Climb: 3:40 (Asc 398m) Reached 3285m
Descent: 1:20
Return: 1:35 (Asc 20m)
May 8th, 2011
At 1030h Pat and I skied along Burstall Pass and ascended 953m up the Robertson Glacier to reach the Mt. Douglas/Robertson col (2900m) by 1545h. The sky was clear with an intense sun and the temperature was around 12C. There was a lot of sluffing on the approach bellow the Robertson Glacier from the sun radiating onto the East facing slopes by 1100h. This showed how important it was to have an early start tomorrow. The going was flat until we hit the glacier. This is where most of the elevation was gained. Clouds lingered around the mountain which made it impossible to see our intended climbing route we planned to do tomorrow. While setting up camp a break in the clouds gave us a quick glimpse. The face was quite big. The longest technical climb I planned to do so far. Seemed like we had quite a day ahead! We dug our camp against a wind lip of snow and were in bed by 1930h.
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| View of Mt. Sir Douglas on the left. |
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| Our camp on top of the col. |
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| Looking at Mt. Sir Douglas from the col. |
May 9th, 2011
The alarm went off at 0300h. We needed an early start if we wanted to avoid falling snow and rock. A quick bite of bagel and peanut butter washed down with some coffee which was kept warm in the thermos and out of our sleeping bags we went. By the time we pulled on some warmer layers and boots it was 0400h. Everything seems to take longer when you’re winter camping. We started walking along the ridge leading to the base of the snow gully on the East face of Mt. Sir Douglas. It was obvious where the bergschrund was since it wasn’t completely covered. The crossing wasn’t too difficult. The snow in the lower wide gully was more work than I had expected. I thought that with the warmer weather. The melt/freeze of the sun would have had a bigger effect on the snow giving us a firmer surface to slog up in the morning. Instead, we occasionally had snow up to our knees. Our advance was more time and energy consuming than expected. When we reached the highest point in the gully we started trending right onto a narrow snow ledge. This is where the more technical climbing (5.6) was to start. It was now 0740h and the sun was starting to break through the clouds. It made for amazing views with us above a sea of clouds. But the intensity of the sun and the temperatures were something to worry about. The weather forecast was predicting clouds in the morning but they seemed to linger too low in the valley to cover the upper section of the peak. There was a good amount of snow pillows sitting on the rocky ledges of the face. I didn’t want to sit around too long with the sluffing we witnessed yesterday. We made the decision to bail on our attempt for the summit and returned back on our tracks. Lower down in the gully we started to see small signs of melt. At 0900h we were back at the tent. We didn’t witness too many signs of sluffing until 1025h which was when we started skiing down the Robertson Glacier. At first it was a fun ski descent on boot top snow. Although lower down we came across a hard crust that made it difficult to turn on skis. Especially with 70L packs that weighted around 50lbs. We made it back to the van for 1200h.
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| View of the sunrise before turning around. |
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| Pat heading down. One step at a time. |
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| Back at camp. |
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| Skiing past some seracs higher up on the Robertson Glacier. |
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| Fine style on nice snow. Even with a 50+lbs pack. |
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