Double Bow
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- Apr 29, 2005
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Well, Townie told the story of what his team did, let me fill you in what the rest of us did.
When the ten of us reached the rocks below Central and Odells, we took a break and then Team SG (Mad Townie, 7summits, and cbcbd) headed off to climb South Gully and then had a good time of it. For the rest of us, the experience was a little different...
The seven of us split into two teams. Team CG I, consisting of Swamp, skimom, and Jeff decided to just hit it. Team CG II, consisting of me, Giggy, Abster, and Arm roped up at the start.
At first the going was pretty easy as we climbed the snow and worked out way into the gully. Apparently, along the way Swamp got sucked into some kind of wormhole in the space/time continuum and wound up flying up the thing and topping out solo in the blink of an eye. For the rest of us, it proved more of a challenge.
We were going along pretty well until we got to the bulge. We weren't quite as comfortable going up with out protection and so Arm went up to help Jeff set up some pro and to get a rope to skimom (out team's rope was closer than the one Jeff had). With the corn snow, setting any kind of anchor was proving difficult and while Giggy, Abster, and I waited below the bulge, they tried their best to secure a route. However, ice kept breaking off and racing down the slope. It seemed like every five minutes someone was yelling "Ice!" and we were ducking. Giggy got hit it the helmet with a piece slightly larger than a softball and I got a tennisball sized one off of mine.
That wasn't enough though. Another piece, this one bigger than a breadbox broke off and came rocketing down toward me. I saw it coming and I tried to duck and turn at the same time so if I got hit, I would get hit in the pack, but I couldn't move fast enough and it slammed into the left side of my back, just shy of my pack and below my shoulder blade. It knocked the wind out of me and I went down in a lot of pain. Fortunately, I didn't get knocked off the ledge we were on. While I was roped in, I still would have gone for a ways.
We assessed the situation and figured that I wasn't having any trouble breathing and that nothing was broken. If it had hit me in the arm, I wouldn't have been so lucky. Looking at where we were and what we had just climbed up, I figured that going down would be way too difficult and that only left one direction, up.
A little while later, they had everything set, and we kept moving. Jeff got a belay set up on a rock outcropping further up and arm had been able to set some picketts in some shady areas. I found using one of my ice tools in combination with my mountaineering axe to be the best way to go. In some parts the axe easily slipped all the way down into the snow and in other parts I found it difficult to get the pick of my tool out. Sometimes, the going was smooth with easily sunk picks and other times, the ice would just shatter and skid down the slope. All the while, my back/side was killing me. At one point, Giggy (who was at the end of our line) had to drop back and help a skier who was coming up and had lost one of his crampons!!
Fortunately, the crampon was recovered and the guy wound up being OK.
After what seemed a lifetime, we finally topped out only to have some clown (cbcbd) be throwing pebbles at us calling out "Rock!" If only he'd known what we had just gone through!! Still, he more than made up for the bad joke later when he greated us near the beginning of the Tuck Rav trail. (Thanks, man!)
Meeting up with rest of the team we headed down Lion Head winter route and that was slow going on a miserable trail. Still, I was just glad to be standing upright!
Back at camp, we enjoyed the best food, fire, and friends one could want after an adventure like that. Thanks again Giggy and everyone else who helped make this weekend the rockin' good time that it was!!!
When the ten of us reached the rocks below Central and Odells, we took a break and then Team SG (Mad Townie, 7summits, and cbcbd) headed off to climb South Gully and then had a good time of it. For the rest of us, the experience was a little different...
The seven of us split into two teams. Team CG I, consisting of Swamp, skimom, and Jeff decided to just hit it. Team CG II, consisting of me, Giggy, Abster, and Arm roped up at the start.
At first the going was pretty easy as we climbed the snow and worked out way into the gully. Apparently, along the way Swamp got sucked into some kind of wormhole in the space/time continuum and wound up flying up the thing and topping out solo in the blink of an eye. For the rest of us, it proved more of a challenge.
We were going along pretty well until we got to the bulge. We weren't quite as comfortable going up with out protection and so Arm went up to help Jeff set up some pro and to get a rope to skimom (out team's rope was closer than the one Jeff had). With the corn snow, setting any kind of anchor was proving difficult and while Giggy, Abster, and I waited below the bulge, they tried their best to secure a route. However, ice kept breaking off and racing down the slope. It seemed like every five minutes someone was yelling "Ice!" and we were ducking. Giggy got hit it the helmet with a piece slightly larger than a softball and I got a tennisball sized one off of mine.
That wasn't enough though. Another piece, this one bigger than a breadbox broke off and came rocketing down toward me. I saw it coming and I tried to duck and turn at the same time so if I got hit, I would get hit in the pack, but I couldn't move fast enough and it slammed into the left side of my back, just shy of my pack and below my shoulder blade. It knocked the wind out of me and I went down in a lot of pain. Fortunately, I didn't get knocked off the ledge we were on. While I was roped in, I still would have gone for a ways.
We assessed the situation and figured that I wasn't having any trouble breathing and that nothing was broken. If it had hit me in the arm, I wouldn't have been so lucky. Looking at where we were and what we had just climbed up, I figured that going down would be way too difficult and that only left one direction, up.
A little while later, they had everything set, and we kept moving. Jeff got a belay set up on a rock outcropping further up and arm had been able to set some picketts in some shady areas. I found using one of my ice tools in combination with my mountaineering axe to be the best way to go. In some parts the axe easily slipped all the way down into the snow and in other parts I found it difficult to get the pick of my tool out. Sometimes, the going was smooth with easily sunk picks and other times, the ice would just shatter and skid down the slope. All the while, my back/side was killing me. At one point, Giggy (who was at the end of our line) had to drop back and help a skier who was coming up and had lost one of his crampons!!
Fortunately, the crampon was recovered and the guy wound up being OK.After what seemed a lifetime, we finally topped out only to have some clown (cbcbd) be throwing pebbles at us calling out "Rock!" If only he'd known what we had just gone through!! Still, he more than made up for the bad joke later when he greated us near the beginning of the Tuck Rav trail. (Thanks, man!)
Meeting up with rest of the team we headed down Lion Head winter route and that was slow going on a miserable trail. Still, I was just glad to be standing upright!
Back at camp, we enjoyed the best food, fire, and friends one could want after an adventure like that. Thanks again Giggy and everyone else who helped make this weekend the rockin' good time that it was!!!
