Taking it Easy--A Scramble up Whipping Post
When we awoke Friday morning, the weather had definitely changed.
A thick
low level of clouds had moved in. It definitely felt like there
was some moisture in the air. The Seattle guys were busy packing--today
was there day to hike out. After we said our goodbyes and they had left,
camp felt quite and empty. We were quite happy to have met these guys and
wondered what a different week we would have had if we hadn't had such great
neighbors.
Neither our level of motivation nor the weather looked conducive to climbing so we decided to take a hike north towards Cobalt Lake. This was an area that had been mostly hidden from our view the rest of the week, so curiosity got the best of us. The terrain wasn't supposed to be technical so we packed up a few essentials, grabbed our trekking poles and headed out towards the Crescent-Eastpost Col.
Things went fine until just after the Crescent-Eastpost Col. At this
point we
had the option of either descending down a large snowfield or
contouring around to the left on talus. The snow didn't appeal to us for a
couple of reasons--we didn't bring our axes and all of the elevation lost would
have to be regained on the other side of the valley. So we opted for the
talus. Had the talus been well settled and secure, this would have been
the way to go. However, it was very loose and we had to really watch our
step to avoid going for a ride down the 
snow slope below that were were trying
to avoid. Angela got very pissed off and emotional about the loose rock.
The sounds of nearly constant rockfall nearby certainly didn't help the
situation. I definitely couldn't blame her for feeling this way.
With a very dear friend badly injured from rockfall earlier in the year and a
fellow climber dying just a few days ago, we had become ultra sensitive to loose
rock. Coming to terms with a risk over which you have limited control is
certainly difficult, but eventually I got Angela to relax and focus on what she
could do to minimize our risk in this situation and we managed to get through
unscathed.
Once out of the talus the hike became rather enjoyable, crossing a large rather low-angle snowfield. With the clouds hanging out overnight, the snow had stayed just warm enough for us to make nice secure footsteps in it. After this snowfield, we had to climb up another small col--this time between Whipping Post and one of Crescent Spire's lower ridges. Once again we encountered much loose rock, but this time it seemed more benign--more scree-like than the killer talus variety we encountered earlier.
From this col we could see that we had a long way yet to go to get to Cobalt
Lake. We still had another valley to descend in to and climb out of and
another loose col to climb up. And that would just get us a view of
Cobalt! Getting down to the lake would entail another 700 feet of
elevation loss. With our bodies still tired from our long
day on Bugaboo
Spire and our minds equally weak, we decided to abort our plan on visiting Cobalt Lake and scramble to the top of Whipping Post via it's west ridge
instead. From it's base, the ridge looked sufficiently easy (so easy in fact that it's not even
mentioned in the guidebooks) and it looked like the
view from the top would be nice, so at least we wouldn't go back to camp totally
empty handed.
So we found our way to the top. Angela was actually enjoying herself
again after
being freaked out earlier in the morning which was nice. We lounged on top for a while and spent some time photographing a few bright
flowers that
really stood out in our environment of mostly blues and grays.
Once back at the base of the ridge we found a nice warm spot to have a bit of a
picnic before heading back to camp. The hike back went just fine--the
sections that had us freaked out earlier seemed
manageable this time around.
Funny how your perspective can change like that!
We arrived back at camp around 2 o'clock. We discussed what we were
going to do the rest of the day and
decided that maybe we should just pack up
and start heading back to the car. We had planned on leaving the
next
morning, but with no time for
more big ambitions we really had no reason to
stay. Added to that, it really looked like some weather was going to be
moving in, so leaving early could mean the difference between packing up a dry
camp or a wet one. Having become very
efficient at packing and unpacking
our gear on this trip, we had everything packed away and ready to go in under an
hour.
Though our packs were a bit lighter than when we had hiked in on Sunday, our
legs still complained going down the steep trail back towards the Kain
Hut--Bugaboo Spire had really kicked
our butts! As we dropped elevation,
we became keenly aware of the changing ecosystems.
As more and more
brightly colored flowers appeared out of the moraine we were hiking down, the
more we realized how limited the color pallet had been up among the spires.
About halfway back to the trailhead the rain started. Boy were we glad
we had decided to hike out early. We looked back up towards Bugaboo
Glacier and it looked like it was getting
pounded with rain! Would've been
a long night had we stayed up at Applebee. Eventually, but not before
getting soaked, we made it back to the parking lot. Our rental car had
survived the week--our porcupine precautions seemed to have done the trick.
Though the rain had nearly washed our car clean, we could just make out where
somebody had written "Omaha or Bust" on our previously dusty back window.
Those Seattle guys just had to have the last laugh!
So, our first trip to the Bugaboos was in the bag and what an experience it had been! It had certainly been an intense experience with many highs and lows that would take some time to process. While we didn't do everything we had planned (we almost never do), we were truly psyched to have been successful on our main objective, Bugaboo Spire's NE Ridge. Add to that success on a few unplanned objectives, the cool vibe around camp, and the many wonderful people with whom we shared the week and you have a week which will not be soon forgotten. Indeed, as we drove toward Golden that evening we were already talking of returning in the future to try and recapture some of that Bugaboo magic.
Though we had been through more in the past six days than on most of our climbing trips, we still had nine more days of vacation and adventure to go before returning to the states! After spending Saturday in Golden doing laundry and resting we headed for Lake O'hara in Yoho National Park first thing Sunday morning.
