When Rick, Slava, and I pulled into the trailhead for Greys & Torreys on Friday, we were reticent. There had been 5 inches of new snow the night before; the first big significant dose of puffy stuff. We hoped there wouldn’t be any more that night. Especially since Rick & I were bivying! Slava (ever the gentleman) offered us space in his tent, if needed.
Questions bounced around over dinner, would we make the summit the next day? Or, would we have to back off due to premature winter conditions? How icy would the knife edge be? Should we have brought crampons? Winter boots?
On Saturday morning, Nancy and John met us at the trailhead. I learned that John had climbed the route 6 times in the past, and a few others have summited via the standard route. But the Kelso Ridge was a first for many, including myself. I was excited there was a more challenging route to the top, as I prefer climbing or scrambling (or both) to just a plain jane trail.
I was also excited to be climbing it with such a great group of people (no big egos or summit fever types). Everybody was jazzed to be there and looking forward to the challenge.
We left the trailhead just after 6am.
We took a break at the 12,300ft saddle around 7:30am.
We then collapsed our trekking poles as the trail turns 3rd class.
There were several gullies we negotiated, one was 4th class.
At 10am we were at the knife edge.
John scurried across it without any problems. So did a group of ~6-8 twenty somethings.
The rest of us (Kelso Ridge Noobs) decided we would play it safe. We roped up and spent the next 1.5 hours crossing this ~80 ft section. I went last, after making sure everybody else was safely across.
The view down on either side was thrilling. I’m glad we took the time to rope up. For my first time across this bit, it was nice to have a line of safety! Rick also did a good job of organizing the rope and ensuring we were working together. Thank goodness Rick remembered the butterfly knot, whoop whoop!
Here’s Rick just below the summit.
Our group of intrepid CMC members summitted Torreys Peak (14,267 ft) at noon. We were back to the parking lot a bit before 3pm. What a fun day!
Tags: CMC, Hiking, Kelso Ridge, Torreys Peak