Eldorado, NE Face. October 6-8, 2000.
Read Dave's trip report Since he wrote such a good one, I was only going to add some comments - but it turned into a full trip report anyway! So here goes:Dave neglected to mention that he went right for the Kava Royale as soon as the car was parked. We only had one bottle to share amongst two of us, so we unfortunately could not enjoy its calming effects.
Saturday morning, Dave and I crossed the Cascade river on a log, hiked up a steep, soft trail through open forest, travelled across a mile long boulder field, up through some sub-alpine forest, into glowing red and orange alpine meadows, over and down a slabby rock ridge, then up moraine and slab to the Eldorado glacier, and up firm snow and ice to a bivy spot, 5300ft above the road. Whew!
When you're doing these climbs, you are always supposed to think of what it must have been like "back in the day", before roads, trails and climbers paths. Well, assuming that the Eldorado first-ascent dudes made it up the Cascade River, the route up to Eldorado glacier would have been a relative breeze. Open forest all the way to a boulder field, which takes you all the way to open meadows. It doesn't get much easier than that around here... this really is a brush-free approach. Not that I'm trivializing their successes or anything...
Our calves and thighs were burning from the long (but brush-free... did I mention it was brush-free?) ascent, but we were determined to summit today, after a rest. The weather forecast for Sunday was looking less than ideal. From our camp, we kept an eye out for the other party headed in here this weekend. They were approaching via Sibley Creek, which starts higher (~4000ft), but involves a long alpine traverse over scree and snow. They were planning to do the northwest couloir of Eldorado, a grade III climb on water ice to 60 degrees - when in season.
Phil, on the Roush/Eldorado divide, with Mt Johanesburg in the background
Shortly before 2 o'clock in the afternoon, we headed out across the wide flat expanse of glacier just south of the peak. We rounded the east ridge and proceded towards the NE face. Our tracks were very visible in the few inches of new snow that lay upon the glacier ice. In sheltered north-facing pockets, this snow was actually a bit deeper, and still very dry and fluffy - it would have been excellent skiing - but for the 6000ft approach!
Some route-finding was required in order to approach the bergschrund at the base of the face, and I think we made a few lucky guesses as to which way to go when we encountered yawning crevasses extending as far as the eye could see in either direction.
We picked out a few good-looking lines and approached the 'schrund. Dave popped over a hill, and the rope stopped moving. Difficult terrain? After a few minutes of this, I wondered whether it was wise to mill around in the bergschrund (we could easily get around it on the right, and we didn't know what was in store for us up above time-wise. It was already past 3pm). Soon, the rope started moving again - it felt like Dave was belaying me in. I crested the hill and saw him at a fixed belay, across from a sketchy snowbridge. I joined him, and we planned the ascent up the bergschrund wall.
Playing in the Bergschrund
With a fit of bravery, Dave decided to head straight up from our belay, up a slightly overhanging wall, that he thought had plenty of steps on it from which to place pro. I suppose he was having visions of being Miles Smart or something (pictured in Selected Climbs II, on an overhanging bergschrund wall on this face). He took a few steps up, realized his folly, and began a traverse right, towards a snow ramp that exited the bergschrund. This involved an awkward maneouver on extremely brittle vertical ice, into a little nook. Once there, he made quick work of exiting the 'schrund, and I soon joined him. The ice on this bit was rock hard, but so very brittle - it was hard to get a tool placement, because you just destroyed anything you hit.
From here, we continued up the center of the NE face, which was much easier than expected. It approaches 40 degrees on the steepest parts - not quite the 40-50 degree ice face described in Nelson's book. Fun nonetheless though. Under the surface snow was firmer alpine ice that took screws well (although we didn't need them).
NE face of Eldorado
At a small plateau just below the summit area, we detoured to the edge of the face to see if we could look down into the NW couloir. Yup - there it was, in all its glory! A slightly dark and menacing place. The rock looked horrid, but there was a continuous line of (somewhat thin) water ice snaking up the top 200ft of it (which is all we could see). Patches of old dirty snow also clung to the sides. It looked like a fun climb - somewhat scary, but apparently it's only 600ft high. And it was refreshing to see water ice in the Cascades. The glacier approach did look not-trivial though, and there was a very large, recent rockfall on the glacier below, most likely in line with the couloir.
From here, we continued up to the famous knife-edge snow arete. The only time I'd been on something like this before was Mt Athabasca, in the Canadian Rockies. The one on Eldorado, at least in these current conditions (it would probably be easier in soft snow), definitely one-upped that one in exposure. The pictures really don't convey how exposed it was (so I haven't included any - the shot below is just after the arete). We felt it in order to protect the arete with ice screws and the occasional picket.
Dave on the summit, where the arete flattens out
As I reached the highest point, a large bird flew up and circled the summit area, as if acknowledging our arrival. I crossed the summit and continued on a short ridge of easier snow to a pile of rocks where I brought Dave in, and we both sat down and enjoyed the view (and the setting sun!). Wow... it was beautiful. We looked down towards our camp, and the glacier south of peak. Still no sign of that other party. The only sign of humans was the thin line of our tracks from earlier in the afternoon, crossing the wide expanse of glacier covered in fresh snow. We had the whole place to ourselves. There hadn't even been any trace of footprints on the snow arete.
Once we started getting cold, we headed down. The snow arete was a little trickier going down! I hung off one side, and planted my tools on the opposite side. Down lower, it was a fairly straightforward plod down the east ridge, complicated only by a few solid snowbridge crossings. The final walk to base camp along the huge flat icefield, with the suns rays deepening in afternoon colour, was unforgettable.
View north from the summit of Eldorado
Of course, back at camp, the wind was roaring. We quickly set up the tent, got inside, and started melting water. Dave had a headache, and immersed himself in his sleeping bag, while I did all the work :-)
Shortly after setting the tent up, we discovered a crevasse running along the doorway, previously concealed by new snow. It was a small crack, not dangerous, but it seemed to attract small objects and suck them down into oblivion.
It was a long windy night. Occasionally, when awake, I peeked outside to check that stars we still visible. Wouldn't want to wake up in a whiteout windstorm, like happened on the Colonial Glacier last year! The sky stayed clear until sunrise the following morning, when we poked our heads out and, above the red-orange glow in the east, were some dark high clouds, with precip falling from them. A strenuous glance around the doorway of the tent, westward, showed dark menacing clouds filling the sky and obscuring distant peaks. Eldorado was still in the clear, with high clouds moving swiftly above it. A pair of dark birds circled high above our tent, perhaps telling us that it was time for us to go. We decided to hurry up a little.
On the way down, we tackled difficult boulder problems. Here is Phil on his successful 6th attempt on this challenging VI 5 problem.
However, when we finally got going, things seemed to be better. The clouds stayed high, and were now everywhere, but interspersed with openings, and overall not very menacing. It turned out to be a nice cool day.
We made our way down the white glacier world, into the light grey slab world, over a ridge to the red and orange meadow world, along the dark grey boulder-field world, and finally into the dark green forest world. The long descent was punishing, breaks were frequent and appreciated.
In dark-grey boulder-field world, marmots are king. We saw one standing atop the highest boulder around, surveying its terrain. Luckily it was on the hour, and we arrived on time to watch the changing of the guard.
We arrived back at the car in the early afternoon, exhausted, and hungry for Marblemount food. The car belonging to the party attempting the NW couloir was still here. We never did see them - or anyone else. What a great way to top off a climbing season!
