| Ref: Chic Scott's Summits and Icefields |
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| On the snowcoach road early morning. |
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mountaineering: RT 14.25; 9.0 up. A reliable high pressure ridge
prompted us to plan a trip on the Columbia Icefield. Since the Rocky
Mountain Bed & Biscuit Kennel no longer exists, we were inclined to
do Mount Kitchener as a day trip. This trudge is similar in distance
and height gain to Castleguard Mountain; having done the latter a few
weeks ago, I knew we had a good chance at being successful. As usual,
we had an early start. We left Golden at 1 AM, and met Jay and Charles
at 4 AM. We parked at the climber's parking lot and booted up the road
shortly thereafter. We roped up at the snowcoach's terminus and
proceeded towards the headwall. Although we are quite familiar with
this approach, the seracs are always a concern... so are the numerous,
large crevasses near the crest of the headwall. With a sudden dramatic
rise in temperature over the last week, awareness was heightened. We
followed an up-track, which contoured Mount Snowdome's flank and
continued towards The Twins. At some point, we left the trail and kept
going around Snowdome, aiming for Mount Kitchener. We climbed
progressively on gentle terrain, near us were signs of large crevasses.
Once we had Kitchener in sight, we skied towards a saddle. I ended up
sidehilling over very hard snow and had to loose a bit of elevation to
proceed safely. Fab and Charles went higher and gained the ridge
easily; we met at the saddle and had another break before the last
push. The weather was sublime, no wind at all and almost too hot. From
the saddle, we climbed towards a recent up-track and engaged in the
last push to our objective in good spirit. The plod seemed to take
longer than we anticipated but eventually we reached the top. We
suspected the highpoint to be a cornice so we ventured there on belay.
After taking tons of pictures, we hung out for nearly 2 hours. This was
most likely amongst the longest summit breaks for us, we even had time
for a nap! Eventually though, we started to focus on returning. I
didn't realize how knackered I was until we started to come down, my
legs were burnt!
We skied to the saddle, site of our earlier break, and elected to
continue roped up. We even stayed roped up for the headwall, which I've
skied several times unroped... At the bottom of the headwall, we stowed
the ropes and continued to the snowcoach terminus. Thanks to the grader
operator for giving us permission to drive our truck to the loading
area to pick up our gear! |
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| Roping up at the snowcoach terminus. |
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| Approaching the headwall. |
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| Lots of recent avalanche activity. |
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| Coming up the headwall. |
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| Contouring Mount Snowdome's southern flank. |
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| Substantial crevasses along the way. |
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| Looking back. |
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| Castleguard Mountain appears closer than it is! |
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| Mounts Columbia and King Edward. |
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| Looking back with Mount Bryce on the left. |
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| Mount Kitchener ahead. |
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| South and North Twins, a camp is visible (center). |
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| Looking back again. |
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| The north face of Mount Snowdome. |
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| Mounts Athabasca and Andromeda from the top. |
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| The view north-west towards Mount Alberta and Stutfield Peak. |
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| View east.
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| On belay, we venture on the hightpoint of the summit cornice. |
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| No wind and blistering heat, we stop for a long pause. |
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| Taking a nap. |
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| Mount Columbia once more. |
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| Mount Snowdome. |
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| North Twin and Twins Tower. |
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| Can you pick out Castleguard Mountain? |
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| Making our way out. |
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| Travelling roped up. |
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| Mount Andromeda and its approach. |
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| Plowing down the softened snow on the headwall. |
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| The snowcoach terminus is quickly reached. |
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| Unroping before crossing under the seracs. |
| Back
to home page |
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