For the second night in a row at Upper Slate Lake I didn’t sleep very well. A cup of coffee didn’t help right matters and I yawned most of the 2 hour approach hike to the basin between Peaks Q and R.
Along the way we saw some tracks from the Outward Bound group who’d gone up this way and then did some ice axe arrest practice on the slopes above the “South American Lake” before making tracks towards the Peak Q-P saddle.
Gary and I decided to head right up the snow slopes on the firm snow and so strapped on the crampons.
I was dragging behind Gary the whole way and didn’t help much to navigate or kick steps. Mentally I was tired and my legs didn’t have their usual spring.
Gary led us up the east facing snowfields and through a short talus band.
The snow was steep in places, but the sun had been hitting for a while now and had really softened it up. Eventually we transitioned onto loose rock slopes and began scrambling. Very quickly we spotted a rock cairn marking a class 4 gully we needed to head up.
The terrain got a little easier above the gully, but it was still confusing and a couple wayward cairns led us astray.
After climbing one really loose step we started to get closer to the true summit. A few more class 4 sections presented themselves.
Finally we reached the summit.
One look at the deep and steep notch to the west killed any though we had of traversing off that way (“We’re going to need a bigger rack” I thought) and on to Peak P. The weather wasn’t very confidence inspiring and my listless energy all pointed to descending back the way we came.
We avoided the one really loose downclimb with a steeper but far more solid option then worked our way back to the top of the 4th class gully.
Slowly and carefully we downclimbed it while avoiding some of the ice still present. Afterwards we stayed on rock for a longer period to avoid some of the steepest sections of snow which had been softening up even longer by now.
Finally it was time to tackle the snow again and we traversed out to meet our previous tracks.
Then we followed those down to the talus band where we removed our crampons and put on our rain pants for the upcoming glissade.
By sliding down the snow we rapidly descended back to “South American Lake”. A break in the sun allowed most of our gear to dry before we packed it back up for the hike back to camp.
We stayed lower and closer to the creek this time and found a decent path. We also identified a place to cross the creek fairly easily for our ascent up Peak L tomorrow.
We arrived back in camp a little less than 10 hours after leaving and I spent a good portion of the afternoon napping and avoiding the mosquitoes by hiding in the tent.
