The snow was soft and wintry and deep! I left my jacket open, but snow was flying up into my face and into my jacket — who would have guessed there were faceshots to be had in April!?
I had been leading the hike for the last two hours and when I crested this rise I jokingly shouted “oh no!” However, as I looked, I instantly regretted the joke. This was indeed a false summit, but the true summit was even further than I possibly could have guessed.
I had second thoughts about deciding to bring my “fat, fun” skis rather than my narrower “mountaineering” skis for which I have ski crampons. With ski crampons, I would probably easily maintain my initial pace of 1,500 vertical feet per hour. Instead, it would take me two hours to climb the next 1,000 ft.
Eventually the rock became loose enough that we could plunge step, but this also meant that it was loose enough to pick up momentum. I was fortunate to happen to look back up the slope just as the rock was starting to slide on its own and shouted to Rafee to take cover. We managed to jump to the side as several soccer ball sized rocks came hurtling past.
Along the shore where we stood, the trail happened to be littered with great skipping rocks (a rarity in the Sierra!) and Rafee and I spent a couple minutes lobbing rocks out onto the ice and reveling in the alien sounds produced.
We arrived at the crux of the climb where I had read that the standard route ran up the gut of this gully and was called “The Staircase.” I could indeed see the large 3-5 foot ledges and agreed that this was probably the easiest way up, normally. At that moment, however, the steps were buried in 3 to 12 inches of snow.
Alas, after several weeks of searching, I’ve been unable to find my SD card from this trip…
Iris shouted up “Ooh! AJ’s going for bonus points!” Apparently there was a much easier route down, but I was enjoying the climb and it seemed like the more complicated climbing was successfully distracting my mind from the pain in my legs.
Sean had written that he summited at 10:40 am, more than three hours earlier! Even better, according to the entry, he’d left some cookies for us!
I was ecstatic to make it to the summit and officially be a 5.easy climber!