Castle Towers slog
Posted: Thu May 17, 2012 5:19 am
I wanted to ski when I got back to Vancouver last week. The weather was super nice so I emailed everyone in hope to find a partner to ski with. Andy replied with the idea of skiing Castle Towers. Well, first he said he might ski Sahale in WA with Mike on Sat and then ski Castle Towers, BC, with me on Sun. I think I might be a little insane but next to Andy I felt like I have normal ambitions. Of course, I know I don't really have the average person's ambitions since I did after all agree to ski Castle Towers in a day.
To sum this the trip in a nutshell, it was a huuuuuuuuge slog (40km), a loooooooooong day (16.5 hours) just to find the N face of Castle Towers with huge bergshrunds and shitty spring snow conditions. Andy and I were so disappointed when we got to the top and looked down the other side
. Ah well, it was my first time skiing past April, it was nice to ski in a t-shirt, it was a good to experience to see what spring snow conditions are like and the views did not falter my memory. It's beautiful out there.
I'll stop rambling and show some pics.
Andy and Jeremy Frimer getting a breather before crossing Garibaldi lake. Jeremy Frimer was a psychology student at UBC, who cleaned and set up new routes in Squamish. He told us that he got a professorship and is moving to Manitoba
Castle Towers is the big peak in the middle. The N face is on the left side of the peak.
Looking back at where we came from: across Garibaldi (big) and Sphinx (small) lake.
Andy skinning towards Phyllis's Engine.
Mt. Garibaldi looking mighty. (Maddy, I don't want to ski down that face till winter again.)
This is what we found on the N side when we got to the top
. It took us only 8.5 hours to get there.
What we saw were the bergshrunds to the top right of the peak. We ended up dropping in further down left where the shrund was smaller on the NW face.
Andy heading quickly back to the col to get out of the warm slopes.
We started at 5:30am and got back at 10pm. We were done. I decided to try drinking chocolate milk after a big day like today cause Sky read somewhere that it's great recovery energy. So, I had a litre in a cooler for when I got back. You might think I'm weird now, but it was the best chocolate milk ever. I drank the whole litre in two goes. Andy did the normal thing and had a can of beer.
Done!
To sum this the trip in a nutshell, it was a huuuuuuuuge slog (40km), a loooooooooong day (16.5 hours) just to find the N face of Castle Towers with huge bergshrunds and shitty spring snow conditions. Andy and I were so disappointed when we got to the top and looked down the other side
. Ah well, it was my first time skiing past April, it was nice to ski in a t-shirt, it was a good to experience to see what spring snow conditions are like and the views did not falter my memory. It's beautiful out there.I'll stop rambling and show some pics.
Andy and Jeremy Frimer getting a breather before crossing Garibaldi lake. Jeremy Frimer was a psychology student at UBC, who cleaned and set up new routes in Squamish. He told us that he got a professorship and is moving to Manitoba
Castle Towers is the big peak in the middle. The N face is on the left side of the peak.
Looking back at where we came from: across Garibaldi (big) and Sphinx (small) lake.
Andy skinning towards Phyllis's Engine.
Mt. Garibaldi looking mighty. (Maddy, I don't want to ski down that face till winter again.)
This is what we found on the N side when we got to the top
. It took us only 8.5 hours to get there.What we saw were the bergshrunds to the top right of the peak. We ended up dropping in further down left where the shrund was smaller on the NW face.
Andy heading quickly back to the col to get out of the warm slopes.
We started at 5:30am and got back at 10pm. We were done. I decided to try drinking chocolate milk after a big day like today cause Sky read somewhere that it's great recovery energy. So, I had a litre in a cooler for when I got back. You might think I'm weird now, but it was the best chocolate milk ever. I drank the whole litre in two goes. Andy did the normal thing and had a can of beer.
Done!
