August Long Bugaboos

 I had a 4 day long weekend coming up and was really hoping to get on something big. It had been over a year since I was last in the Bugaboos and the Beckey-Chouinard was calling me. My friend Cailan had posted on Facebook seeing if anyone was available for the Bugaboos that weekend and I hopped on it right away. I'd acquired a partner and a trip planned for the weekend, I just needed to wait for the work week to finish now.

Eventually it was over and I was off to the Bugaboos thursday evening. Lightning storms, naps, dead batteries, and flat tires, eventually lead me to the parking lot. A hour later Cailan rolled in, with much less incidents than me and we got to discussing our final plans and to packing. The plan still was to climb the Beckey-Chouinard, we would hike to the base of the climb on Friday then either climb the first pitches to the bivy ledge, or bivy at the bottom depending on our time and fatigue. We eventually got all our packing down and left the parking lot at 11AM. A couple hours later we were unloading as much as possible at Applebee camp, ate a little food, then took off on the approach, we joked about having an alpine start just before 3... PM

The Bugaboo-Snowpatch Col was in great condition and we walked up it without need of our crampons, we headed up the highway trail towards Pigeon Spire then took final advantage of the toilet at the base of the west ridge climb, literally a throne to s(h)it upon while looking over the mountains. We dropped our crampons and ice axes at the Pigeon-Howser Col and started the descent into the Eastcreek Basin. A final fill of our water at the Basin, and a scramble to the base of the climb had us there at 630PM. We were both tired from all the uphill today and a sheltered boulder bivy at the base rather than an open bivy on the climb appealed to us so we settled in for the night at the base with dreams of being on route the next day.

A flash woke me up at 2AM, then another, there was lightning in the sky. As my other senses came too I realized it was raining too. I'm not sure how long the storm lasted but I didn't sleep much after it. Eventually the sky cleared up, the sun started rising, and we started climbing. The first couple hundred feet are class 4 scrambling, around 830AM we were roping up for the first real pitch of climbing and off. We simul-climbed the first 3 pitches to below the crux roof pull, something that was much easier than I expected (thanks sport climbing), then simul-climbed again to the first bivy ledge. We started pitching it out from here, leading pitches while carrying both our bivy gear, made the 5.9 climbing feel harder than it should have been, but it was all easily protected and we slowly made our way up.






Pitch after pitch we enjoyed perfect climbing, it was all varied and interesting keeping you on your toes. Corners, splitters, roofs, it was all good. We had been going for a while though and fatigue was beginning to catch up with us, it was also getting cold as the clouds began covering the sun. Two pitches from the top as I was leading up a corner it began to hail, streams of pellets funnelled down the corner as I tried to jam up it, then I started hearing thunder too. All I could think was "here we go, looks like we're about to have an epic". But I got to the top of the pitch, belayed Cailan up and the storm was blowing over, just narrowly missing us. Cailan took off on the last pitch freeing the traverse, and I followed up blowing the last move on it before coming around the corner. I laughed to myself saying I didn't free the Beckey, next time I guess, maybe without such a heavy bag it will go (that's my excuse).

We did the final scramble to the top, enjoyed the view, had the last of our water and food and set off for camp. We still had a few more hours before we could be enjoying a warm meal and tent. On the second rap we went the wrong direction, but luckily found some tat anchors and got back on the rap route. A few more raps lead us over the Howser bergschrund and we were on our way back to camp. Finally rolling in around 930PM exhausted, we had a quick meal then passed out in our tent.

We woke up to blue skies the following day, however our stiff bodies resisted wanting to do anything for a while. But the granite spires were beconing and we were on our way for another climb by 11AM. This time we were setting off for the NE Ridge of Bugaboo Spire, another classic! From the camp we could see quite a few parties heading up to the base of the route, but as we got closer everyone was coming down. A party in the morning had pulled off a canoe sized flake on the first pitch and needed a heli-rescue, that combined with some darker looking clouds scared everyone off. We kept going though and at the base of the climb found the flake with some blood all around it, a great sign. But looking at the route, they were clearly not going in the right direction, so we avoided where it fell from and got through the first pitch no problem.

Pitch after pitch we enjoyed stellar jamming, and took the variation on the upper pitches enjoying splitter cracks avoiding the easier chimney climbing for as long as we could. Eventually our splitters ran out and we walked across a ledge to join the chimney. The skies were getting darker and we were wanting to get a move on. We simul-climbed through the chimney up until a pitch from the top where the rop drag had me struggling. I belayed Cailan up and then it started hailing again, I heard a few claps of thunder too but luckily those disappeared after a while. Cailan climbed to the summit and I followed up as the storm kept getting worse.

We began traversing the summit ridge wanting to get off this peak not wanting to have an epic. At points you could barely see 50m ahead of you, but luckily Cailan had climbed this route before and knew where to go for all the raps. I can easily see how many parties have difficulties with this traverse, especially if you were caught in a storm. Slowly we kept moving along not wanting to stop, moving at least kept us sort of warm. Eventually we were at the gendarme on the Kain route setting up for our last few raps before the downclimbing, we were both miserable by this point but had gotten through the tricky section of the traverse. After about another hour of working our way down the storm began to settle and the sun poked out for a little. We were greeted with great views of the Howsers, Pigeon and Snowpatch as the clouds disappated. A leftover fixed rope on the Bugaboo-Snowpatch Col made the descent extremely quick this time and we were back in camp by 730PM. Another quick meal and we were both off to bed enjoying the warmth of our sleeping bags again.