Experience: The Best of All Teachers

What we learned...

Packing

We arrived at the Big Sandy parking lot at around 8:00 PM.  The light was growing thin and the mosquitos were growing thick.  Nothing like packing in a cloud of bugs.  A couple of hours earlier we passed a gas station that was free of mosquitos and had plenty of space for us to spread out and pack.  But it never occurred to us that we could pack before we arrived at the trail head.  From now on the pre pack option will always be considered.

Weather

Prepare for the worst and when the worst happens hunker down and wait. This is the best advice I can give concerning weather in the Cirque of the Towers and the Tetons. Weather is difficult to predict in ranges that block the horizon. Always be prepared for rain, hail, lightning and temperatures below 40 degrees. In most of the guide books I read the majority of the rain, hail, lightning and low temperatures happen after 2:30 in the summer time. But there are exceptions to every rule.

Light and fast

The approach into the Cirque is ten miles. The first six miles are easy and the last four can be challenging especially if coming directly from sea level. Since we arrived at the parking lot at the trail head at 8:00 PM we broke the hike into two days. The first six miles we did at night to get to Big Sandy Lake. The next morning we finished off the hike into The Cirque and set up our base camp by noon. If climbers are interested in spending multiple days in the Cirque the load will not be light. Bear canisters, tents, food, fuel and other essentials are necessary items to have back at base camp. We splurged and brought in a one person tent and a two person tent. The two person tent was our bug free hangout area. This made our down time in camp a little more bearable when the bugs were in full force. It was also nice to not have to share a tent for six nights with each other after several days of freeze dried meals...

The approach to Pingora was about an hour. We brought two small packs, two ropes, an alpine rack, climbing shoes, one belay jacket, one wind breaker, two liters of water, and some food. We both wore polypropylene tee shirts, fleece hoodies, our harnesses and helmets and light quick dry pants. We left one pack, a liter of water and our approach shoes at the base of the climb. Since the weather was nearly perfect we never used the belay jacket or the wind breaker. The approach to and from thee climb, the three pitches and our thirty minute summit picnic was completed in under six hours. We packed the same for the next two climbs, but we had to carry extra water and our approach shoes since we would be needing these items for the descent and would not be rapping down to the beginning of the climb.

After two epic weather events (one on Wolf's Head and one on The Upper Exum of the Grand Teton) we took a hard look at what we would bring the next time we went into the high alpine environment. In the future I think we would bring two belay coats and some light weight, water resistant pants and jackets. Although it will add a little weight it will dramatically reduce the amount of suffering involved with waiting out a weather event. The route’s we chose were not technically difficult and we felt that the extra weight would be easily manageable.

Wolf's Head

Pablo and I have been relaxing and getting town stuff done since we arrived in Jackson, Wyoming this past Sunday night. We hiked out from the Cirque of the Towers in one push on Sunday morning and were exhausted after a productive trip into the area. We'll write more as time allows, but for now, we'd like to share our experiences from the East Ridge of Wolf's Head, one of the 50 classic climbs in North America.

After getting into the Cirque and climbing the South Buttress of Pingora on July 4th, we took a rest day in preparation for climbing the E. Ridge on Wolf's Head the following day. We awoke to auspicious-looking skies but decided to at least get to the bottom of the approach and see how things looked from there. Hiking out of camp for an hour put us under the base of the "grassy ledges" approach, which looked wet but doable. Most parties just scramble up here to the saddle between the Tiger Tooth and Wolf's Head, but because things looked wet and greasy, Paul and I opted to rope up. Turned out to be a good call. We sketched our way up wet rock, through water pouring over our heads, and finally crested into the sun and within view of the start of the route. We were psyched to be in the sun and on dry rock! Unfortunately, that would be short-lived.

I led up the first pitch, which included the "Sidewalk," a 24-inch wide fin of rock with 600+ feet of air on either side. Paul took the next pitch with sunny skies above, but as I started to follow, the clouds were building and the nearby summits were beginning to be shrouded in heavy clouds. Knowing we had to keep moving, Paul and I swapped leads along the ridge, figuring out which way to go around every tower that was thrown at us.

Before long, the valleys below were obscured by fog and mist, and we started hearing the first few pieces of hail landing on our helmets. Bailing and rapping weren't much of an option, so we continued on through the varying types of precipitation. We found refuge at belay stations below big roofs and in caves on the route while waiting for the party in front of us that was doing the lions share of the route finding. They, like us, found little comfort in the deteriorating weather.

Just before I reached the top of the crux pitch the skies opened. Heavy, wet slush poured down and soaked the rock and all of those on it. As I straddled on a small rock perch Paul followed with our pack. The rock was soaked and the climbing was awkward. We attempted to lower a loop to haul the pack through the top of the pitch to no avail. Finally, Paul grunted his way through the tight overhang, straddled the perch behind me, stripped me of my gear, and cruised through the next pitch.

My next lead was a tricky one, especially in the rain. It was a very exposed hand traverse on some very greasy rock. Some small chicken heads lead my feet down to a tiny belay. Once Paul arrived he built an anchor above me, racked up, and pulled his way up through a short pitch, and disappeared. A few minutes later I found myself squeezing my way through a tunnel. I emerged out onto a large, sunny ledge. I felt as though I had been shoved through a birth canal and landed in a tanning booth. The sun was bright on the northwest side of Wolf's Head and we were now a couple easy pitches away from the summit.

After some high fives, pictures, water, and food the four of us began our journey down. Five repels and a few hours of scrambling led us back to our campsite. We were "home" and feeling pretty good about how we handled a very difficult fourteen-hour day.  
- B.T

Give em enough rope...

Erik's last post is a timely one.  Brian and I have been mulling over the double vs single rope situation for our up coming trip to the Cirque of the Towers in the Wind River Range.  Seventy meter Nano?  Two photons?  One sixty meter workhorse?  Two fifties?  Region, rock type, weather condition, style and route are all variables that need to be considered.

According to Mountaineering: The Freedom of the Hills the advantages of twins and doubles are: rope friction can be greatly reduced, falls can be shorter, two ropes are less likely to get severed in rockfall or sharp edges, and two ropes are available for rappel.  The book also points out advantages when protecting the second from pendulum falls and when doing traverses.  Another important aspect is that when clipping gear slack can be given to one rope while the other can remain taught.

I started surfing the web looking for answers, but could not find "the answer". 

The reason that there is no definitive answer that works for all climbers is that all climbers are different.  I asked Erik for his advise and he pointed out that the climber is another variable that needs to be considered.  A technical route that might be challenging for me, might be considered extremely easy for someone else.  Some climbers can cruise through the remainder of a route and top out before the thunder storm hits, while other climbers might chose to bail off the climb and rappel down to safety.

After all sorts of searching and pondering I feel like I have made up my mind about what I would like to bring to The Winds with us, but I am still open to suggestions and comments from folks who have climbed in The Winds or similar places.  Feel free to post a comment and let me know what you think.  The more information I have to consider the happier I will be...