Opening the season (Chasm Junction hike).

As an opening hike for this season we (Shamil' and me) decided to go for Chasm Junction (elevation 9400 feet), having in mind Meeker as an ultimate goal if conditions allow. We left Longs Peak trailhead at 6-40 (03-29-2008), accompanied by continuous light snow. The trail was well-packed, and we were making good progress, coming to Goblins Forest (~10140 feet) at 7-25. At 7-56 we had a short break at the lightning hazard sing (~10594 feet) and moved above the treeline. The wind was getting stronger, with some pretty good gusts and blowing snow. Occasional postholing, scrambling and head wind slowed us down considerably, but as we got higher the snow was mostly blown off, which made our job much easier.
Blowing snow really made for a very fun hike. It definitely gave some extra appreciation of the place we were in:
At 9-36 we got to the Chasm Junction (~11480 feet) and immediately went further along the Chasm Lake trail to hide from the wind. Quickly we started sinking below knee in unconsolidated snow, and with some major effort reached a hiding place by a standing rock. Here we ate and "relaxed" a bit, although wind made it pretty challenging. Half of my face was frozen from the wind, so it felt I just got numbed up by a dentist. Wind was forcing us to keep moving, so after a brief rest and a couple photos we headed down.Longs and Meeker were completely obscured by clouds and snow:At 10-03 we headed back. Soon the wind started to calm down, and by the time we reached the treeline the weather was very good again. At 12-00 we came back to the trailhead after a great day out. It was a good way to start the season - nothing strenuous, but very fun. Thanks to the weather we got some pretty stern views.

The color of life (is lilac).

I think in terms of defining what's possible for a human being it's a step up: http://www.climbing.com/exclusive/features/lifeislilac/

A short summary: Silvia Vidal is a renowned big-wall {very long routes on rock faces} climber, known for her extreme aid-solos of the new routes. She weights 95 pounds and is 5 feet 2'' tall (there is a photo of her if you scroll down the page that is given above). During her climb of the Shipton Spire she spent 21 days on the wall (alone, she did it solo), so she had hundreds of pounds of gear to carry and haul to the base and up the route. And the route itself is extremely difficult too (5.10 A4+ 2900 feet, grade VI).


It's as inspiring as it gets :-). Amazing!

Igor

Andrew's Glacier Cirque, RMNP.

I wonder if there is a route following this ridge line:And another one:

Kiener's Route, Longs Peak (07-Aug-2007).

I remember vividly my thoughts when I first saw Kiener's Route: you got to have a death wish and/or be just damn foolhardy to do that. It was about three years ago, I wasn't doing any climbing back then. The route just looked intimidating as hell, when doing Keyhole route seemed like a major adventure. But as time went by, the super-intimidating thing started to look pretty doable, so I decided to go for it.This photo was taken in May, it's not that snowy during summer time. But it's a long route, and escape from its upper part is problematic, in case weather turns sour. Storms usually come from over the mountain, so you don't see them until it's too late. Last year two climbers got caught up there in a storm like that, and one of them didn't make it. So you got to start early and go fast.

Here is a different photo of the route, taken a week before doing it:It's a lower portion of the route, Lamb's Slide couloir. One of the great things about this route is that it has it all: you start by 40-45 degrees snow/ice couloir, then traverse the Broadway (a horizontal system of ledges), then climb some easy fifth class rock (3 pitches of 5.4 when on route, the green line on the top photo), followed by quite a bit of fourth class scrambling to the top.

To be continued...

Long's Peak solo: Lamb's Slide, Loft, Clark's Arrow (2).

Getting back to it. I got to the Loft and continued on the Clark's Arrow route. The routefinding was fun: at first I started cutting the Keyboard of the Winds too soon and ended up cliffed out. I scrambled lower and went along the Keyboard, finally (after some more interesting routefinding) getting to the top of Keplinger's Couloir. The connection between the top of the couloir and Homestretch was snow-covered and ended up being the crux of the route:The snow slope was ~45 degrees steep, with a dropoff at its bottom. As I put my crampons on and started traversing it, I found that this "snow" was mostly ice. Boy, was I glad to have borrowed a second ice-axe from Morgan! I would have to turn around otherwise, it just wasn't very safe with one ice tool and my soft boots. It took me about the same time to traverse this thing as to climb the whole Lamb's Slide, and it was exhilarating! A no-fall territory, on ice, it was fun! Very tiring though :-) . That section really took its toll on me.

After finishing the traverse I started on the Homestrech, the last section before the summit (green line on the photo above). It was pretty iced too:To keep up with the spirit of the climb, I followed the ice line (green) to the top, summiting at ~9-30am. I shared summit with only one more person, a guy from California. He told me that a day before a hiker doing Keyhole route fell on the Homestretch and broke his leg. He had to wait for six hours before being evacuated. Poor guy, six hours on the mountain with a broken leg!

After resting and snacking, I went down via the Keyhole route. On my way down I bypassed the ice on the right (pink line), I was just too tired for downclimbing ice.

The lack of sleep really caught up with me on the way down. I got only around two-and-a-half hours of intermittent sleep in my armchair, and I guess it was not quite enough :-). I was hiking to the parking lot in a strange state, with dreams getting mixed with reality. It was kind of fun though, a mild hallucinogenic experience. The best thing was a bolder that looked (just for a moment) like an intricate dark castle, with towers and everything. After 13 and a half hours of hiking, I got to the car, had some coffee and headed home. It was a great day, and I felt that the next thing on my tack list should be Kiener's.

Long's Peak solo: Lamb's Slide, Loft, Clark's Arrow.

This weekend my climbing partner was out of town, so I decided to do something long and solitary. I decided to try Long's Peak via a reasonably technical route. Enough to make it fun, but not too dangerous to solo. And to make it as solo as possible I decided to start on Monday.

In May we tried to climb Long's via a variation of the Clark's Arrow (Loft) route, where you get to the Loft by climbing Lamb's Slide to its top and then traversing the top of Flying Dutchman Couloir to the saddle itself. Last time we made it only to the top of Lamb's, so this time I decided to start really early. After leaving Fort Collins at midnight, I drove to Estes and ended up starting hiking at 1-35am, from a deserted parking lot. The moon went down by the time I got above the treeline, and I saw Milky Way for the first time in my life. That thing alone was worth all the trouble. And there was more to come ;-). The night was really dark, so I could discern the silhouette of the mountains just by the line between a starry blackness and a tar-like blackness. It was surprisingly warm, and even with the wind picking up I felt comfy in a thin T-shirt.

At 3-35am I got to the Chasm Lake, which was invisible. I could only see what my LED headlamp was illuminating, an oval spot several meters ahead of me. I thought that I'm gonna get in trouble finding my way to the Mills Glacier, but it was surprisingly easy. At 4-25am, when the sky started to change color, I was looking up the Lamb's Slide. After taking a little 15min break I put on my crampons, took one of my ice axes and started to kick steps up the couloir. The snow was perfect, firm but not icy, which made for a very fun climb. As I was getting higher, so was the sun, first turning Diamond red, and then orange. After getting above the Broadway I took some photos:

That's looking down the Lamb's Slide. After 1 hour of climbing I got to the top, from where it was easy to traverse on to the Loft. Here is the top of Flying Dutchman:Another fun and easy patch of snow that brought me to the Loft at 5-40am, with a great view of Meeker with its Flying Buttress (the prow in the center):As it turned out, this was the easiest part of the ascent. The real fun part started higher up...

To be continued.