We walked upstream to find a good place to cross. There was a downed tree that we waded to, climbed up on, and walked across. Not the ideal way but we didnt fall.
Here I am crossing the tree
Once across the river we picked up a faint game trail headed downstream which took us to a few cairns pointing up Tourist Creek. The cairns were short lived and after ditching my trail shoes and hiking poles (because I get sore feet I decided to pack my approach shoes and wear my Brooks Cascadias on the trail) we started the endless boulder hopping. I kept remembering being told "Tourist Creek is a bear" and I would have to agree! We went high on the climbers right side of the canyon to get out of the car sized boulders and into the smaller more manageable ones.
Here is a pic of the traverse across the boulder field. The views were amazing and "almost" made you forget how exhausting jumping across a mountain is.
Route finding was easy and we were soon at the divide getting our first glimpse at Gannett. We were moving slower than I anticipated and were now about 7.5 hours into the hike. Here is a pic from the divide with Gannett in the background.
As you can see the snow that fell a week ago hadn't melted yet. It was hard to tell just how much that was going to effect the rest of our hike from here and we pressed on.
As recommended we stayed to the left and avoided descending to Scott Lake. At Lake 10795 we stayed left and then crossed over and up another boulder slope toward the base of Minor Glacier. Here we stopped for a PB&J sandwich and Rod discovered he was out of water. Knowing we could get good water from the glacier we headed across and found a great place to fill the camelbak. This has to be the best tasting water ever!
The traction on the glacier was solid and we traversed directly across to the base.
Here is Rod coming across
As you can see we were starting to get into snow. We also met up with tracks from previous climbers and I was glad to be able to have another reference for the route. We started up the finger to the col heading to the saddle then the tracks we were following started heading right. The better line was to continue straight up, so we kept to the shorter route. We reached the couloir heading north and their were no tracks??
Here is a picture of me looking at the map verifying this was the correct way.
We continued on assuming the others knew of another route further across the face. We slowly worked our way through the loose rock and soft snow to the saddle. Here is where things got interesting... The Class 4 section had firm snow and ice in it making it much harder to climb. I started up and climbed one section that Rod didn't feel comfortable with and there he decided he would play it safe and turn around, it was the downclimb that worried him. Hearing about a fixed rope from earlier trip reports I decided to continue on and try to find it. I did find an empty sling and figured someone had taken the rope. I really wanted to touch the summit!! I knew I could climb the route but was unsure about the descent. I was so close to making the first section but the last few moves were very slick and the holds were not the greatest. I looked on the south side trying to convince myself that the exposure wasn't that bad... crazy!! I even considered summitting and waiting for another group to come up the main route and beg for a rappel, again not smart. Not knowing what to do (and not even knowing if I would have trouble downclimbing what I had already climbed) I decided it was a great time to say a little prayer. It was after that that I knew I needed to leave this summit for another day. The downclimb proved easier than expected as I found alternate lines down the sketchy parts I climbed. Soon I was back with Rod at the saddle looking at the amazing views in all directions.
Here is a pic of where I think I climbed to:
It was now a little after 4:00... the realization that we would be be hiking in the dark twice in the same day started setting in. Rod was a trooper and pushed himself amazingly well to the top but I wondered if he had enough in him to make it back. We did pack emergency bivouac gear but that was an option I really didn't want to rely on. Also I knew my wife would start getting worried if she hadn't heard from me by Sunday morning (I had my cell phone on the entire trip and in one spot on the west side of the peak during the climb I received 2 txt messages. I stood there trying to get a message out to her letting her know we would be late but the signal was gone and I couldn't get it back).
I'll try to abbreviate the return... we followed our route back and didn't have many issues. I did take a short detour to see if I could tell which route the other climbers had taken. Shortly after the spot where their tracks headed south they took shelter in some larger rocks then turned around and went down. I wondered if maybe they were there a couple days prior when the weather forcasted 70mph winds?? I am typically a good navigator but Rod had to "refresh" my memory a few times when the terrain didn't look familiar. We made it to the descent into Tourist Creek when darkness set in and we dug our headlamps back out of the packs. Coming down the boulder fields in the dark would definitely be more of a challenge.
As some of you know I have replaced my camera, gps, maps, watch, and many other techno toys with my iPhone. I use "Runmeter" to track my route and pace. I then use "Trimble Navigator Pro" for detailed topo maps and to point out my exact location. The Runmeter app came in extremely handy to track the last part of Tourist Creek to our stashed gear... it led me exactly to it in very dark conditions.
We changed back into our trail shoes and decided to try to find a shortcut to the trail. The route was shorter but involved bushwacking through some pretty thick trees/downfall and then navigating another boulder field. We reached the river and worked our way downstream hoping to find a shallow place to cross. Luckily we found one, crossed and bushwacked up to the trail... what a relief to be on a trail again! We had been hiking for about 19 hours and ONLY had about 11 miles to go. We both started off at a good pace but after about 2 miles or so Rod yelled ahead telling me his "Rocktane" had wore off. **Rod had never tried GU before and prior to the trip picked up a few Rocktane flavors (he hated the orange :)). I also learned from a climbing partner on a previous Teton climb that "Zip-Fizz" can work wonders when you are starting to crash and I gave him one to pack at the car. It was a combination of his will and determination and the little kick of caffeine every few hours that was keeping him going.
I knew Rod was going to make it and I really wanted to be at the car so I continued on ahead clearing the way of all the things that go bump in the night (trust me there are a lot of them when you have been awake for 20 or so hours). I rolled in to the car at 2:23am...
Here are a few of the stats pulled from my phone
Total trip time = 22 hours 53 minutes
Total Miles = 36.65
Total Calories Burned = 6394
Total Elevation gain/loss = 12472/-12472 ft ascent
***This ascent figure had me confused also... when I got home and transferred the track log into my map program it read 7865 ft of ascent I then transferred it into Google earth and it read gain/loss 10756 -10756??? Here is my theory - the gps in my phone is more accurate than my 4/5 year old Garmin, I believe it tracked the up and down of the boulder hopping along the way giving a extremely accurate gain/loss figure. Plugging it into a topo program the figure there is based on the contour lines therefore the variation isn't as much. No clue on Google earth.
I changed clothes and put on the Crocs, wow were they a relief! I also hoped I had enough time to get some sleep so I would be able to drive at least to cell reception to call my wife and let her know all was OK. About an hour later Rod came strolling in... he seemed to have plenty of energy and was even smiling (I was delirious still though so who knows :)). We drove to cell reception woke my wife up (dang she is a good sport) then continued on until snake river canyon where I decided I better rest for as little more. After a short rest we were off again. My dad lives in Afton, WY and as we passed through I called and talked him into making us breakfast :)... Although he made me earn it by setting up his new iPhone5.
The Wind River Range is definitely one of the coolest around. Now that I have recovered a little I would recommend this trip to anyone able (although if I do it again i am going to try the Wells Creek route).Thanks to all those that helped with TR, beta, etc!
Here are some links if you want gps info
Google Earth KML
GPX File
Map of the route:
Picture showing the route from Tourist/Wells Divide
Tony
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