Yale Gully - Huntington Ravine

Awesome day in the ravine. Woody48, Annalisa and I took a stroll up Yale Gully on Sunday. We were loosely heading in with team Denali (arm, frodo, jeff, mats, dr d, etc..) , but headed up a bit before them as we were planning a different climb.

Lots of snow in Huntington right now - which makes travel nice.

Yale is a nice mix of about 4 or 5 ice bulges seperated by steep snow. Nice alpine gully.

Conditions were pretty good. Snow was soft enough to kick nice steps to rest the cavles a bit when off the ice and the ice was nice and butter - one swing and one kick got good solid placements. Yale is one of the longer climbs in the ravine - we simul-climbed and ran out the longer steep snow sections with a picket or 2 - or in some cases rock pro or a screw.

Classic Line of the day:
Giggy: "Hey woody how is the belay anchor?"
Woody: "Its 2 equalized screws in slush"

(it was actually a solid anchor - though we didn't test that thankfully)

Woody led, I trailed pulled the pro and Annalisa took up the middle and belayed me up the steeper ice sections.

Day started off hot (snow slog up the fan was a sweat fest!) and we were roasting in the sun and then the summit and ravines became socked in and it got quite cold with wind chill (for april) and by the top out, we were covered in rime ice..

At the first belay on top of the Yale bulge, we heard a very very loud crack and crash and roughly 1/4 of the Harvard Bulge came crashing down to the base of the ravine. Later we found out that Frodo, Arm, Mats, Jeff, Dr D, Stevo, etc - were at the bottom of the ravine gearing up for a central gully climb and not only had to dodge the chunks of ice but said some were probably around 700 pounds heavy. Nice way to get woken up anyway - and the winds at this stage were nothing and I could actually hear someone in damnation gully yell - "what the F**k was that????" If someone would have been climbing those to get into diaganol - game over.

pic that shows harvard bulge to the left
http://www.tuckerman.org/photos/huntington/imgpages/image003.html



all in all - awesome alpine climb - felt good to top out as woody and I got partway up in December and had to bail off it due to sudden bad weather moving in with very high winds and low visibilty.

Lions head winter route was a pain in the arse mess coming down (though better than usual) - total mash potatoes with gravey tossed in - the really steep section (the one where you grab the tree stump and swing and downclimb the wet rock) is totally filled in with snow.

Due to low avy danger and nice weather - busy day in Huntington - at one point I saw parties in every gully. A nice suprise was seeing team denali at the bottom of the lions head winter route after doing central gully (which also looked nice!). Hike out with them.

Summit was socked in - didn't bother heading up there.

some pix.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/dawoodford/sets/72157604418025300/

Glad you guys got to get on that, looks like lots of fun... Diagonal looks like it would be an awesome ski!! Never saw a good picture into it.

Good to see Woody up and swinging again with his new robotic shoulder

Nice trip report and photos, Giggy. We did not realize that you were the three in Yale when the ice fall occurred; we had some nice big rocks to hunker behind!

A fine afternoon in the Ravine, after an earlier snow pit study in Tucks, but I was felling under the weather, so to speak, so lazed around the floor while the others headed up Central. After some chit chat with a guide and client who had climbed Odell's and a couple preparing to climb Pinnacle gully, I headed down, passing large numbers for people still on the way up to Tuck's after 2 pm! It was that kind of day.

You guys had great weather, Giggy - nice reporting! I was sorry not to be there but we were enjoying similar sunshine and corn snow in the Daks. Did anyone else forget to put on sunblock and now have burnt red face and neck?

The Lisa said:

Did anyone else forget to put on sunblock and now have burnt red face and neck?

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That would be me!

Nice report Giggy. Makes me very jealous! Sure do wish I was up in those gullys!

Very nice!

happy trails

Great Climb!

We had really nice weather for most of the climb. Even with SPF 30 sunscreen on I have a pretty good sunburn. Should have put more on the back of my neck. A couple of times as I was sitting and bringing up Annalisa and Giggy I felt like I was sitting on the beach; the sun was so nice and warm - at least relative to most of my other visits into Huntington.

I was climbing up above the Harvard (right) ice bulge at the start of Yale Gully when I heard a loud "CRACKKK" and I looked over to my left to see some really big chunks of ice falling off of the other big ice bulge. I watched it roll down the slope and I could see the people way down at the floor of the ravine watching the ice roll down. I remember thinking "they better start moving out of the way". Then they all started to run for cover. I didn't realize at the time it was the Denali training group. Dodging objective hazards is probably good training for Denali as well as avi training and gully climbing!

It was great climbing with Annalisa and Giggy. Annalisa climbed along with us like she had been part of our team many times before. We simul-climbed most of the gully except for the top of the first ice bulge. I only stopped and belayed Annalisa and Giggy up to me when I ran out of pro to place. I should have brought some small to medium sized nuts with me for pro. The only rock gear I had was a few tricams. I considered bringing some nuts, but I thought my rack was heavy enough and I wanted to keep my pack as light as possible to take it easy on my injured shoulder.

cbcbd said:

Good to see Woody up and swinging again with his new robotic shoulder

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My shoulder doesn't seem so bionic today. I can barely lift my arm. I took it easy on the pain killers yesterday because I didn't think it would be good to be climbing while taking vicadin. Good thing ice season is about over. I'll stick to hiking for a while.

Woody48 said:

I remember thinking "they better start moving out of the way". Then they all started to run for cover. I didn't realize at the time it was the Denali training group. Dodging objective hazards is probably good training for Denali as well as avi training and gully climbing!

I should have brought some small to medium sized nuts with me for pro. The only rock gear I had was a few tricams. I considered bringing some nuts, but I thought my rack was heavy enough and I wanted to keep my pack as light as possible to take it easy on my injured shoulder.

My shoulder doesn't seem so bionic today. I can barely lift my arm.

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Good point on the objective hazards training, Woody, as I believe that the most recent fatalities on Denali's West Buttress were from rock fall at Windy Corner.

I have always found that the cracks in the schist bedrock in Huntington are perfect for wired stoppers (light-weight ).

Good luck with the shoulder recovery; I guess that chiseling and shoveling icy snow is out, eh?

The Lisa said:

Did anyone else forget to put on sunblock and now have burnt red face and neck?

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Thats a big 10-4 on that

I had a kind of day.
I've been telling people I went to florida for the weekend.

I think I have some shots of team giggy, when I zoom in.

Great day to be out!

Nice report Giggy. Glad you guys didnt get taken out by Harvard bulge! So what do you think? 2+?

-chris

percious said:

Glad you guys didnt get taken out by Harvard bulge!
-chris

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Not everyone was as lucky as we were......yesterday Mark Synnott was in Tucks and a chunk of ice came down from the sluice area. Mark saw it in the last minute but the dude below him got hit in the head real bad and Mark had to help him down. Not sure the extent of injuries.....

Mats Roing said:

Not everyone was as lucky as we were......yesterday Mark Synnott was in Tucks and a chunk of ice came down from the sluice area. Mark saw it in the last minute but the dude below him got hit in the head real bad and Mark had to help him down. Not sure the extent of injuries.....

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See http://www.vftt.org/forums/showthread.php?t=21760

Doug

percious said:

Nice report Giggy. Glad you guys didnt get taken out by Harvard bulge! So what do you think? 2+?

-chris

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yea - If I were to take a guess - the line we took on initial lower bulge "might" be a 3-, but it might be a 2+ as well. The rest of the ice was probably 2/2+ and of course, probably 75-80% of the gully is snow. With the butter hero ice, it was rather easy. Its all about conditions, becuase when jeff woody and bailed off it in december due to sudden high winds and instant whiteout, with much less snow and much more ice, it was probably rated a solid 3 (the lower part) and was much longer. if I recall, it was roughly 1/3 rope pitch on sunday, when in december it was a full rope length.

Just a fun alpine gully.

I would agree with the grades Giggy gives under the conditions we encountered on the different visits. 2+ this past weekend and a solid grade 3 for the lower right side (Harvard?) bulge to start Yale Gully. In December, the first pitch over the Harvard bulge was a full pitch with a 60 meter rope. It was nice climbing on both visits.