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scooter
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Topic Author's Original Post - Nov 19, 2013 - 12:39pm PT
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I would like to climb Mont Blanc. Is there a route of similar difficulty to Liberty Ridge? I don't want it to be much harder than that if at all. Any info would be greatly appreciated!
Thanks!
Pat
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sharperblue
Mountain climber
San Francisco, California
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Nov 19, 2013 - 01:07pm PT
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Mont Blanc is a whole different order of magnitude, but still has a few softer lines; the Innominata is probably the most classic of these. check out the 'routes' tags on the left hand side of the home page here:
http://www.summitpost.org/mont-blanc/150245
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Topic Author's Reply - Nov 19, 2013 - 01:24pm PT
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Inominata Ridge sounds quite a bit harder than Liberty Ridge. Sharper Blue, have you climbed both of those routes? Or both mountains via different routes?
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sharperblue
Mountain climber
San Francisco, California
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Nov 19, 2013 - 04:27pm PT
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sadly, no; just passing along a good Beta page
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scooter
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Topic Author's Reply - Nov 19, 2013 - 04:32pm PT
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I had already read the summit post info. I was actually looking for first hand knowledge, as I know there are frequent posters who have most likely climbed both mountains. Thanks though!
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scooter
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Topic Author's Reply - Nov 19, 2013 - 04:36pm PT
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Shwortz, Have you climbed both mountains? I have already used Google search. Thanks though.
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scooter
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Topic Author's Reply - Nov 19, 2013 - 04:45pm PT
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Burc3y- Nope, don't need El Cap info. I was hoping to get a direct comparison from someone who has at least climbed both peaks. I have climbed Liberty Ridge as well and I thought that would be a good route to compare another one too.
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Dolomite
climber
Anchorage
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Nov 19, 2013 - 04:52pm PT
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The Ordinary Route on Mt Blanc (Bosses Ridge) reminded me a lot of the Disappointment Cleaver (regular) route on Rainier, except it was longer and had serious rockfall at one point and also lightning danger. It is not as steep as Liberty Ridge (which I've been on twice in winter, but never summited).
There are tons of people on the regular route on Mt Blanc, just as on the regular route on Rainier, but Mt Blanc is incredibly beautiful and very much worth doing by any route you can eke your way up.
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scooter
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Topic Author's Reply - Nov 19, 2013 - 05:10pm PT
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Thanks Dolomite! What month did you climb Mont Blanc? Our descent path from Liberty Ridge was down Disappointmenting Cleaver. I didn't like it...There was puke every 10 feet and guys crying and tripping on their own feet.
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Dolomite
climber
Anchorage
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Nov 19, 2013 - 05:43pm PT
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August, as I recall. I would have thought the Brenva on Mt Blanc (yeah, another route I bailed off) would have been comparable to Liberty Ridge, but last I heard the Brenva had massive seracs toppling down it constantly and hasn't been done for a while. I am a huge fan of Rebuffat's, The Mont Blanc Massif, but some conditions have changed since he wrote it. Great book, though!
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Topic Author's Reply - Nov 19, 2013 - 05:51pm PT
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The falling massive seracs sound terrifying. I am thinking late June for an ascent. Sounds like that may be a little to early though. Thanks again!
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Reilly
Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
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Nov 19, 2013 - 06:23pm PT
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If I'm not mistaken, hard as that is to imagine, Remy Julienne drove a Fiat or something up Mt Blanc. He might have used chains though. YMMV, literally.
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Topic Author's Reply - Nov 19, 2013 - 06:30pm PT
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I can't find the info about the Car ascent Reily. Where did you find that? I would like to see a picture!
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i'm gumby dammit
Sport climber
da ow
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Nov 20, 2013 - 01:06am PT
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There was puke every 10 feet and guys crying and tripping on their own feet. What did you expect from something called Disappointmenting Cleaver?
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schwortz
Social climber
"close to everything = not at anything", ca
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Nov 20, 2013 - 01:38am PT
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i guess instead of giving you an honest reply i should have told you to f*#k off since thats the level of respect you showed me....
try reading my name correctly next time before you show off your fantastic attention to detail and wonderful bedside manner
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mongrel
Trad climber
Truckee, CA
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Nov 20, 2013 - 02:28am PT
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The entire Brenva side has always had occasional huge serac falls, but once you get across to the standard climbing routes, they're mostly not threatened (certainly not the easier ones). The Brenva Spur route is completely easy climbing and was a routine solo all the way back in the 1970s. It still gets done all the time (check internet, you'll see). Probably safer than anything that's at all steep on Rainier. What's changed is that there was a rock avalanche on what used to be the "regular" route, so now the only reasonable way is a variation (Gussfeldt) that was always better anyway: steep snow for the entire climb instead of a long starting part on low angle mixed and crummy rock. Just stay ALL the way to the left at the bottom. Classic route. Scenery is great. If you leave either bivvy site early enough (1 AM is normal; 3 AM way too late for safety unless you're really fast), it is a long but reasonable day to get to the summit and all the way back to Chamonix. Get some!
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Degaine
climber
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Nov 20, 2013 - 04:15am PT
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dolomite wrote:
I am a huge fan of Rebuffat's, The Mont Blanc Massif, but some conditions have changed since he wrote it. Great book, though!
That's an understatement! I have the "100 finest", and it's amazing how much the glaciers have thinned and receded even in the Mont Blanc Massif. The difference is even more astounding when comparing now / then photos with the Ecrins Massif (some glaciers have disappeared).
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Degaine
climber
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Nov 20, 2013 - 04:34am PT
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June's a good time to go for two reasons: one, the summer vacation season has not yet hit, so the crowds should be minimal (try going during the week), and the infamously dangerous "Gouter Couloir" will be filled with snow, so rockfall during this terrifying one minute traverse should also be limited.
The Three Mounts route is spectacular, as well, although Mont Blanc de Tacul's north face is a bit of a crap shoot, with regular serac fall and someone getting caught every couple of years. You also start out at the Cosmiques Hut (3613m) after taking the Aiguille du Midi Tram to 3800m.
The other option in June, if it is a good snow year (like last year), is via the Grands Mulets hut and the Dome du Gouter's north ridge :http://www.camptocamp.org/images/159808/fr/mont-blanc-par-les-grands-mulets-en-pointilles-itineraire-par-l-arete-n-du-dome-du-gouter
The dotted line is the line of ascent. This is the route most people use in the spring / early summer and one skis.
The Italian regular route is also spectacular, but a bit of a maze through the crevasses above the Gonella hut (just renovated).
Killian Jornet "ran" the Innominata ridge, so it's not that technically difficult in good conditions, but it is a long route.
You can also do the knife-edge traverse from the Aiguille de Bionnassay. This from the Durier Hut, and should be in good condition in June. It meets up with the regular route (from the Gouter hut) at the Dome du Gouter's summit.
Hope that helps. FYI - I've only done the Three Mounts route on the way up, and then skied from the summit down the north face (see photo I linked).
Have fun!
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Rivet hanger
Trad climber
Barcelona
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Nov 20, 2013 - 07:31am PT
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I would add Sentinelle Rouge and Major routes. Both steep snow slopes and quite protected from possible Brenva falling seracs since they are spurs.
Another interesting option to climb Mont-Blanc (very different kind of route) is the arête integrale du Brouillard.
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steveA
Trad climber
Wolfeboro, NH
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Nov 20, 2013 - 07:31am PT
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Having not done Liberty Ridge, I can't compare but when I was 24, I soloed
the Gouter Route from the valley of Chamonix in February, back in 1971.
Yes, I know pretty dumb.
I remember it being pretty much a hike-although a tough hike, in deep snow in places. The Gouter Hut was left open, which I took advantage of up, and down. The wine was good!
I was lucky with the weather-crystal clear, and not that cold.
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Jan
Mountain climber
Colorado, Nepal & Okinawa
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Nov 20, 2013 - 10:41am PT
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I did Mt Blanc by the Gouter Route in October and it was uneventful as there were only a half dozen people on the mountain, and we started at 1 am when the snow was crisp going up. There was a north wind which was pretty terrible however. I remember my nose running and freezing into a horizontal icicle which I occasionally had to snap off. The water bottle in our packs were completely frozen and didn't thaw until around 10 am.
One thing to remember when going up on Mt Blanc is that it is a magnetic mountain and compasses do not work properly up there. Many people have descended Rainier in storms on compass settings but you can't do that on Mt Blanc. In addition, 15,000 feet gives some people altitude sickness if they are only weekend alpinists and weather conditions can be quite severe even in summer, because it is so far north, being the same lattitude as northern Canada.
That said, it is one of the most beautiful views in the world up there! The only place more spectacular is the Himalayas. It's well worth it and taking an easier route up so one has time to enjoy the view would be preferable in my opinion to doing a more technical route the first time up.
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Topic Author's Reply - Nov 20, 2013 - 10:55am PT
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Thank you all for the great info. That was exactly what I was looking for. Much better than anything else I have found.
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BASE104
Social climber
An Oil Field
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Nov 20, 2013 - 11:02am PT
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I've only come down the easy route on Mt. Blanc, but I remember it being a hog trough with a couple of in place ladders. Stay roped up, there are a lot of little crevasses. Later in the summer the crevasses are much easier to see.
My buds did the Inominata unroped, and it was supposedly a very cool route and not that hard.
As for lightning, The only time I experienced it in Chamonix was at night during a storm.
The Route Major is supposedly fun, but a reasonably serious undertaking compared to the tourist route. I went up to do it once and had to turn around because of a storm and huge avalanches.
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stevep
Boulder climber
Salt Lake, UT
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Nov 20, 2013 - 11:05am PT
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I've been most of the way up the standard Chamonix side route on Mt. Blanc. We bailed a little below the summit as the weather started getting bad.
It's comparable to the easier routes on Rainier. I've not been on Liberty, but understanding is that it's a fair chunk steeper than anything I remember on the easy route on Mt.Blanc.
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steve shea
climber
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Nov 20, 2013 - 11:11am PT
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The Brenva Spur. Follow Mongrel's instructions. Gorgeous scenery, feels remote. The Italian side is just spectacular and does look Himalayan in scale when viewed from Entreves/Courmayeur. After your successful climb, celebrate on Sunday night with the Grand Boeuf at Maison di Fillipo in Entreves. If its still there. Just checked, still there.
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Jan
Mountain climber
Colorado, Nepal & Okinawa
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Nov 20, 2013 - 11:20am PT
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The regular routes on Rainier and Mt Blanc are comparable but the weather is always more serious in the Alps and can come up more suddenly. One advantage of doing it in June is that the days are so much longer then which means you should get an even earlier start to avoid sinking into mushy snow. You'll have to ask around but 11 pm might be a better start time than 1 am.
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steve shea
climber
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Nov 20, 2013 - 11:27am PT
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Just learn about and follow the Isotherme.
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jaaan
Trad climber
Chamonix, France
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Nov 20, 2013 - 12:39pm PT
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Is there a route of similar difficulty to Liberty Ridge? I don't want it to be much harder than that if at all.
The answer to your question is obviously yes but as I've never climbed Rainier, suggesting routes is difficult! I have however climbed Mont Blanc fifteen times via seven different routes, so I'll give it a quick go.
If you think that either of the regular routes are going to be too easy/crowded, or you're looking for a bit more adventure without being silly, then I think I'd go with Steve Shea's suggestion of the Old Brenva.
The Innominata is just a bit harder and just a bit more serious given its position, but also excellent.
La Traversée Royale - traversing the Dômes de Miage, then the Aiguille de Bionnassay to finish up the Bosses ridge is long (two and a half days) and ultra classic but a deal easier than the Brenva or Innominata: http://www.camptocamp.org/routes/54092/fr/mont-blanc-traversee-domes-de-miage-aiguille-de-bionnassay-mont-blanc
Routes that personally I'd avoid (at least at this stage) despite them having been suggested above would be the Sentinel Rouge and the Arête du Brouillard.
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Topic Author's Reply - Nov 20, 2013 - 01:11pm PT
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Old Brenva sounds like an interesting option. Thanks for you input. That is a lot of ascents of a big mountain, well done.
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wbw
Trad climber
'cross the great divide
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Nov 20, 2013 - 02:57pm PT
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I climbed the "Three Summits" route on Mt. Blanc in late July 15ish years ago, and it is very scenic. It was surprisingly cold: I wore my belay jacket all of the way up. We camped below the S.Face of the Midi, and climbed mostly unroped. We climbed via a running belay through the steepest part, while watching a party of many Brits belay the pitch while all hanging off one screw in neve.
While the route and the mountain are very beautiful, it is mostly the shenanigans that we witnessed that sticks in my minds. Lots and lots of people doing stupid $hit. While we were down climbing the steepest part on a running belay, an Italian guy climbing with a French guide grabs the rope going up to my partner and starts pulling up on it. He almost pulled my partner off the mountain. Then, at the place where the seracs have been killing people in recent years, there were parties stopped and eating lunch on the mellow slope immediately below the seracs. Back then, the seracs did not look too menacing, but the thought of hanging out below seracs made me sick to my stomach then, and now.
Go as early as possible to climb the route up and down in the firmest possible conditions. It's not possible to go early enough to avoid the crowds.
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jaaan
Trad climber
Chamonix, France
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Nov 20, 2013 - 03:52pm PT
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Another interesting route is the Kuffner Arête. This is in fact not on Mont Blanc but on Mont Maudit, but is as classic as it gets. The reason I mention it in the context of Mont Blanc is that from the summit of Maudit it takes just a few minutes to descend to the Col de la Brenva to join the last section of the Three Monts route (that WBW mentions above) to the top of Mont Blanc. Count maybe an hour and a half, maybe a bit more, from Maudit to Mont Blanc - depending on how tired you are, of course! Think of it as The Two Monts...!
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Dave Davis
Social climber
Seattle, WA
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Nov 21, 2013 - 01:06am PT
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I've climbed Liberty Ridge and the Brenva Spur and would say they are fairly comparable in difficulty with the Brenva perhaps being a bit more difficult with the short bit of ice climbing near the top of the spur and the higher altitude of Mt. Blanc. Both first- class mountaineering routes .
I just read a previous post that said the Brenva is now dangerously exposed to serac/ ice fall. Did not know this as it has been many years ago that I did the climb.
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jaaan
Trad climber
Chamonix, France
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Nov 21, 2013 - 04:18am PT
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The Old Brenva route's seracs that guard its exit certainly do change from time to time. When I did it in 1987 we traversed rightwards to the col de la Brenva to avoid climbing through them, though this was more because of bad weather. Another thing that's changed is that the whole of the initial buttress fell down and nowadays most folk seem to take the Couloir Gussfeldt Variant to start the route though I'm sure the rock buttress must have stabilised by now. If you look at a photo of the route, Couloir Gussfeldt is the big slope to the right of the rock buttress start. It generally features large seracs - perhaps this is what the post you read was referring to? After the rockfall the route understandably became somewhat forgotten, but now it's regularly climbed again. I'd say that overall, serac/avalanche danger is far more a feature of the neighbouring Sentinel Rouge.
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