June 12, 2004. Serpentine Arete. Grade IV, 5.8, steep snow.
Theron Welch and Michael Stanton.


We left the car at 5:45 am.

steep hard snow to get to the climbing, all frontpointing. For Theron, the most nerve-wracking part, tense for me too. There was a big cliff below us. I nearly lost my ice axe when the wrist loop sling came untied. It fell and luckily caught on a rock 10 feet below.

Our pitch 1 was the pitch that led to the first 5.8 pitch.

Pitch 1: 10:30 am. Theron tried to get into a blocky gully from our snow-covered ledge, but couldn't figure out a good way to do it. He placed some gear and continued up mossy steep featureless rock, hoping to traverse left into the gully higher up.
It looked like 5.9 at least to me! His body started to slither down, and he decided to give up on that way. We wondered what to do. Another look around the corner to the left was more fruitful, and provided good climbing despite a few steps on snow with rock shoes. Theron led a full 60 meters up a long gully then flakes, with a hard lieback move near the end. Then he walked along a ledge to a gnarled dead tree around the corner. This pitch took one hour, which kind of scared us. But it did cover a lot of ground and that transition from snow climbing to rock climbing is often problematic.

Pitch 2: 11:30 am. I had a choice of 5.9 climbing in a corner or a 5.8 face with shallow cracks. I decided on the face because the corner had vegetation, and what might be a hard exit from an overhang (might be bomber jams though, a great way to escape!). The first moves on the face were hard. Standing on the left, I got a good fingerlock with my right hand, and
feet on small ledges. I had placed a small cam just below. Standing up I could reach a good hand jam. Getting my feet high (one jammed in the crack, the other smearing), I reached for another good jam but I had messed up, because the crack flared, providing a good hold only with my right hand (still jammed in the crack at my hips). I decided to downclimb, get in sequence and try again. Also, I should put gear in the hands section because it was a little dicey above that. While downclimbing, I couldn't find a good foothold (it was under a lip), and started to fall. "Falling!" I yelled, as I slithered down. I fell away from the rock and onto my small cam. Whew!

I tried again, this time adding some pro, and getting the moves right as the crack flared. Higher, I had a dilemma because I placed a cam in the most secure handhold location. I grabbed the carabiner on the cam as a handhold, not concerned with free climbing as precious minutes were ticking by. Some more interesting moves brought me to a steller corner crack that I couldn't pass up. Excellent jams and smearing for feet took me up 30 feet to the exit. As a reward there were chicken-heads for my feet there. I crossed a slab on the left, and belayed below an open book. I think I got a picture of Theron climbing the corner crack, which he described as fist jamming. My hands were all scraped up from this pitch!

Pitch 3: Theron now led up the open book, encouraged to place gear early by my barely adequate gear belay. Despite slipping feet in the corner, he climbed out of the book, and on to an enjoyable dihedral leading right under a roof. This was an enjoyable pitch, 5.7 or maybe 5.8 in the open book. I remember asking "did you feel a drop of rain?"

Pitch 4: At the belay it started to snow. Small, dry graupel flakes. We tried to do several things at once, and almost lost Theron's lunch container. I was eager to reach easy ground before the snow accumulated, so headed up what was actually a really nice pitch. A chimney with an overhanging chockstone provided the opening difficulties, then I entered a sheltered
rock garden, making a step across move to the left. The snow was piling up on ledges, but not melted yet, so I still had some friction for smearing feet on walls. After climbing a blocky gully, I continued up loose rock to a final interesting climbing problem (the details of which escape me now!), and a ledge. 

Pitch 5: We were eager to begin simul-climbing, especially as the weather might get much worse. If we could eat up easy terrain we would have time to go into "ultra-slow-and-safe" mode near the top if conditions required it, and still have time to escape by day's end. We coiled some rope around our chests, and began climbing mixed 3rd and 4th class terrain. Theron  
wisely suggested putting on rain jackets, so after about 50 meters we joined up to do this, somberly putting away the video camera as we prepared for suffering up icy cracks and faces!

Pitch 6: I'd only placed a piece or two, so I continued in the lead. A wall reared above us, and we climbed gullies with solid flakes to reach the heart of it. In the driving snow I came to a slab leading right, with all the other options being featureless or overhanging. I think Theron belayed me on this part or at least kept slack out of the rope. I saw a piton 15 feet away in the middle of the slab, so got a quickdraw ready to clip it. The reason for my apprehension was that now the rock was wet. And this rock was covered in black lichen, which is icy slick once soaked. Put all that at an angle, with a few shallow handholds, and it can provide the scariest terrain of a trip! For me, this was. What's worse, I reached the piton, and found it so loose I could remove it with my fingers! Suspiciously, I put it back (I don't know why). It appeared to be pounded into dirt. Protection opportunities looked poor (hence the bad piton I suppose), so I carefully continued on the icy tilted "dance floor." Breathing a sigh of relief, I moved back left, climbing short steep steps and walking ledges. By now, the rock faces in the distance had noticable snowy outlines on all non-vertical surfaces. I protected a short walk across another "dance floor" with a cam high and a four-foot sling to prevent rope drag. Once across I tried to climb a steep corner, but quailed at the difficulty, realizing I needed a belay and some human proximity. The driving snow seems to increase the distance between rope-mates, and a good belay at the base of the corner would get me moving. I'd promised to belay Theron as he crossed the slab, and this was a good point. He reports that the snow was really driving down as he crossed. Happily, it started to let up as he finished the pitch. Tiny figures were walking on the Colchuck Glacier below.

Pitch 6: As Theron belayed me, I started up the corner, liebacking more confidently on rock that was already beginning to dry in the wind. Before, I thought I'd have to aid the section, but with just a little more friction, the secrets were unlocked. I continued up terrain of stacked loose blocks and sand, trying to find a place to belay Theron. Next to a finger of snow below a steep wall, I reeled in the rope as he climbed. Now we could see distant mountains again, but dark clouds continued our way as if to say "we'll be back."

Pitch 7: Theron climbed a short gully then continued on a ledge leading around right. I was suddenly fearful of leaving the crest, and recognized the wall above from one of Dave Burdick's photos. Theron knocked off some loose blocks around the corner, and I scrambled up, coiling rope around me to get voice contact with Theron. As it turned out, he'd abandoned the idea to leave the crest, and was climbing the wall starting from an easier point. We knew that easier terrain lay to the right of the ridge. But during the snowstorm I'd been looking over there, only to see dripping gray slabs in the murk, at their worst in fresh wet snow. Theron continued up pretty friendly terrain: nice 5.0 corners with solid flakes for holds.
We were really thankful the snow had stopped! 

Theron states there was an occasional short crux of maybe 5.4-5.6. He followed ramps with a zig-zag shape, and after some bad rope drag he belayed me up to his stance.

 
Pitch 8:  Theron led up more easy terrain and eventually got back onto the crest.  He could see a distinct notch in front of himself with a loose-looking gully to the right and more difficult, snow-covered ground on the left.  He climbed up and over the high point before the notch only to see that it was too difficult to descend on either side, or straight over the crest.  So, he removed his sling around a solid flake and climbed back down to the low point, set the sling on a lower flake, and downclimbed to the right.  The ground was loose at the bottom but easy to avoid.  Easy moves led back to the ridge crest which had flattened out into a face again.  He continued up maybe 100 more feet, placing slings on flakes for protection then hip-belayed me up.

Pitch 9: I was getting really tired, and overburdened due to extra rope I'd coiled around myself on the previous pitch. I went up and left, making a hard move around a corner only to see a hint of easier ground above, passage sadly blocked by black overhanging slabs. I looked elsewhere for a good way (at one point entertaining an overhanging hand crack), but finally had to downclimb almost to the belay. It was pretty hard to downclimb this easy terrain because of all the things hanging from me, blocking the view of my feet! Theron suggested looking around to the right, so I went over and saw what looked like a steep but reasonable exit to lower-angle terrain. It turned out to be a slightly overhanging crack and chimney, filled with icicles! But I was tired of hunting around for the best way up, so I bashed the icicles away and felt around for holds inside. I placed a camming device, asked Theron to keep the rope tight and started up. It was odd, because one wall of the crack was smooth ice. I could still jam my hand in, but I knew it would go numb pretty soon. Thrutching gracelessly, I managed to get a foot up by my head and by scraping my back against a wall, move up into a slot that led after more thrutching to easier terrain. Climbing past more loose blocks, I set a belay below snow slopes and the final headwall. Theron came up, chiding me for missing a third class gully around the corner. Shucks! 

Pitch 10: We had to change into boots for snow slopes, and didn't want to change back into rock shoes for the final 5.7 headwall, so this was just a steep snow traverse to the left and easier ground. Then snow and rock slopes led us to the summit at 5:30 pm, for 7 hours on the climb.

We reached the car at 8:45 pm, so 15 hours round trip.