Waddington Range: Serra One - East Ridge, AD 5.4 260 m

8/6/2010

The plan was to climb the SE face of Serra One. Supposedly a fine route on solid rock, at 5.8. But then it started snowing.

We woke to a blustery day, wild with clouds. It seemed likely to evolve into a storm, but we were impatient with waiting in the tent. Decided to go for it while the sun lasted. It was  sunny and only partly cloudy as we slogged up the glacier, but by the time we had crossed the 'schrund the first snow flurry was passing over. After 15 minutes, the sun came back out, and we agreed to downgrade our objective to the east ridge. This was to be our descent route, and all we knew about it is that it was supposed to be 5.4. We figured this was a route we could  climb in boots and gloves, and descend safely in the event of a storm.

We left our rock shoes and glacier gear on a convenient ledge just above the schrund. The first pitch wandered up the south side of the ridge. It was a challenge to find a way up that was both solid, and not stupidly hard. Thereafter, the rock firmed up and things got fun. The 2nd pitch climbed a steep face and well fractured slabs near the ridge crest, leading to the north side of the ridge,  and ending on a good ledge on the north side. The 3rd pitch was likely the best, heading up and right on the north face of the ridge crest. Very steep climbing,  but with good shelving holds for hands and feet. It finished up a nice corner crack and a bit of face climbing out on a pillar to the left as the crack widened. The 4th pitch climbed straight up through ledgey terrain with a few good jam cracks in it's first half. The 2nd half followed a very steep  corner/chimney with multiple crack features, culminating in a comfortable but rubbley belay. The fifth pitch climbed easy-looking but slabby  and difficult-in-boots terrain up past a deep gash, and almost reaching the summit. At about this point the sun disappeared for good, and the snow really began to blow. Jim came up to my belay and headed up just high enough to tag the summit, perhaps 15-20 meters above. Then we got the hell out of there. 

Three full 60 m rappels and one partial got us back to the rubble just above the notch between Serra One and Stiletto. The snow never let up, but varied strangely between heavy wet flakes  that stuck and melted, to styrofoam like pellets that came in on blasts of frigid wind. We were both soaked and slightly miserable by the time we crawled back into the tent. We scarfed some of the food we hadn't taken the time to eat on the climb, and passed out, with the wind and snow skirling outside.

Overall a pretty awesome climb, but some of the stuff we climbed was decidedly NOT 5.4. The steep corner on pitch 4 was particularly hard. Likely we didn't find the easiest possible route.