Jun 30, 2019
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Etymology |
Story | Photos / Slideshow | Maps: 1 2 | GPX | Profile | |
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Petit Griffon later climbed Jul 2, 2019 |
I had expected us to start off at 6a from Mosquito Flat where I had spent the night. Robert and Kristine had gone in to camp on Friday afternoon, so we planned to meet them at the base of the couloir in a few hours. Of the others, Scott and Brian were the only two at the TH at 6a, Tom and Iris showing up just after but not ready to go. Brian started off ahead of us, planning to wait with Robert and Kristine for the rest of us to arrive. It wasn't until almost 6:30a that the remaining four of us headed out from the TH, though this wasn't at all a problem - we would have tons of daylight for this one and time would not really be a factor. We had heavy packs though we weren't spending the night in the backcountry. Each of us had a pair of snowshoes, crampons, axe and personal climbing gear (helmet, harness, shoes). Brian and Scott each carried a rope (Robert had a 3rd rope with him at Mills Lake), Brian had a full rack of gear (he was easily carrying the most weight of all of us), and there was some other pro distributed to the others. I had craftily managed to get none of it, but my pack still weighed me down - I blame old age. Iris led off at a pretty good clip with me chasing her tail and the other two losing ground behind. When we reached the Mono/Morgan Pass trail junction, she was breathing hard.
"Why so fast?" I asked.
"I don't know..." was the gist of her reply.
Scott, Iris and Tom had driven up Saturday morning, stopping at Whitney Portal for an afternoon climb of Candlelight Peak. This was supposed to be their warm-up and acclimatization, but it had taken longer and more effort than expected, leaving them starting the morning already flagging. We reconvened and started up the trail towards Mono Pass, but I soon found myself alone in front and the others nowhere to be seen. I should have stopped to take the rope or other gear from them, but I sort of assumed they had paused for one reason or another and would soon catch up. At Ruby Lake I stopped to put on my snowshoes. They weren't really needed on the firm morning snow, but I figured they might help me navigate the suncups that characterized much of the two miles we had to reach the base of the couloir. As I started up from Ruby Lake I spotted others behind me just reaching the lake's outlet. It would be the last I'd see of them for some time. It would take me another hour to make my way up the drainage, past Mills Lake (still mostly frozen) and up to meet the others. I caught sight of Brian up ahead climbing a steep slope with two others we'd met at the parking lot who were headed to Mt. Abbot. It was shortly after 9a when I pulled up to the large rock, the last dry spot before climbing the couloir, where the other three were busy putting on crampons. Kristine and Robert had been waiting for some time now, wondering if the rest of us would show. Brian's appearance alleviated their concerns but when I arrived, I told them I thought the others were over an hour behind by now. That didn't seem problematic at the time, as it would take us awhile to set up for the rock climbing once we got to the notch. I hurried to dump my snowshoes and put on my crampons as the others started off.
Kristine and Robert led the way up the couloir, straight up at first, then zigzagging as it got progressively steeper, then finally straight up again in the shady section near top that was much harder snow. Brian and I reinforced the steps they had made so that there was a pretty decent set of tracks running up the couloir before we were done. At the very top we switched from using the spike of our ice axes to the pick, the most nervous part of the ascent because a slip here would be hard to arrest until we had fallen to the softer snow in the sun below, by which time we'd have built up considerable speed. It took us about 40min to climb to the couloir where we found ourselves back on dry, rocky ground, though somewhat unstable. The wind was blowing strongly across the col, sending us to our packs for more layers to put on. Kristine almost immediately went up to the left to explore the climbing options. It certainly didn't look like the easy class 5 we were expecting, and it was about this time that we began to realize that none of us had done a thorough job of learning the route beta. Brian had information provided in Secor's book and another source, neither of which proved very useful. Perhaps we were supposed to go over the notch and around the other side? Brian and I explored that briefly, only to decide that we'd have to drop way down the other side to get around cliffs, and that didn't seem correct either. We were also aware that there are in fact two notches, not just the one that our limited beta suggested. We were on the northern one that separates Petit Griffon from Mt. Mills, but there is another higher and sketchier one on the south side that is shared with Mt. Abbot. There were older steps that we'd seen going into that couloir and we wondered if we'd picked the wrong one. And though we were indeed at the correct notch and starting point, we collectively convinced ourselves that the other notch might be the right one.
Far down below, we could see that the other three had arrived near the base of the couloir but were making no real effort to go further. Tom had already pre-guessed that he might not get further than this point. Scott, feeling unusually weak in part because of a crash diet, had given Iris the rope somewhere around Ruby Lake so that he could continue. The result seemed to be that all three were not feeling up to continuing beyond the point they'd reached. Scott, of course, knew the route better than anyone and watched as we hesitated in the right-hand couloir and probably with some disbelief as we then switched to the other.
I went back down first, once again using the pick to get through the
shaded snow, then traversed across the snow-filled gap between the notches to
reach the left-hand couloir.
This one was steeper, the snow didn't extend to
the notch and the rock above was exceedingly steep and rather loose, too. We
would have to break out a rope to consider safely reaching the top of this
notch, almost a full rope length above us. Robert was willing to give leading it
a try whereas Brian was having serious doubts about the enterprise altogether
at this point. Kristine and I were somewhere in-between - we were ok with
continuing if someone else was willing to lead it. After some silent
deliberation, Brian decided to go back down, but not before leaving us the rope
and gear he'd carried up. That left us with two ropes and a full set of gear.
Despite having plenty of gear, things did not go well. Robert managed
to lead about half a rope length up, a bold effort considering the poor quality
of the rock. We scrambled some beyond this only to find even
crappier rock above that would require a tougher lead
than the first. We all began to have doubts by this time. We'd already spent
hours on the effort in this couloir, and decided
The other four had started back hours ago and we'd see no sign of them the rest
of the day. We carefully descended the couloir facing into the mountain
until the gradient eased and allowed us to face outward and make faster
progress. Once back to our large rock where we'd left gear, I switched back to
snowshoes for the two miles of suncups we had to cross before getting
back to Ruby Lake.
Though I had a good headstart, Kristine managed to catch up to me at Mills Lake
wearing just her boots, which pointed out there was no real advantage to the
snowshoes and I might just as well have been carryng them as dead weight.
Kristine and Robert had to stop off at their campsite above Mills Lake to pick
up the rest of their gear. Robert's girlfriend, Angela, had spent the day at
camp while Robert and Kristine went off to climb Petit Griffon. Angela and
Robert would hike out at a slower pace.
I was carrying Brian's rope and some of the gear and
by the time I'd strapped the snowshoes to the pack at Ruby Lake,
my shoulders
were aching from the extra weight. Ugh, ugh. The remaining hour to Mosquito Flat
seemed to drag on far longer than I remembered. More Ugh, ugh. It was nearly
3:30p by the time I returned
to the jeep and could unload my unruly burden. I'd
been back about 10min, time enough to spread out my gear all over the bear boxes
to help it dry, when Kristine came waltzing off the trail. After returning to
her car and removing her boots, we sorted out gear so I could get Brian's stuff
back to him in Mammoth Lakes. We were of course disappointed that we hadn't
gotten ourselves to the top of our spire, but we had to agree that the weather
had been fine and the outing quite enjoyable. This would serve as a lesson that
we might or might heed in the future - do the research on your route!
Continued...
Mammoth Knolls
After meeting back up with Brian in Mammoth to give him his gear, I had several
hours of daylight and was kinda itching to get to the top of something.
The forest areas north of Mammoth have a huge network of roads that one can
explore on bike, ATV, motorcycle or car, with a collection of easy summits. I'd
visited some of these on past trips, but there were plenty of others still.
Mammoth Knolls is one of the closest ones to town, overlooking it on the north
side. I used the Mammoth Scenic Loop Rd and then a few lesser forest roads to
get within a short distance of the summit. An easy stroll leads to the open
top where one has a fine view overlooking Mammoth to the south with the
Sherwins and the Sierra Crest in the background. There is a small solar-powered
installation on the slightly lower east summit where I had
parked.
Dry Creek Knoll
Less than a mile and a half further north, Dry Creek Knoll also has a road
going nearly to the summit, though this one I found blocked by a large
downed tree on the northeast side of the peak. I simply parked at the
blockage and went up from there, about 1/3mi each way. The
cross-country through open forest understory was easy enough, the
highpoint found at a rocky outcrop with partial views through
the forest. In all I spent about an hour on the two summits, just
enough extra effort after Petit Griffon to satisfy me for the day. I ended up
parking at the TH for Inyo Craters where I showered and camped for the night,
with plans to do some other peaks around this area the next day...
For more information see these SummitPost pages: Petit Griffon
This page last updated: Tue Nov 24 08:44:01 2020
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