| Peak: | Cathedral Peak A (13er) |
| Route: | South Ridge |
| Range: | Elk |
| Posted By: | madadraw1 |
| Date of Info: | 06/11/2019 |
| Date Posted: | 06/12/2019 |
|
| Details |
|---|
|
No reports before I went. Read that snow started at 10K at Castle/Conundrum. NOT true here!!! Lugged my skis on my back and waded through tons of avy carnage in the dark in my ski boots. Didn't start skinning until the lake, 12K. Maybe around 11.8-11.9K there is intermittent snow on the trail that further slows things up. The couloir had 2-3 large gouges the entire length from glissading (some areas gouged over a foot), so left my skis at the base of couloir. The ridge is almost 100% free of snow and I was not prepared to hike it in ski boots w/ crampons. Short of summit by 200 ft and then getting too hot. Fortunately, the snow all around looked stable at 11AM w/o avy's. I wanted to be descending by 10:30 to play it safe. Long story short, leave the skis at home. Not worth it. Despite a VERY slow go, I still took 9.75 hours when I had estimated 10 hours. Probably could get this done in 8 hours w/ a clear trail and hiking boots/light pack. Avy debris on trail not going anywhere soon. I ran into one worker chopping with an axe mid-day. I'll be back next year (w/ hiking boots!). |
| Comments or Questions | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
