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tolman_paul
Trad climber
Anchorage, AK
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Topic Author's Original Post - Oct 2, 2008 - 12:21pm PT
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How many have climbed the tower? It's one of those routes thats on my must do list. Wanting to hear any stories about the route, logistics et al.
I have this absolutely crazy thought of climbing the route with my whole family.
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Witch Hunter
Social climber
Templeton, CA
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The route is not all that difficult, however the weather can be awful. We were in Fairy Meadows in late June/early July and it rained or snowed every day for over two weeks. The approach hike is pretty brutal too. And the biggest marmots I've ever seen! The Cirque is truly a beautiful place. When we went we also ran the Nahanni river. We flew in upstream of the Cirque, rafted to the confluence of a Glacier Creek (I believe that's the name) and stashed our gear in the trees and then hauled all our wall gear up to the Cirque for a little over two weeks of climbing/waiting for weather to climb.
Most people fly into the lake below Fairy Meadows and then hike up to the Cirque. If you do this, look for one of the canoes stashed at the lake and use it to get across the lake, hiking around the lake will take a lot of time and the mosquitoes will eat you alive!
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tolman_paul
Trad climber
Anchorage, AK
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Topic Author's Reply - Oct 2, 2008 - 02:27pm PT
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With weather concerns I was planning on a 3 to 4 week trip.
I've visite George Bell's sight many times, it's a great resource.
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mojede
Trad climber
Butte, America
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Cool TR, ryanb--thanks for sharing the link.
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tolman_paul
Trad climber
Anchorage, AK
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Topic Author's Reply - Oct 3, 2008 - 05:55pm PT
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Trying to bump at least one political thread.
Thanks for the links, that float trip was inspiring! I'm a weenie so am planning to fly in.
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matisse
climber
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the porter, my s.o. was one of the raft guys. if you have specific questions feel free to email me and I can forward them to him,
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Double D
climber
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Cirque? … great place. One of the most awe-inspiring places I’ve ever had the fortune of visiting.
I’m impressed by the river TR mainly because the crux of the whole place is the low-land mosquitoes (Canadian National Bird!) and the fresh bear droppings down by the lake as you are humping 100lb. packs through a bunch of fallen trees and swamps, then a very loose boulder field that’s about 10 times longer than the Zodiac direct approach. If one were to come across a hungry bear…let’s just say you wouldn’t have a chance to get your pack off and run away.
I came down from a trip in AK after an ill-fated attempt of the Mooses Tooth with the Bird. As luck would have it some fungus showed up in the mail and provided the much needed funding for a detour to the Cirque to meet up with my buddies, Augie Klein, Guy Thompson and the late Geary Zacor (RIP bro.). After hitching rides and buses, planes and meeting so many cool folks in AK and Whitehorse where I was time in time again taken in by complete strangers, my arrival to Watson Lake was disheartening. I called our pilot only to find that my buddies had already flown in (thanks guys!) the day before but left a note to wait for Mark Wilford and Bill Wylie coming from CO. I asked the pilot if he could pick me up in town, he flatly refused and was a real jerk about it (6 miles). Having only enough money for my flight in, I scoped out the town to find a decent sleeping arrangement. As luck would have it, there was a vacancy at a condemned apartment that had all the fixings…or at least I made it that way.
Ok so I found out that the bars shut down promptly at 2am unless you knew the right person that would sell you beer out of their motel until 4am. Obviously the all-nighter plan wasn’t going to work. I did hook up with a miner that was on liberty who offered to stow my bags (did I mention I had a 150lb pig with me?) in his motel room and was the culprit of the 4am club. Anyway, after banging on his door for 10 minutes, it became apparent that my friend was in a far deeper coma than me so I opted for my condemned digs with the ledge.
Got my pig, packed the ledge and finally was able to plead with the pilot to pick me up. Watson Lake is real pretty but swimming with the massive ‘squites changed my nationality, or at leas my skin color. Days go by and still no CO boys but as luck would have it I ran into some really cool Swiss guys who let me ride in with them. They were quite intent on going out on the town but being cash-challenged I had to resort to bar tricks and bets to chase anything, but it worked and they were a blast.
After humping the first loads in I figured I had a 50/50 chance of surviving the next loads. Here’s how we should have come in…
Not a bad idea for an exit strategy either…
But this is how we came in…see that lake way down there and the very steep boulder field? Yep that’s it!
Guy Thompson at the base of our climb on top of the endless bummer…
Here’s another shot of me making the best of our descent whilst fixing…
I remember that Pink Floyd’s “The Wall” had just come out and Geary had a cassette of it and had recently seen them in concert with his buddy Randy Leavitt. The surroundings seemed to really fit the music well but we also had a bit of disco just in case…
Mark Wilford and Aug Klein strutting.
Unlike most parties who come there just to climb Lotus,
we were intent on doing a 1st ascent prior to Lotus so we picked Mt. Harrison Smith…a fine looking 2,500 foot throne that is perched over the epic boulder field approach. We really didn’t think much about how the boulder field got there, but as the story unfolded, we found out, but I digress.
The climbing was very high quality…mainly aid, but the weather…well it wasn’t so great.
Aug Klein cleaning
Geary Zaccor leading one of the lower hooking and heads pitches.
Geary at a belay
Augie leading something higher up.
Me bumming in the drizzle.
Unfortunately our route turned into a waterfall towards the end of the 2nd day on the wall which was the source of something called “trench-foot” which I still have the pleasure of having. All night long there was horrendous rock fall fluttering through the air…a sound that still haunts me today.
So we bailed with only a couple of days to hang. Eric Reynolds, founder of Marmot Mt. Works showed up late in the season to climb Lotus. He later told me that the day after we left there was a huge rock fall in the vicinity of our route that enlarged the boulder field slightly and left a could of dust for several days. Close one, eh?
Camping in the meadows is way cool. You set up under the overhangs of these huge boulders and stay DRY! Lots of fun times, met some great folks at the village. Great bouldering too!
Wilford bouldering
Augie bouldering
Mark Wilford dressed for Sunday services
Hiking is incredible with lots to see
Mount Proboscus prior to it becoming a sport route (how did those guys ever get that much clear weather anyway?)
Fun times, great place!
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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very nice!
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matty
Big Wall climber
Valencia, CA
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Thanks for the write up Dave:)
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Double D
climber
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You're welcome! If anyone hasn't read the link to the TR of the rafting approach, it's a hoot! My hats off to those guys.
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MisterT
Trad climber
little blue truck
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great pics and TR Double D.
I was the one who wrote about the rafting in trip and was going to post that TR, but I see someone else had already. It is a truly amazing place, make sure you have enough time to do what you want even if the weather is bad for a while though.
If you liked that TR, you might be amused by this one about when some of us got together for a bit more suffering this summer...
http://www.electricant.net/grundyman/montana2008.html
--=Tom
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Mike Bolte
Trad climber
Planet Earth
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great post dave - wonder how many more great stories are out there to be told.
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Double D
climber
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MisterT...you guys are nuts! I'm sitting here shivering in my cozy, secure home and feeling your pain. Thanks again for a very cool TR.
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le_bruce
climber
Oakland: what's not to love?
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Thanks for sharing, Double D. 10/10 photos.
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Bargainhunter
Mountain climber
Los Angeles, CA
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I approached it on foot from the old Canol road in the Yukon Territories with some inflatable AIRE kayaks in 1993. We took 2 months of food with us and explored a few valleys along the Nahanni, including Black Wolf Creek and the Cirque. We carried everything and had no resupply for 2 months. Made it to the big ledge halfway up on the classic LFT route before a big rain storm hit, we shivered in bivy sacs all night then baled in the morning and had an epic descent with the rope getting stuck on multiple rappels in the rain, requiring re-climbing up multiple pitches to free it with vertical rivers of ice cold water running down the wall. Thought we were goners. Some Italians there before us said it had rained for 3 weeks straight when they were there. When we reached Nahanni Butte, I had to hitch-hike 1400 miles back to our starting point to get my car. High points were: aurora borealis, bears swimming with us in the river, big ass moose, being totally self-reliant covering 1000+ kilometers of wildness with my pal Jason, no trails and reading RM Patterson's "Dangerous River" about his life trapping in the area.
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Tom Frost described his trip into the Cirque as the perfect expedition, "good weather, good friends, good climbing."
Looks like you were stacked tall in category two, Dave, and might have lost points on the others! LOL Great Tale of a strong team! Thanks for posting up.
Any photos Bargainhunter? Your trip sounds like a major adventure, to say the least! Makes my shoulders ache to ponder your full pack!
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Double D
climber
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Coz, I wasn't dis'n the route nor the style. Quite the contray I'm amazed at what they (and you guys) were able to pull off. Climbs that hard in remote, semi-alpine settings get nothing but my total respect. In fact when I read the article about it (Nat. Geo? w/ Galen) I was amused at how Todd commented on his distain for aid-climbing and how it was simply a means to the end for the free route. It's kind of like doing the 1st ascent and the 1st free ascent all wrapped up in one.
What amazes me more... two weeks of good weather!
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