Broken Top: 5th attempt, getting greedy

Having not gotten out much since my sublime experience on Mt. Jefferson, I was stoked to have a free weekend with a good weather forecast. I decided that it was about time I sent Broken Top via the High Noon Couloir and began convincing myself it was a good idea. I tried hard to ignore the fact that I was tired from a combination of lots of work and lots of training over the past week. I also tried hard to imagine that the conditions were good, despite over 20 inches of snow in the past three days and reports of wind loading and avalanche hazard. My one concession to the unknown conditions was to bring a range of climbing gear that weighted my pack and did my fatigued body no favors.

Approaching Broken Top (don't worry, these are not my tracks, I know how to use skins).

I slept in Saturday morning, hoping that I would recover from the week in a single night. I lubricated a scratchy throat with copious tea, ate an insufficient brunch, and packed my gear. I drove up to the Dutchman Flats snow park around 1 PM and started the now familiar skin out to the wilderness boundary. Given the forecast and the weekend I should not have been surprised by the large number of snow mobiles. I generally don't have a problem with the sled-necks, provided they keep their distance and be respectful, but when they decide to gun it within feet of someone on skis they can take their two-stroke motor and shove it up where the sun doesn't shine. I could go on about the inverse correlation between the size of your motorized toys and the size of your manhood... but I digress.

Looking south to Mt. Thielsen.

I dumped my pack on level ground by the last tree and skied into the crater. I didn't think to clip out of my skis and check snow conditions in boots. I also didn't stop to consider how much of the rock bands were buried beneath snow when compared to November. Instead I skied only far enough to see that there was probably sufficient rime and ice on the rock sections to scratch my way up. I skied down to camp, ignoring the ugly turns on the breakable crust. I could tell it was already below freezing and I just told myself that the snow would be nice and solid when I woke up.

Ball Butte on the left and Tumalo in the distance from my camp site.

Alpenglow on Ball Butte.

Alpenglow beneatht the clouds.

Once back at my pack I set up my tent and started melting snow for dinner. The cold air and wind made it slow going and I eventually had my "minute" rice and dehydrated lentils as a tepid soup. I went to bed and soon realized that it was going to be a lot colder than the initial forecast. I shivered most of the night, hugging my cold water bladder and wriggling around trying to keep my feet warm. I finally gave up and started melting water for breakfast at 3 AM. After eating cold water and instant oatmeal mixed together, I battened down the tent against the wind and shouldered my too heavy pack.

I skied up the crater until the angle steepened too much, then stepped on the snow, broke through the crust, and sunk up to my waist. Luckily a nearby fan of rime debris provided firm footing and I carried my skis cramponless up the 45 degree neve to the base of a rock buttress beneath the Eleven O'clock Couloir. There I dug a platform and put on my pons and harness. I stashed my skis and started up the firm debris trail again, but before I could reach the rock the snow returned to breakable crust on waist deep fluff. I tried traversing but it only got worse so I down climbed to slightly lower angle snow and tried traversing right to the next rock buttress, hoping to find something solid enough to safely reach the rock and ice above. I had no luck and the wallowing was so prohibitive that I actually lost elevation traversing. Halfway across the snow field I looked up and considered how ridiculous the whole thing was. I didn't think an avalanche was likely but I'd seen one in this exact same place before and I knew from floundering in the stuff that if it did slide it would be so big no one would find my body until August. More importantly, it was impossibly frustrating and my boots were half filled with snow, making it no fun. Deciding it wasn't worth it, I fought my way back to my skis and descended to more level snow.

The moon was obviously out of alignment, as I didn't have any luck, but it sure looked pretty over Bachelor in the predawn.

Sunrise happens fast... but not fast enough when you can't feel your toes.

I skinned over to the west side of the crater and then back to the east side, looking for something accessible, trying to find some justification for coming out there. Tired, cold and hungry, I ate a granola bar and waited for first light before skiing back to my tent. I packed and skied vigorously for a couple miles until my feet warmed up. I thought the worst was over once the sun rose and I was warm enough to skin in my t-shirt, but within a mile of the car a cloud rolled in and a mini-inversion on Dutchman Flats left me shivering and coughing. I reached the car around 9:45 to find my extra water and food frozen solid. I drove into town and gorged on deli food from Devore's before going home to spend the afternoon as a sleep-deprived zombie. Overall, I was annoyed that I wasted a weekend doing something so worthless, but you have to try to succeed and in the end it's all training anyway.

Sunrise behind Ball Butte.

Ditto... I expected a chorus of angels but the heavens were silent.

Eleven O'Clock Couloir

The three ingredients of hubris are turkey, stuffing and gravy... at least that's what I found out this Thanksgiving. I know most people want to sit around and do nothing after the gluttonous feast, and I did too. However, the next day I looked out the window at clear, blue bird skies and decided that obviously the forecast, calling for cloud cover with a chance of rain at high elevations, was dead wrong. And obviously now was a good time to haul a big pack of camping and climbing gear into the Three Sisters Wilderness and try to climb the mountain that has shut me down three out of three times in the last two winters. Well, at least I know I can still learn something.

I roped my friend Chris into coming, and I'm sure he was wondering what he'd got himself into as we skied/snow shoe'd out there in warm weather with clouds moving in. I had come to the conclusion, after three failed attempts, that to give yourself the best chance of doing anything on BT you needed to camp out the night before so that you can maximize the early morning temps in the south facing cirque. We reached a suitable camp site, just south of the cirque at around 7,300', an hour after sunset.

South Sister emerges from cloud above Green Lakes in the predawn. Taken from the top of the Eleven O'Clock couloir on Broken Top.

We crawled inside our tent and ate Thanksgiving leftovers (what else?)! I then realized that A: I had forgotten an extra pair of socks (not good when snow camping), and B: I had forgotten the cook pot and we could not use the stove and fuel that we had packed to melt more water (whoops). Well it's the first winter outing of the season for me so I guess a couple kinks are to be expected, and it gave me the chance to problem solve. For instance, I found that putting gloves over your toes keeps them very warm, especially when they are relatively new and well insulated. I also found out that if you pack snow into your partially filled dromedary bag, and cuddle it like a teddy bear, your body heat will do a great job of creating water. Although you have to snuggle up to a big, red, squishy ice bag, which is way worse than an already warm squishy bag. But I digress.

We awoke on and off through the night to various "piter-pater" sounds on our rain fly. It appeared that the precipitation varied between rain, sleet, and ice crystals. We awoke for the final time at 4am and ate a quick snack while pulling on our shell pants and boots, and went outside to a blessedly clear sky filled with stars. The temperature was warm and we made quick work of crossing the (now practically non-existent) Crook Glacier. During our approach the previous day we had seen slide debris in the High Noon gully, but could see that the Eleven O'Clock couloir was fully snow covered, so we made that our primary goal. We ditched the skis and snow shoes beneath a rock wall and broke out the climbing gear. We had hauled quite a bit of pro, not knowing what the conditions would be. "Oregon High" lists the route as 500ft of 50 degree snow with the chance for near vertical snow in the last 10ft as you approach the cornice. The more recent "Best Climbs Cascade Volcanoes" lists the less helpful and more ambiguous rating of grade II, class 4-5, AI2. In the end, 500ft of 50 degree snow was dead on. It got slightly steeper and less consolidated up top but the low snow pack at this point in the season meant no cornice.

The Eleven O'Clock couloir after we climbed it. I took this shot from a rock buttress near the entry to the High Noon gully.

Once out of the couloir, we started traversing toward the Northwest ridge which provides easy access to the summit. The terrain was a weird mix of exposed volcanic scree-mud and deep drifts of sugar snow. This was only Chris' second time climbing in winter mountains (he soloed Hood via the Old Chute the week prior), and he looked uncomfortable on this terrain. I stopped on a snow fin before what looked like a waist-deep wallow fest and waited for him to catch up. After discussing our options we traversed back to the couloir and down climbed. We never used the rope or any of the pro.

Chris traverses back to the top of the Eleven O'Clock couli with Peak 9094 in the background.

Chris prepares to descend the Eleven O'Clock couloir.

Chris downclimbing the upper section of the Eleven O'Clock couloir.

Chris downclimbing near the bottom of the Eleven O'Clock couli.

We scouted several potential routes on the way out but nothing looks to be in good condition yet. High Noon has lots of exposed rock up top, Nine O'Clock is thin snow, and harder potential lines are still iceless. The skiing was equally horid, no thanks to the wet precip. The snow was mostly 2-3" of hard crust on top of airy sugar. Down lower it was wet and soggy.

Peak 9094 on the western crater rim. Taken from the Elven O'Clock couloir. The obvious left trending snow ramp has had loose dry snow on it both times I have investigated. It is NNE facing and could be a good moderate ice line or a gnarly ski line depending on conditions.

Looking down on the Crook Glacier from the ridge climber's left of the Eleven O'Clock couloir.

Looking up the High Noon gully. In ideal conditions this route is supposed to climb the rock walls above on 60 degree snow and ice. Obviously we need a lot more snow.

We returned to the car by noon and I derived some satisfaction from passing spandex clad cross country skiers with my full pack and a rando setup. I was curious why my feet hurt so much on this trip and found out I had gotten blisters for the first time in almost four years; big matching bubbles on the inside of my heels. I guess a second set of socks might have helped. Although we didn't summit I was happy to have topped out the crater rim for the first time and gotten a closer look at other possible routes. Every time I go out there I learn something and one of these days (gosh darn it!) I will send a route that does justice to those steep craggy walls of rock and ice.

Looking back up into the Crook Cirque from our camp. The Eleven O'Clock couloir is just visible below and to the left of the cloud bank obscuring the main summit.