descended the Ramp Route to the climber's parking lot. Bounday Glacier
is easily passable on far climber's right just below one of the ugly
gullies. The glacier below Athabasca's N Face is passable but quite
broken in places.
Silverhorn was mainly ice with about 100m of snow (used T-slots in
this section) in the middle below the last crevasse, and a thin
covering of snow for the last couple of pitches, which was easy on the
calves. The snow was hard and crusted with minimal foot penetration.
The seracs on the climber's right side of the Silverhorn (about half
way up) are a little menacing.
Cold (around zero first thing in the morning and didn't really warm up
the rest of the day) with thunderstorms, complete with buzzing ice
tools, and 1 cm of graupel early in the morning; cloudy with sunny
breaks the rest of the day.
Another group climbed the N Ridge yesterday and reported excellent
conditions. The N Face is all ice except for the exit gully at the
top. The crux rock band appeared to be crusted in ice but I can't say
for certain.
The ramp descent was in good shape with good cramponing on the
supportive snow crust. We descended by swinging far skiier's right
(not over the bridged crevasse where the track currently is) and while
doing this I discovered a very nice, small digital camera in a black
case which I suspect fell from higher up on the mountain. It's still
in perfect condition. If it's yours contact me at twolfe at sawback
dot com to claim it.
Regards,
Tom Wolfe
AAG/ASG
_______________________________________________
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