Torreys Peak Trip Report 06/09/2014

Peak(s):	Torreys Peak - 14,272 feet
Date Posted:	06/09/2014
Date Climbed:	06/08/2014
Author:	Doug Shaw

Lefties need love too
I'd originally planned for either Dead Dog or Kelso - to be a game-time decision. I hadn't climbed Dead Dog since my very first snow climb probably a decade ago, but I wasn't excited about the massive amount of clusterf**age that Dead Dog seems to get anymore, so Kelso was seeming preferable. Hiking up the drainage at about 0430 the idea of South Paw popped into my head. It never seems to get any love. I wonder what the Dead Dog:South Paw climber ratio is - 100:1? I wouldn't be surprised by an even larger discrepancy - I'd never met anybody who climbed it and thought that maybe* I'd seen one or two reports on here about it. I'd never climbed it and hadn't planned on it for this trip, so the only information I had was generalized eyeball beta from previous trips - a monster cornice covering the top - and vague details I remembered from whenever it was that I'd last read the route description in Roach's book - which basically amounted to "a monster cornice covering the top". What I didn't have any memory of was how one would bypass the cornice to top out. I figured I'd head up and take a look, and if I couldn't find an egress, I'd come back down. (It turns out I got in early enough that there was only one person just starting up Dead Dog when I entered the basin so I probably could have avoided the cluster, but by this point my brain had already zeroed in on South Paw.) When I stopped to gear up at the base of South Paw I apparently dropped my mojo and lost it in the snow - the rest of the day I was moving slowly and just not full of energy - but you know what they say about a bad day in the mountains. There was some old avy debris/sluff for the first few hundred feet, which was not well or consistently frozen and made forward progress pretty brutal. The "R-U-N" in "runnel" is the closest I got to moving quickly in this junk. Looking up South Paw. Eventually I found a sequence of runnels that provided better travel. How many people do you think had to glissade this path to get that butt groove that deep? Scouting the cornice for exits during the ascent, I thought I saw one area on climber's left that didn't look overhung: Psst, hey kid ... want some candy? And one small notch where the cornice hit rock on the right: Psst, hey buddy ... want a ribeye? The left side looked more straightforward - at least from hundreds of feet below - but the right side definitely looked more sporting. The couloir rears up a good bit as you approach the cornice, and by this point there was starting to be regular tiny debris (icicles) falling off of the cornice. Nothing dangerous, but definitely a reminder that I was glad to be almost out. I assessed the options at the top and had to go right - I could hardly take the route less traveled and then take the easy way out, could I? (Plus: how crazily windloaded does a section of cornice have to be to no longer overhung? I wasn't crazy about finding out and potentially having all that "easy" stuff fall away under me five feet from escape.) Things steepened up even further climbing up the right side directly along the base of the cornice - probably 60+ degrees for a short stretch. Climbing with one axe and starting to sneak out over the edge of the east face, it was definitely careful movement terrain. looking back down from along the right side of the cornice As I snuck around/beneath the lower part of the cornice, I looked up and saw that the small notch that I thought would go wasn't directly accessible from snow - the snow reared up to vertical immediately beneath it. It was going to be out onto the rock or turn around. This way to the Great Egress! As I approached the rock ahead of me, of course I found that the snow was melted out a good foot away. A few light-footed moves to my right instead and I stepped onto a flat spot on the rock where I could catch my breath and assess next steps. The rock above was featured and doable, and it was only about 10-15 feet until I could get into the notch - but first I had to cross the moat. There was some ice and snow but there was no strength in it, it just fell apart when I tried to plant the axe. Mostly downward-sloping rock above stuck out far enough to provide some holds, but made the climbing motions much steeper. I eventually found a small ice feature that seemed stable, put a frontpoint on it and gently weighted it. It held. Other foot smoothly came up into a small notch into the rock. Right foot up onto small ledge, then the left, and the sketchy exposed moves are behind me. A few more awkward moves to flounder my way into the notch, around the corner, and onto the top of the cornice and I'm through. The egress climbing was all committing enough that I was entirely focused on the climbing, and not at all on the fact that a fall would have been a Bad Day, or to remember that I generally suck at mixed climbing. I slowly schlepped my way to the summit to arrive just as a group of about a dozen Dead-Doggers arrived. Got some food and drink and rested for a few minutes, then headed over for Grays. Slowly schlepped my way to that summit as well and arrived at about 10AM... to find myself completely alone on the summit. It's a very weird feeling to be on the summit of a Front Range 14er by yourself in mid-morning on a weekend day. Sure, there were dark clouds forming and precip falling not far away, but c'mon - it's Grays Peak. I just took a picture to document the momentous occasion and headed straight down. Less than 5 minutes later it started snowing. Three glissades and 20 minutes later I was back down in the basin collecting my slowshoes to the sounds of thunder at 10:30AM. I'd had a successful day, but something just seemed to be missing from my Grays and Torreys experience and I couldn't put my finger on what it was... As I was exiting the basin at 12K I pass a group of four out-of-place-looking folks in cotton hoodies with minimal gear, still heading up. Back at the trailhead, vehicles had made it to the summer trailhead for the first time this year, as well as being parked down the side of the road for hundreds of feet. Now my Grays and Torreys experience felt complete. Thumbnails for uploaded photos (click to open slideshow):

Lefties need love too

I'd originally planned for either Dead Dog or Kelso - to be a game-time decision. I hadn't climbed Dead Dog since my very first snow climb probably a decade ago, but I wasn't excited about the massive amount of clusterf***age that Dead Dog seems to get anymore, so Kelso was seeming preferable.

Hiking up the drainage at about 0430 the idea of South Paw popped into my head. It never seems to get any love. I wonder what the Dead Dog:South Paw climber ratio is - 100:1? I wouldn't be surprised by an even larger discrepancy - I'd never met anybody who climbed it and thought that maybe I'd seen one or two reports on here about it.

I'd never climbed it and hadn't planned on it for this trip, so the only information I had was generalized eyeball beta from previous trips - a monster cornice covering the top - and vague details I remembered from whenever it was that I'd last read the route description in Roach's book - which basically amounted to "a monster cornice covering the top". What I didn't have any memory of was how one would bypass the cornice to top out. I figured I'd head up and take a look, and if I couldn't find an egress, I'd come back down.

(It turns out I got in early enough that there was only one person just starting up Dead Dog when I entered the basin so I probably could have avoided the cluster, but by this point my brain had already zeroed in on South Paw.)

When I stopped to gear up at the base of South Paw I apparently dropped my mojo and lost it in the snow - the rest of the day I was moving slowly and just not full of energy - but you know what they say about a bad day in the mountains.

There was some old avy debris/sluff for the first few hundred feet, which was not well or consistently frozen and made forward progress pretty brutal.

The "R-U-N" in "runnel" is the closest I got to moving quickly in this junk. Looking up South Paw.

Eventually I found a sequence of runnels that provided better travel.

How many people do you think had to glissade this path to get that butt groove that deep?

Scouting the cornice for exits during the ascent, I thought I saw one area on climber's left that didn't look overhung:

And one small notch where the cornice hit rock on the right:

The left side looked more straightforward - at least from hundreds of feet below - but the right side definitely looked more sporting.

The couloir rears up a good bit as you approach the cornice, and by this point there was starting to be regular tiny debris (icicles) falling off of the cornice. Nothing dangerous, but definitely a reminder that I was glad to be almost out.

I assessed the options at the top and had to go right - I could hardly take the route less traveled and then take the easy way out, could I? (Plus: how crazily windloaded does a section of cornice have to be to no longer overhung? I wasn't crazy about finding out and potentially having all that "easy" stuff fall away under me five feet from escape.)

Things steepened up even further climbing up the right side directly along the base of the cornice - probably 60+ degrees for a short stretch. Climbing with one axe and starting to sneak out over the edge of the east face, it was definitely careful movement terrain.

looking back down from along the right side of the cornice

As I snuck around/beneath the lower part of the cornice, I looked up and saw that the small notch that I thought would go wasn't directly accessible from snow - the snow reared up to vertical immediately beneath it. It was going to be out onto the rock or turn around.

As I approached the rock ahead of me, of course I found that the snow was melted out a good foot away. A few light-footed moves to my right instead and I stepped onto a flat spot on the rock where I could catch my breath and assess next steps.

The rock above was featured and doable, and it was only about 10-15 feet until I could get into the notch - but first I had to cross the moat. There was some ice and snow but there was no strength in it, it just fell apart when I tried to plant the axe. Mostly downward-sloping rock above stuck out far enough to provide some holds, but made the climbing motions much steeper.

I eventually found a small ice feature that seemed stable, put a frontpoint on it and gently weighted it. It held. Other foot smoothly came up into a small notch into the rock. Right foot up onto small ledge, then the left, and the sketchy exposed moves are behind me. A few more awkward moves to flounder my way into the notch, around the corner, and onto the top of the cornice and I'm through. The egress climbing was all committing enough that I was entirely focused on the climbing, and not at all on the fact that a fall would have been a Bad Day, or to remember that I generally suck at mixed climbing.

I slowly schlepped my way to the summit to arrive just as a group of about a dozen Dead-Doggers arrived. Got some food and drink and rested for a few minutes, then headed over for Grays. Slowly schlepped my way to that summit as well and arrived at about 10AM... to find myself completely alone on the summit. It's a very weird feeling to be on the summit of a Front Range 14er by yourself in mid-morning on a weekend day. Sure, there were dark clouds forming and precip falling not far away, but c'mon - it's Grays Peak.

I just took a picture to document the momentous occasion and headed straight down. Less than 5 minutes later it started snowing. Three glissades and 20 minutes later I was back down in the basin collecting my slowshoes to the sounds of thunder at 10:30AM.

I'd had a successful day, but something just seemed to be missing from my Grays and Torreys experience and I couldn't put my finger on what it was...

As I was exiting the basin at 12K I pass a group of four out-of-place-looking folks in cotton hoodies with minimal gear, still heading up.

Back at the trailhead, vehicles had made it to the summer trailhead for the first time this year, as well as being parked down the side of the road for hundreds of feet.

Now my Grays and Torreys experience felt complete.

Thumbnails for uploaded photos (click to open slideshow):

Comments or Questions

Kevin Baker	Nice 6/10/2014 4:45am Good to see a rare TR from you, Doug. South Paw does need a bit more love, but that cornice always looks so menacing!
FireOnTheMountain	cool 6/11/2014 3:07pm man DD is popular. I was stunned when I looked down 3/4 of the way up and saw like 10 people all huddled around about to start the line. You see me waving to you, didn't want to get too close to your top out? Loved the ”How's the weather?” questions from people just starting as dark clouds were looming overhead....tis the season

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