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Stefan
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Joined: 17 Dec 2001
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Stefan
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PostTue Jul 09, 2002 10:43 am 
This trip was unreal. Great weather, no bugs, great snow conditions. This must not be the Cascades I thought to myself. Mitch and I met at the Monogram/Lookout Peak trailhead at 6:30 on Friday where we left one car and proceeded up to the Eldorado Peak trailhead. We left Mitch’s car sometime at 7:00 and crossed the river easily on the wide tree and up the Eldorado Peak climbers path making pretty good time. Steps were already kicked in the snow for us so we just followed the steps all the way up to the base of Eldorado. Weather was fantastic. From Eldorado we traversed over the Inspiration glacier to our objective, but enroute I thought, “Hey, why don’t we do the highest of the Tepeh towers?” So we did having a good view of Dorado needle. The Tepeh Towers summit went easily without any problems and we were back to our packs in about 45 minutes. We continued on to the base of Dorado Needle where we dropped all of our camping gear on the SE col and proceeded up Dorado Needle. We went up Dorado Needle via the steep snow covered east face to the rock ridge. The most difficult part I encountered was the minor snow covered bergschrund at the beginning of the snowslope where I thought I might fall in! We climbed the rock ridge which is low 5th class and solid-airy too in some sections but very enjoyable rock. We could find no register. We downclimbed the peak without any problems. We had time, so on we went to Marble Needle climbing a minor class 4 section. The very final section we roped up which is airy but very short. After our successful summit we went looking at the col between Marble Needle and the Preying Mantis for a reconnassaince. We decided that the col between the Marble Needle and Preying Mantis was ideal for our traverse the next day-however we would have to once again ascend the Marble Needle. Back down to camp at 7:30. Next morning on Saturday we left camp at 6:30 and ascended back up to the Marble Needle and easily traversed below the Preying Mantis. We thought, why not do the Preying Mantis. So we did. This peak is really class 4 or low class 5 from this side. Only one and a half pitches to the summit. We rappelled back down to the col from below the summit. When we got back down, we saw three people at the McAllister/Inspiration col and we knew it was Mike T., Matt B., and Billie B. We yelled and they yelled back! It was wonderful to see them, but we knew we were one day ahead of them and we would never meet. Next we rappled down and easily traversed over to Early Morning Spire. This summit was easily done going around to the north side following steep snow. We came down the peak and down the glacier to the base of Perdition and Backbone ridge. Mitch and I looked at the SE ridge of Perdition and thought “why not?” Well upon closer inspection we saw that there was a false summit looking somewhat like an obstacle so we opted to do the Roper 4th class section along the west ridge. Mistake. We traversed around the SW side of the peak in the snow to the base of the west ridge-I guess I did not pay attention to how long this traverse took me. We started at 12:00 up the west ridge. The start of the west ridge of Perdition took us up a 4th class dirt gully. We roped up. Anybody ever done 4th class dirt? Don’t do it. At one point I put a sling around a rock bulge about the size of a fist because I was sketched and within two steps above this rock bulge the sling came off. We all have been there in this situation. Needless to say because I am writing you this story we made it up above this one pitch section and on to easier 3rd class climbing. The 3rd class climbing soon ended. 3rd class then turned to 4th and low 5th class on the north side of the peak. Mitch and I roped up the entire way to the summit making about 12-15 rope pitches. Snow on the north side of the peak made this traverse a little more sporty but we still did it. The length got to me. I thought the length was as long as my one eyed giant-too long in fact. It is longer than the west ridge of Forbidden but equal to the length in the ridge for Johannesburg. At one point we traversed on to the south side of the ridge-but only for one pitch. Did I say long? TOO LONG! We mainly stayed on the north side thinking “John Roper was a crazy man to to do this solo!” We finally made it to the summit 3.5 hours later. No register. No way were we coming back the way we came so we decided to come down the SE ridge which we had spied earlier. And this went really fast. So fast in fact I will have to recommend you climb it instead of the west ridge. Here is the route description for the SE ridge: From base to summit there are three false summits on the SE ridge. The first false summit is an easy walk up. I never saw the route between the first and second summit, but if you can do that section, you have got this peak made. Between the second false summit and third false summit is a 40 foot rock horn. Drop down to the base of the rock horn from the second false summit (where Mitch and I rappelled down a gully and on to the SW slope) and traverse around on the east side on a short section of slabby class 4. From here the summit is easily gained with one 30 foot section of class 4. We were back down to the snow at 5:30. Relief! When we got back down we saw someone climbing Early Morning Spire-we were sure it was Mike T. We exchanged yells. We traversed over to our packs and then made the long traverse under Backbone ridge where I climbed the Coccyx from a snow finger on the SW side of the peak. We made camp at about 6080+ on the SW arm of the Coccyx in a nice wide heathery section. Our tent had a full frontal view of Perdition peak which was smirking at us all night. On Sunday we left camp at 6:30 to gorgeous weather again. We traversed up “The Bat” which really isn’t that difficult-but will intimidate you at the begining. All you have to do is make sure you follow a well tread goat path up. Look for it! The goats know the way and they take the path of least resistance too. The Bat has a nice glass mustard jar with a metal inscription plate in it. Roper and Dahl put it there in 1967. The next people to sign in were Mitch and Jerry in 1997. Well guess who was the next party? Mitch (AGAIN!) and I. After the Bat you come to the second false summit to the west. We decided to rappel down this false summit leaving a sling around a rock horn, but upon closer inspection from below you could rappel down from one of the trees further to the south. Here is where Mitch and I said our goodbyes. I was faster and my next goal was to do Little Devil. Mitch wanted to take his time coming out. We parted ways. I easily went up Radar Peak (6329) and traversed down and up to 5100 feet above Haystack Creek where I dropped my pack for my summit attempt of Little Devil. Sometime in this timespan it rained on me for about an hour. Not strong rain, but more than a drizzle. In fact I wasn’t paying any attention to the weather and it caught me by surprise. I did notice then that the south and west were quite dark and remained dark for a long period of time. The rain subsided and I made it to the summit of Little Devil in one hour from where I dropped my pack. The weather then became gorgeous again! There was a 12 foot rock horn at the summit of Little Devil so I thought this was the summit-it looked almost equal to the other summit most people go to. I made a climb of this rock horn. This was stupid. The exposure. The fear. The climbing difficulty. Don’t do it. When I climbed it, I probably looked looked the Cingular Wireless symbol all spread eagle with my fingers grabbing and barely holding on. When I shimmied back down I went over to the easy block summit of Little Devil and decided to figure out which one was taller. I did a line of sight to the summit of Baksit peak (6920+). Since Baksit was lower I could then determine if that rock horn to the north was smaller-it was!!-by about 2 inches. Don’t do the rock horn on Little Devil! I started to glissade down from just below the summit of Little Devil. Something was wrong with my right rear bum-I think I cut it somewhere. Anyway, I had to modify my glissading technique. I laid on my back, put my feet down and raised my bum. I was quite amazed at how well this works with the ability to dig your elbows into the snow, but you don’t get that good of views-you also get a lot of snow up your shirt. I did this glissade technique for two sections back to my pack. By this time Mitch had passed me by and I followed his footsteps out via Monogram lake and to the trailhead by 5:00 without incident. Mitch had already hitched a ride to his car at the Eldorado trailhead-we met once again on the road and said our goodbyes. This was an awesome weekend! Stefan Feller

Art is an adventure.
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