Broken Top 9 O'clock Couloir 2/3/07

A week after reading and hearing my friend Josh's adventure on Broken Top's 9 O'clock couloir I convinced others to go. Route description here http://www.summitpost.org/route/265396/9-o-clock-couloir.html . So the plan was hatched that Joel, Meg, Tania, Cort and I would start around 5:30 am for the 7 mile approach.

As usual getting started took longer than planned and we were off at 6 am. Tania and Cort were on snowshoes, Joel and Meg were on XC skis and I was on my AT setup. We were making good time. I had been back there before with Josh to climb 11 O'clock couloir so I was trying to stick to the snowmobile trails for ease of travel. Some how I nailed it to the wilderness boundary where we needed to be. At this point Tania was feeling tired and decided to turn around and the rest of us headed in. Meg was having trouble traveling across the ice so she and Joel ditched the XC gear for boots and met Cort and I at the base of the Crater. We geared up and headed to the base of the route with the clouds rolling in to engulf the top of the peak. As you can see the fog was quite thick and it was misting on us. But the fun part was short so we headed up anyway. We gathered up on top of the lower lip of the shrund guarding the base of the route.

At the shrund I took the lead with all the pickets we had and headed up. The climbing was easy a modest 4 deg slope for most of the way. About half way up there was a mini-shrund you had to be careful not to kick too hard in fear of blowing out the steps. When the rope was taught between Cort and I she headed up having no problem with the route. I topped out shortly there after and belayed Cort up the rest of the route. Cort topped out and we were wondering where Joel and Meg were. Joel should have started right behind Cort to minimize time on the route. Guess she was a bit scared of the climb and worried about getting down off the route, but after some reassuring words from Joel they started off. Joel leading out till the rope was taught then Meg headed up. She did great on the route and they both topped out quickly. The next thee pictures are of Cort heading up the route and kicking but. The last two is of Joel starting the coulior and the other is of Meg walking over to get onto the steeps. Now to get down. Josh told me that you could rap the route off some slings that were around a large horn. He thought we would be able to rap to the shrund with a double rope rap and skip any down climbing on the steeps. We even with rope stretch a double rap would not make it so I set up an intermediary anchor. After they had rapped down to me we set up a snow bollard to rap off. I was a bit worried that it would hold and me being the heaviest person I went first. It held most of the way till I had to put all my weight on it for a free hanging to rap over the lip of the shrund it went. I felt a jerk as I was in mid air. The backup held me while I finished and touched down on the shrund lip. MMM now what to do. Joel mad another, this time much, much larger and the three of them rapped off no problem. Lesson: make the snow bollard HUGE!!! Packed up we headed out and made good time to the car for a long 12 hour day. The route is fun and a great one for in intro to steep snow climbing but I will never do that route again this way. It was way too short for the amount of work involved getting in and getting out. If we had access to snowmobiles (like Josh did the week before) that would be different story. But we all had fun any way and now Cort is ready to tackle some real routes like Leuthold Couloir on Hood. Now that will be fun!!!