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Cuckawalla
Trad climber
Grand Junction, CO
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Topic Author's Original Post - Jul 7, 2007 - 06:51pm PT
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After dislocating my shoulder a week or so ago I was itching to get out and do some climbing. When I first started climbing I had heard about Wham Ridge on Vestal peak and thought it would be a good beginner climb. I later learned that there is something like a 12-mile hike into the thing and decided to take it off the tick list. With the temperature getting way into the hundreds a trip into the high country sounded good. I recruited a friend of mine, Mike, who had done a little climbing and a lot of hiking/backpacking. It ended up that my regular climbing partner Jesse B was going to come and bring his brother Luke making two parties. The plan was to meet up at the Little Molas Lake Trail head early morning on the 5th. I had gone earlier to meet up with my girlfriend Hillary to watch the fireworks in Silverton. Outside of Ouray, on my way up the pass, my car broke down and I began hitchhiking. It was a busy day on the roads but no one would pick me up. Subaru upon Subaru filled with plastered with gear stickers with those outdoorsy types passed me by. A few miles up the road a Jeep Cherokee pulled over and there elderly ladies from Nebraska said they could give me a ride as far as red mountain where they would be going on some back roads in search of some flowers. They were very kind and good people, we talked about the marvels of the Internet. I was impressed that they would pick me up when no one else would. At Red Mountain I wished them luck and hopped out. It was after a couple more miles of getting passed that a retired guy from Durango picked me up and gave me a ride the last few miles down into Silverton to the gas station where I was to meet Hillary. Since my car was just barley off the road on one of the most steep and treacherous mountain passes I made her drive me back so that I could try to coast back down to Ouray. Low and behold the car started up and I made it down to Ouray where we decided to watch the fireworks.
Hillary meets a Construction cone
After the fireworks and
when the crowds had died down I decided that I would try to make it to the pull off where I would meet my friends. Hillary followed me and we made it to the pull off late and threw our tent in some field and crashed for the night. Of course it had been the day after the 4th so my friends were a little late, they ended up getting there around 9 am. We took off down the trail, Hillary following us for a ways.
The first part is a decent of a thousand feet or so via switchbacks on the Colorado trail. At the Animas River crossing Hillary turned around and from there it was a sausage fest. The grade was steady for another four miles until we hit a beaver pond with crazy swirls of moss. We could see Vestal from there, it still looked far away:
The grade slowly became damn steep and we huffed and puffed our way up.
We got to the base of Arrow Peak
and took a rest and continued up another 3 miles or so to 12,000 feet and just below Vestal Peak.
We were hard pressed at finding anything remotely flat for our four person REI Rental tent that we had divvied up between us. It ended up taking us about 6-7 hours to get in and find a grassy slope to sleep on which was next to this pristine lake.
Flowery Interlude:
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We pitched the tent and used my jetboil to cook up five freeze-dried dinners.
It became overcast and cold. We huddled over the jetboil, shoveling in grub and sipping on some vodka from a plastic bottle. At 7 pm we decided that it was too cold to be outside and retired to our fine four-man tent. All of the tents occupants except for Jesse B. were 6’ or more. As Mike put it, “ This sh#t is like a giant man-Pita”. We set the alarm for 5 am. Jesse and Luke were thinking about staying another night. Mike and I would have to do the peak, the decent, and then hike out. At about 12 am it began to rain. It rained harder and harder all night. We all woke up cursing and figured our summit was not to be. We turned off the alarm, rolled over and pushed shoulders and legs around in our man-pita. The rain quit early in the morning and when Luke left the tent at 7:30 am and screamed at us to come out we were greeted by two things. The first and obvious was a small heard of rag tag Mountain goats peering over a talus mound at our camp and nibbling at some of the greenery around us.
We happened to have camped on a nice parcel of grass, and the mountain goats were sizing us up to see if they could over take us. We then looked up at Vestal and saw Wham Ridge under blue skies and looking quite dry. We debated, fearing more rain and not getting an early start. We intermingled with the goats as we finished our breakfast. We eventually decided to pack our sh#t up and make a go for it. We were camped nearest to the far left corner of the wave of granite.
The ridge is the right most side of the pyramid. If you start to the right you end up climbing some 4th class slab for and extra hundred or so feet.
We followed a grassy slope until it met the ridge.
We roped up and threw shoes on. The only light cord I had was a 8mm that a friend of mind gave me to make a rope rug out of for him. I figured that a few more miles on the cord wouldn’t do it any harm. I paid out around 70 feet of cord and tied in explaining to Mike what Simul climbing was. I stuffed the rest of the rope into my pack and threw slings, three tricams, a half set of nuts, and a half set of cams on my shoulder and started off.
Jesse and Luke took a line to your left:
Mike on the left, Luke on the right
Whenever the grade got any harder then 5.5 I would stop and belay him past the difficult sections. I was amazed at all the fixed cams and nuts on this thing. I fiddled briefly with them all but clouds from all directions were looking a wee bit threatening. As it became more broken we un-roped and 5th classed it to the summit on loose rock.
It took us around two hours to reach the top.
We did some inspection and found our decent gully and did some scree skiing and snow sliding to get to the bottom.
We loaded up our packs as it began to sprinkle on us and looked up at the shiny wet face of Vestal and saw a party that was behind us working their way up. The rock up there was slicker then snot when wet. We shouldered our packs and with what was probably a collective sigh, started home. It took us six hours to get back. Going down the steeps that we went up proved very tiring. To top it all off we had to ascend that thousand or so feet at the very end. The whole time the clouds kept pissing on us, never enough to put rain gear on, just enough to make you wet and make things dreary. At 7 pm we arrived at our cars and once again my car fired up as if nothing had happened to it. Mike was to follow me home so that he could scoop me up if and when it died. With the Heater on full blast to try and battle it from overheating, we drove tired and satisfied the whole two hours home. Today I think about how sore I am, and how good that feels. I try and fathom walking as a primary mode of transportation and find myself baffled. How squishy and weak most of us have become. As I start back through the grades, and my shoulder improves I think that maybe Crestone Needle or Sunlight spire is next? Anyone done these yet?
--Jesse Z
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Chiloe
Trad climber
Lee, NH
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Fun TR. The Wham Ridge is a pretty dramatic-looking feature.
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nick d
Trad climber
nm
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Thanks for the fun TR. Glad the weather cooperated enough that you were able to climb. Backpacking with climbing gear is no fun if you dont get to use it!
MS
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dlintz
Trad climber
Neebraskee
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Nice TR. I've done that backpack (what a bitch!) only to get shut down by the weather. We hiked out in an absolute downpour that lasted for 4 hours. The rain literally stopped when we reached the car. Doh!!
d.
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Mom
Social climber
So Cal
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Chuchawalla -- you be sure to post and be certain to include photos any time you go out!! WOW!! great report and great photos too!
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Ouch!
climber
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Really nice pictures.
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climbrunride
Trad climber
Durango, CO
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Great TR. Great pics. Those goats are cool. I'm jealous. That's tops on my wish list, but I got hurted and won't be able to do that stuff 'til maybe October. (I'm hoping for a warm, dry fall.)
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goatboy smellz
climber
colorado
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To bad you live on the western slope,
you wouldn't have those hitchhiking problems out here on the front range...
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climbrunride
Trad climber
Durango, CO
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"you wouldn't have those hitchhiking problems out here on the front range..."
Really! With 2 million more cars on the roads every day in the front range, there really is a MUCH better chance of finding a jeep full of nice old lady tourists.
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goatboy smellz
climber
colorado
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A little satire goes a long way with the right crowd ;)
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Jello
Social climber
No Ut
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Beautiful pics and story, Cucawalla. I used to teach OB in that area back in the 1970's. You brought it all back.
-Jello
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Mungeclimber
Trad climber
sorry, just posting out loud.
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rad formation
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quartziteflight
climber
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nice phots> yay for flowers yay for goats yay for wham!
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Crimpergirl
Social climber
St. Looney
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A most enjoyable sausagefest TR. ;)
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Great area: thanks for the report!
Flowers are awesome and the geometric wonder of that Wham Ridge is really something.
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Euroford
Trad climber
chicago
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nice cones!
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Zander
Trad climber
Berkeley
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Nice trip report and interlude.
The route looks kinda like a giant scateboard ramp. Might need some big wheels though.
Zander
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bluering
Trad climber
Santa Clara, Ca.
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Apr 23, 2010 - 11:43pm PT
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pretty cool...
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Cuckawalla
Trad climber
Grand Junction, CO
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Topic Author's Reply - Apr 23, 2010 - 11:56pm PT
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thanks for the bump, been a while since I reread that one.
-Jesse
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