Mount Shasta via Casaval Ridge

Life is absolutely full of opportunities, I truly believe it is important that one seek them out and pursue them fruitfully. A long holiday weekend to me sure seemed like an excellent chance to see and experience something new. So, I took a gamble by driving 300 miles north to climb a mountain I had never seen before (I am a bit ashamed about of that), by a technical route and solo. Perhaps I was getting myself in too deep, but as fortune would have it, I made some great friends who helped me reach my goal.

In order to avoid the inevitable nightmare of traffic leaving the Bay Area on a Friday evening, I chose to depart at 8pm, placing my arrival time at Mt. Shasta at around 1am. The drive went surprisingly smooth and before I knew it I was gaining elevation quickly. It was pretty neat to drive through a forest with all new tree species, mostly pines and firs. I packed my rucksack and was walking towards the trailhead when I met 2 fine gentlemen from the Seattle Area.

Dan and Kyle had driven 8.5 hours to climb Shasta, I admire their devotion! After speaking briefly we went our separate ways, but I ran into them again at the beginning of the route. It was not clear to any of us where the start of the Casaval Ridge was, so we just started following it from the base. At this time it was about 4am and still very dark. An hour or two later we paused for a break to refuel and rehydrate, the sun was rising and created quite a pleasant aura.

As ashamed as I am about having not seen Shasta before climbing it, it was indeed very humbling to be in her shadow.


Our chosen route followed one of Shasta's most prominent ridges, indeed it led skyward for several thousand feet. It was such an aesthetic ridgeline, as Dan would put it later- it really had an alpine feel to it.


For those who don't know it Shasta is a stratavolcano and part of the Cascade Range, not the Sierras. This for me gave it such a magical mystique, it was so exciting not knowing what was around the next corner!


Awesome steep couloirs, jagged rock only held together by the frozen snow and sharp featured volcanic rock describes Shasta's Casaval Ridge. I just could not get over climbing in the snow with crampons and an ice axe when it was clearly summertime below. In fact, when we left in the early afternoon it was in the 80s in the lowlands you see below me! Even so, when that sun is out it reflects off the snow and magnifies it, creating sunburn in the most unusual places, like the inside of your nose and the roof of your mouth!


The original goal as outlined by Dan and Kyle was to bivy around 10,300 feet where they had seen suitable sites. I managed to talk them into a higher bivy, at a bit higher than 11k feet. I argued the extra elevation gain would net us an easier summit day as well as make the panoramic vistas better.


Truth is, I was extraordinarily lucky to have met Kyle and Dan. Both experienced mountaineers, it was a novel experience for me to learn from folks who not only thoroughly enjoy being in the mountains, but can share in immense sums of wisdom. I seriously doubt I would have summitted had it not been for their support.

Anyway, our bivy site was super mellow. Perched right on the ridge and with drops of several hundred feet on either side, it was the best site I have camped out at for a night yet! We even had suitable rocks nearby for windscreens for the stoves as well as to guy out the tents. It was funny how we both parties came out with the same tent, mine is the blue "betamid" and the orange one was Dan's. Perfect tent for the purpose.

Unfortunately, when Kyle arrived at our bivy site he came up with a slight bout of AMS (Acute Mountain Sickness). The poor guy felt real sick and had to forfeit his summit attempt. Honestly, I don't know how many people these days are capable of even getting to 11k feet! I myself woke up after a short nap with a splitting headache and thought my summit was off, about 1000mg of ibuprofen and heaps of water put me back in the game though.

We all went to bed early that night, despite having napped most of the afternoon. Late that evening a thunderstorm swept in and bringing with it this weird snow called "grapple", which is snow pellets the size of peas. Dan and myself woke and departed at 3am after melting snow for water and having breakfast mocha. Dan had a brilliant idea to bring powdered espresso and hot cocoa mix- winning combination for an alpine start! The second sunrise on the mountain brought just as beautiful colors, I certainly believe there is a strong correlation between the colors in the sky and altitude.

While Dan had to pause to take care of business, I took a quick self portrait at an area called the "red banks". To my right you can see how red they were!


Not long after pausing at the red banks, we passed through the "cat walk". This was a dramatically exposed section where one slip up could lead to certain death or dismemberment. Even so, not even that could dampen my summit fever as I queued behind some slow pokes on the final snow slope!


I reckon we summited around 730, having climbed about 3000 feet in about 4.5 hours, not bad considering the altitude and my relative inexperience in climbing 14ers. The top of Shasta had a slightly different feel than my last and first 14er, Mount Elbert in Colorado. I don't know how to describe it, but probably has to do with latitude and proximity to the Pacific Ocean.


Our summit stay was fairly brief, just long enough to sign the log book and chat with some other summiters. Just below the summit came the acrid smell of sulphur from these vents, it is always nice to be reminded you are climbing on a volcano!

It was pretty cool to see all the snow surrounding the vents melted away. On the way down we passed Shastina, Mount Shasta's "submountain", which looks like it'd be epic for ski touring.


Shasta was an extraordinary mountain and one which has been branded into my mind, it certainly satisfied my cravings for the time being. She sure is magnificent in her own right.


Unfortunately, an unforeseen event occured very recently and may well have ruined any other future mountain plans in California. However, it was liberating and now I can spend time at Yosemite and all the other national parks I have been wanting to see out here in the wild west.

Bouldering in the middle of suburbia

Who would have thought one might find semi-suitable climbing in an abandoned pasture, surrounded by a checkerboard of housing developments? Well, it never would have went this way had the original plan gone through. I met with Stephen, who through Facebook we managed to finally get a day when we could both climb. Stephen just graduated last summer with his master from WVU, where I had met him, he's a strong climber and a real dude. In fact, he even coined the term "beer flash", which is when someone drinks some beer, then uses that beer propulsion to climb a bouldering problem, it is sure to frequent the pages of the next climbing mag.

Anyway, the original plan was to go to a climbing paradise near Lake Tahoe and play around placing gear on some trad routes. Stephen overbooked himself and needed to be back home in the early evening, so we reasoned to climb in Vacaville, 78 miles from my place in Half Moon Bay and a bit closer for Stephen coming from Sacramento. For those who don't know it, Vacaville is in the heat-blasted central valley, east of San Francisco and I am pretty sure it means "place of cows" in Spanish. It was a strange park, atop a knoll, overlooking seemingly endless cookie-cutter houses that sparkled from their backyard swimming pools.

The climbing was decent, a half-dozen boulders strewn about. I don't have any photos of us climbing, but I do of the arete of the rock we played around with and the eery view of suburbia in the backyard. No place to go without an automobile here!

Unfortunately I picked up some damn poison oak while I was there, made worse by a light sunburn and sweat. I don't know that I will return to the Vacaville boulders, the commute back to the coast was so miserable, I80 near Berkeley and trying to cross the Bay Bridge is ALWAYS a damn yardsale. However, it was nice to see some familiarity from West Virginia, I hope to climb mountains with Stephen this summer.

Crack climbing 101

They say crack climbing is the essence of climbing. Without hesitation, I say thats bologna, but those tough folks climbing cracks certainly commands respect! Watch anyone who is a good crack climber, it seems so easy and effortless for them to flow up seemingly insurmountable walls. Watch a beginner crack climber, like myself, and witness the flailing, shaky instability! It is not easy to shove any part of your body into a crack and force it to expand to hold you in place. I have been putting off learning how to jam for some time, but moving to CA I cannot avoid it any longer. The fact of the matter is, almost no matter where you are climbing, there are going to be features that resemble cracks. It is simply a natural part of the weathering and erosion that is occurring on everything on this planet.

So, to remedy my fear and general avoidance of cracks, I enrolled in a crack climbing course at the local indoor climbing gym with several climbing colleagues. We formed a real formidable team, headed by Leslie, a long time local gym climber who has a real knack for making friends with anyone cool. Chef Dan and then myself completed our small group. Dan is the Executive Chef for the Concordia Argonaut Club in San Francisco, he's a real dude who has been climbing for only a short time and I must say progressing rather quickly.

We heard about the course by another climber at the gym who had taken it. She had nothing but great things to say about it. We met Lucho, our young instructor last Tuesday, Cinco de Mayo. Without any delay from the days Corona and lime infested festivities (just kidding, but Dan brought Coronas for after the class, super cool and much appreciated!) we spent 30 minutes learning how to tape up our hands. The indoor gym surface has perhaps 5 grit sandpaper for walls and is super abrasive on skin, making athletic taping of the hands absolutely necessary. My hands still bled by the end anyway, but it is not a good climbing day unless blood is bled by someone right?

The basic idea is to shove your hand in the crack, being careful not to rough it up too much, and then flex your thumb to make your hand bigger. This is the basic concept of the hand jam, as demonstrated by myself above. Another technique Lucho taught us was the finger lock, this is when the fingers are inserted as far as possible into the crack, thereby "locking" them in place. When this method works, you are literally hanging by your bones, and it is never without some pain! Leslie shows the finger lock eloquently below:


Constantly flex your thumb, intuitively trying to make your hand bigger to hold in a crack, and then allowing it to go limp to pull it out is super tough. Chef Dan was climbing a great crack with great style, as I tried to tell everyone that night, it is all about looking good, even if you're getting worked, like we all did!


Just to give you an idea of the abuse your hands take, Dan took a photo of his own hands after our training session:

Thanks to Dan by the way for taking many of the great pictures of that evening.

All in all it was a great, highly informative session. Ultimately, crack climbing is one of those obscure activities that can only be perfected with heaps of practice, at the dispense of your hands. I'm glad I had some cool cats to hang with while learning all about cracks, I look forward to polishing my skills at any one of CA's splendid climbing destinations!

Bye!