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Peak(s):  James Peak  -  13,272 feet
Date Posted:  06/06/2010
Date Climbed:   06/05/2010
Author:  PDavis
 Shooting Star Couloir   

Tony and I have been planning on doing Shooting Star for a little while now, so even though the forcasted low for friday night was only 40 we decided to still head up and at least check out the conditions and hopefully get to the summit.

We left early in the morning and reach the trailhead at 4:30am. We were extremely surprised and bumbed to see that my thermometer was showing that it was already 58 degrees. We still decided that we might as well head up and atleast see what the snow conditions were. To our surprise the coulior was nice and solid. For part of it we sank in a couple of inches, but for a good portion we had to kick in a couple times to get good footing.

Climbing the glacier on the approach
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Early morning sunrise
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We took the the east shoulder off of James down into to basin right in front of the couloir.

The traverse into the basin off the shoulder
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The NE face of James. Superstar is the right couloir. Shooting Star you can just barely see on the left branch of Superstar
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Starting up the climb
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You climb up the base of the climb to about 12,700 feet and take the left branch
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James Peak lake
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The climb averages 47 degrees with some parts being a bit steeper
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Nearing the top
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Topping out on the couloir
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Summit
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The descent was uneventful. We took a varitation of the standard route back to the glacier.

One last look at James and the NE face
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And watch out for those crevasses. They can be tricky to negotiate
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The glacier from the bridge
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Thumbnails for uploaded photos (click to open slideshow):
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Comments or Questions
Yog
User
Crevasse?!?!
6/7/2010 2:44pm
Was that a fall-in?!? Yikes! When I repeat James Peak, it will be one of those couloirs which you showed so well! Thanks for sharing, great photos!


pioletski
User
Nice!
6/7/2010 3:14pm
Interesting line on a beautiful peak.


PDavis
Fall-in
6/8/2010 3:26am
No I didn‘t fall in. Just thought it would be fun to get some pics that looked like I did. That was one good climb though.



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