocks, that's the mantra.
Anyways, here is where things got tricky. I should've seen this steepness and turned around. Actually, I shouldn't have even gone up the chute. I was close to the summit, however, and I really believed I could do it so I kept going. The risk wasn't worth the reward, but I did it anyways. Bad Juddy.
I got about halfway up that snowfield, slowly kicking steps in and self-belaying with my ice ax when one of my steps gave out. I went to self belay immediately, but it pulled free from the snow and I began sliding. About 50 feet or so below me was a bunch of rocks and then that cliff I mentioned earlier (as well as any possible moats between the snow and rocks). As soon as I started sliding I immediately went into self arrest with the ice ax, but it didn't stop me. It slowed me down or, at the very least, kept me from going any faster and I remember the worst part of this whole experience was knowing those rocks/cliff was down there and wondering to myself if this was going to stop me. It eventually did, however, although I had a nice 20-30 foot slide down that face before it happened. Enough to scare me a little. Once I stopped, I very very slowly dug steps into the snow and reset my self belay before getting up. Once back on my feet I crossed over to the rocks and just sat down for awhile. Again, I thought of turning around, but didn't.
I pressed on and found another climbers old footprints/steps which were still in pretty good shape. These are the only thing that kept me going. If I would've had to kick my own steps I probably would've turned around right there, but these steps were in great shape as they were deep and solid. So I pressed on, self belaying with each and every step.
(By the way, self belay is just a way to cross snow with an ice ax in which you plunge the ice ax firmly into the snow with each and every step. This way, if one of those steps fails and you fall, you can hold onto the ice ax (at the base, where it meets the snow, so you don't lever it out) and that will, in turn, keep you from sliding.)
It took a long, long time to climb those last 500 feet or so where I'd have to plant the ice ax, kick a step in, step and then repeat for every step. It was pretty tiring and slow, but at least it was secure. If you are a good self belayer (lol) then the chances of an actual sliding fall are virtually zero. Anyways, I trudged on and made the summit. Woohoo!
The summit was just a few rocks piled up with 360 degree views (obviously) in every direction. The Alaska Basin was to the west, the Grand and the other Tetons to the north, Jackson Hole to the east and the rest of the Teton Range, including Death Canyon and Teton Village (Jackson Hole Ski Resort) to the south. I stayed on the summit for maybe 10 minutes (all that for 10 minutes lol) before deciding to head back down so I'd be well ahead of the common afternoon thunderstorm.
I was a little nervous about the climb down the huge snowfield since it was so steep, but it turned out not being nearly as bad as I imagined. I plunge stepped the first half or so before finding a somewhat gentle slope to the rocks/cliff below. To save time and have a little fun, I glissaded (controlled slide, using the ice ax as a brake) on my butt down this slope to the rocks, which I walked across back to the chute.
The chute itself also made me nervous. It was steeper than the snowfield and it was icy since the cliff to the north blocked the sun. I made it about halfway down before slipping and falling on my butt. Figuring I could glissade down (and not really having a choice since I already started sliding) I got into position and went for it. Unfortunately, about 10 seconds into this glissade, my ice ax bounced up out of the snow, cut me on the leg and I lost control. I must've picked up about 25-30 mph in those split seconds because when I finally realized what happened and got my ax back in, I was flying down that chute and heading straight for a rock in the middle towards the bottom. I don't quite remember what happened here, but I do remember actually stopping about 5 feet above that rock. I got up, moved away from the rock and glissaded (in control, this time) the rest of the way down to the lake.
Wanting badly to get onto some dry land, I walked quickly/glissaded the rest of the way until I finally got to a point where I could take my crampons off and walk with my boots again. I stopped at the snowmelt stream again to refill my camelbak and change into some dry clothes (which I smartly packed along) and I hiked the rest of the way down, losing but quickly regaining the sometimes faint climbers trail near the bottom.
Didn't see any animals or people the entire day. Boo.
In light of that adventure, the rest of the week was pretty boring. Tuesday I sat around a lot because I was too tired to do much of anything else. On Wednesday I was assaulted by millions of mosquitos while Shawn and I blazed our way through 31 goshawk transects (a record). Thursday I ended up having to work with Jenny (groan) for the first half of the morning, but the man upstairs smiled on me yet again as Shawn and Zach's caller broke and they rejoined us a few hours into the day. The funniest part about that was Jenny and I were sitting at a station awkwardly when I heard some sticks and stuff breaking in the distance. I saw a puff of pollen up near the top of a pine tree float down and I thought that perhaps a bear was up in the tree. I stopped Jenny (she's so oblivious) and looked around. Nothing happened so we went and did the transect. About halfway through the transect, I see something flying at me (with a perfect projectile arch lol) out of the corner of my eye. It looked like a rock to me, and it landed about 10 feet away. This threw me for a loop as there aren't any animals out there that are capable of throwing rocks lol. In my head, I thought to myself "Ok, this is either sasquatch or some mountain man who lives up here (which, there are some)." I said to Jenny "Jenny, something is throwing something at us." and she just whimpered "I know". Then I heard a grunt in the woods and I realized who the real culprit was.... Zach. He somehow convinced Shawn to play that little game on us when their caller broke and they had to rejoin. I laughed for quite awhile about that and congratulated the two on the game well played. I think Jenny was kind of mad.
Anyways, Friday was ok since I worked with Zach and we always take it kinda easy. On Saturday when I arrived at the office, Shawn asked me if I had a coin to flip. I didn't, but asked him why and he said that they found a mountain lion kill and a group of folks, including Zach and either me or Jenny, could go check it out. Of course, Jenny wasn't about to budge on this, so I just said "well, whatever" and they flipped a coin and Jenny won (instant hatred lol). Soooo Shawn and I went out and hiked up this huge stupid hill to do more goshawk transects. I think we only got about 15 or so done because we wasted about 2 hours hiking around and looking for Jenny's bear spray, which she lost the day before (and then neglected to tell Shawn about for about an hour after she noticed it was gone). Honestly.
In other news, I've been eating a lot lately. It must be all the hiking I'm doing because all I ever think about is food. Breakfast, lunch and dinner are the best parts of the day and I take full advantage of them. Zach and I always make full use of the french fry maker in the kitchen. This week we had ribs and baked potatoes (half rack and 2 potatoes each) and then one night we had a huge chicken breast, a 1/4 burger, and 3 potatoes of fries each. Last night I had a steak and a potato worth of homefries. This morning for breakfast I had another steak, another potato of homefries (mixed with a scrambled egg and tons of cheese), two eggs overeasy and two pieces of toast with strawberry jam. Thank God for being active!
Well, that's pretty much the whole week. Tomorrow I am probably going to head to Jackson Hole Ski Resort and pay the $10 to use their lift and go downhill mountain biking all day. I'm probably going to pee myself.
I think Zach wanted to float the Flat River this weekend, maybe do that on Tuesday if he actually comes back from town.
Well, that's all for now, I'll probably have tons of crazy pictures and stories up here by Tuesday!
The drive out was uneventful. I mused at being able to drive the entire way through town without having to wait at any traffic lights or see any tourists. I was going to buy the $50 Yellowstone/Teton Annual Park Pass but there was no one at the booth when I arrived, so I drove through for free (woot!). I saw a moose and some deer on the drive in as well. The drive to the trailhead was questionable in the mickeymobile, but I eventually made it (I pushed it to the limit, however) and parked around 6:15 am.
The trailhead I parked at was for Death Canyon (which looks awesome) but I was only on that trail for a mile or so before turning off and heading upwards on an unmarked but pretty well worn climbers trail up through Stewart's Draw. It meandered through a large, Grizzly friendly-looking meadow before heading up up up into the Tetons. It really did go up and up and up. No switchbacks or anything, just up. Very tiring. Eventually I found my way climbing up right next to a roaring whitewater snowmelt stream and the mist from the endless line of waterfalls was pretty refreshing. I pulled out my handy dandy notebo... er... filter and pumped some water into my camelbak reservoir for the hard part of the climb: the snowfield.
As I climbed higher, snow became more and more common until eventually it was all there was. At this point I sat down on the last dry spot I could see and threw on my rented crampons ($12 for the day at Teton Profiteering/Mountaineering!). I got them secured and then started the trudge up through the first snowfields in search of the elusive Timberline Lake, which sits in a bowl just below the 11,938 foot summit of Buck. I read that you wouldn't be able to see the Lake until you were literally on top of it, so it was more or less of a routefinding crapshoot. With the USFS topo, however, it wasn't too hard to find a landmark and then find my way up to the lake, which I found completely frozen with one huge crack running right down the middle. Immediately above the lake was a small 40-50 foot cliff, then a huge, steep snowfield and finally, the summit.
To get past the cliff and to the snowfield, I had to climb up this thin and super steep chute that connected the two. There were some older footprints heading up and down this chute, but they were mostly frozen over. I took a few pictures around the lake and then began kickstepping my way up the chute. Above me and to the right was a 20-30 foot cliff hanging over my head *gulp* with a huge cornice that looked just about ready to fall. I made it up as quickly and as safely as possible and rested on a rock as I checked out the rest of the climb.
I had a long (300 m or so) climb/traverse up and across this snowfield to the summit. It was definitely steep and, although there were a few rocks here and there, it was almost entirely snow. The best way to go about this is to avoid the rocks as much as possible. Although they are solid ground that you know won't slip you up, the warmer rocks melt the snow around them faster than the main snow melts. Since this snow is about 5 foot deep, this creates huge gaps (mini-crevasses called moats) around the rocks which, if you fall into, could be 4-5 foot deep and very very difficult to climb out of. There are actually deaths every now and then from solo climbers falling into these gaps and not being able to climb out. Sooo steer clear of the rocks, that's the mantra.
Anyways, here is where things got tricky. I should've seen this steepness and turned around. Actually, I shouldn't have even gone up the chute. I was close to the summit, however, and I really believed I could do it so I kept going. The risk wasn't worth the reward, but I did it anyways. Bad Juddy.
I got about halfway up that snowfield, slowly kicking steps in and self-belaying with my ice ax when one of my steps gave out. I went to self belay immediately, but it pulled free from the snow and I began sliding. About 50 feet or so below me was a bunch of rocks and then that cliff I mentioned earlier (as well as any possible moats between the snow and rocks). As soon as I started sliding I immediately went into self arrest with the ice ax, but it didn't stop me. It slowed me down or, at the very least, kept me from going any faster and I remember the worst part of this whole experience was knowing those rocks/cliff was down there and wondering to myself if this was going to stop me. It eventually did, however, although I had a nice 20-30 foot slide down that face before it happened. Enough to scare me a little. Once I stopped, I very very slowly dug steps into the snow and reset my self belay before getting up. Once back on my feet I crossed over to the rocks and just sat down for awhile. Again, I thought of turning around, but didn't.
I pressed on and found another climbers old footprints/steps which were still in pretty good shape. These are the only thing that kept me going. If I would've had to kick my own steps I probably would've turned around right there, but these steps were in great shape as they were deep and solid. So I pressed on, self belaying with each and every step.
(By the way, self belay is just a way to cross snow with an ice ax in which you plunge the ice ax firmly into the snow with each and every step. This way, if one of those steps fails and you fall, you can hold onto the ice ax (at the base, where it meets the snow, so you don't lever it out) and that will, in turn, keep you from sliding.)
It took a long, long time to climb those last 500 feet or so where I'd have to plant the ice ax, kick a step in, step and then repeat for every step. It was pretty tiring and slow, but at least it was secure. If you are a good self belayer (lol) then the chances of an actual sliding fall are virtually zero. Anyways, I trudged on and made the summit. Woohoo!
The summit was just a few rocks piled up with 360 degree views (obviously) in every direction. The Alaska Basin was to the west, the Grand and the other Tetons to the north, Jackson Hole to the east and the rest of the Teton Range, including Death Canyon and Teton Village (Jackson Hole Ski Resort) to the south. I stayed on the summit for maybe 10 minutes (all that for 10 minutes lol) before deciding to head back down so I'd be well ahead of the common afternoon thunderstorm.
I was a little nervous about the climb down the huge snowfield since it was so steep, but it turned out not being nearly as bad as I imagined. I plunge stepped the first half or so before finding a somewhat gentle slope to the rocks/cliff below. To save time and have a little fun, I glissaded (controlled slide, using the ice ax as a brake) on my butt down this slope to the rocks, which I walked across back to the chute.
The chute itself also made me nervous. It was steeper than the snowfield and it was icy since the cliff to the north blocked the sun. I made it about halfway down before slipping and falling on my butt. Figuring I could glissade down (and not really having a choice since I already started sliding) I got into position and went for it. Unfortunately, about 10 seconds into this glissade, my ice ax bounced up out of the snow, cut me on the leg and I lost control. I must've picked up about 25-30 mph in those split seconds because when I finally realized what happened and got my ax back in, I was flying down that chute and heading straight for a rock in the middle towards the bottom. I don't quite remember what happened here, but I do remember actually stopping about 5 feet above that rock. I got up, moved away from the rock and glissaded (in control, this time) the rest of the way down to the lake.
Wanting badly to get onto some dry land, I walked quickly/glissaded the rest of the way until I finally got to a point where I could take my crampons off and walk with my boots again. I stopped at the snowmelt stream again to refill my camelbak and change into some dry clothes (which I smartly packed along) and I hiked the rest of the way down, losing but quickly regaining the sometimes faint climbers trail near the bottom.
Didn't see any animals or people the entire day. Boo.
In light of that adventure, the rest of the week was pretty boring. Tuesday I sat around a lot because I was too tired to do much of anything else. On Wednesday I was assaulted by millions of mosquitos while Shawn and I blazed our way through 31 goshawk transects (a record). Thursday I ended up having to work with Jenny (groan) for the first half of the morning, but the man upstairs smiled on me yet again as Shawn and Zach's caller broke and they rejoined us a few hours into the day. The funniest part about that was Jenny and I were sitting at a station awkwardly when I heard some sticks and stuff breaking in the distance. I saw a puff of pollen up near the top of a pine tree float down and I thought that perhaps a bear was up in the tree. I stopped Jenny (she's so oblivious) and looked around. Nothing happened so we went and did the transect. About halfway through the transect, I see something flying at me (with a perfect projectile arch lol) out of the corner of my eye. It looked like a rock to me, and it landed about 10 feet away. This threw me for a loop as there aren't any animals out there that are capable of throwing rocks lol. In my head, I thought to myself "Ok, this is either sasquatch or some mountain man who lives up here (which, there are some)." I said to Jenny "Jenny, something is throwing something at us." and she just whimpered "I know". Then I heard a grunt in the woods and I realized who the real culprit was.... Zach. He somehow convinced Shawn to play that little game on us when their caller broke and they had to rejoin. I laughed for quite awhile about that and congratulated the two on the game well played. I think Jenny was kind of mad.
Anyways, Friday was ok since I worked with Zach and we always take it kinda easy. On Saturday when I arrived at the office, Shawn asked me if I had a coin to flip. I didn't, but asked him why and he said that they found a mountain lion kill and a group of folks, including Zach and either me or Jenny, could go check it out. Of course, Jenny wasn't about to budge on this, so I just said "well, whatever" and they flipped a coin and Jenny won (instant hatred lol). Soooo Shawn and I went out and hiked up this huge stupid hill to do more goshawk transects. I think we only got about 15 or so done because we wasted about 2 hours hiking around and looking for Jenny's bear spray, which she lost the day before (and then neglected to tell Shawn about for about an hour after she noticed it was gone). Honestly.
In other news, I've been eating a lot lately. It must be all the hiking I'm doing because all I ever think about is food. Breakfast, lunch and dinner are the best parts of the day and I take full advantage of them. Zach and I always make full use of the french fry maker in the kitchen. This week we had ribs and baked potatoes (half rack and 2 potatoes each) and then one night we had a huge chicken breast, a 1/4 burger, and 3 potatoes of fries each. Last night I had a steak and a potato worth of homefries. This morning for breakfast I had another steak, another potato of homefries (mixed with a scrambled egg and tons of cheese), two eggs overeasy and two pieces of toast with strawberry jam. Thank God for being active!
Well, that's pretty much the whole week. Tomorrow I am probably going to head to Jackson Hole Ski Resort and pay the $10 to use their lift and go downhill mountain biking all day. I'm probably going to pee myself.
I think Zach wanted to float the Flat River this weekend, maybe do that on Tuesday if he actually comes back from town.
Well, that's all for now, I'll probably have tons of crazy pictures and stories up here by Tuesday!