Goode – NE Buttress – 7/8-7/13 2018

The Northeast Face of Goode Mountain,
viewed from Mt. Logan, August 2015.

I'm still trying to piece together my Goode-Forbidden Traverse – an effort to combine the two best moderate alpine rock routes in North Cascades National Park: The Northeast Buttress of Goode and the North Ridge of Forbidden. In this attempt Grace and I managed to climb the Northeast Buttress of Goode... over six days.

The plan was to start from Cascade Pass, hike down the Stehekin River, up Park Creek, and access the NE side of Goode via. the Goode-Storm King Col. Then, after climbing Goode, traverse the Wyeth Glacier to the vicinity of Park Creek Pass, cross upper Thunder Basin to access the Boston Glacier, and then climb over Forbidden via the North Ridge. This route has the advantage of allowing you to cache some food and fuel (appropriately protected from bear and snaffles), and not have to carry it over Goode.

The first couple days went as planned. We made it up to our high camp beneath the SW face of Goode early on our second afternoon; spent the rest of the day lounging in the shade and scoping the traverse over toward Storm King. Then the "inconsequential trough" moved in and we were stuck in our bivy tent for the next 18 hours. By the time the rain stopped on Day 3 it was almost noon. Still, we decided to go for it, as Becky claims the NE Buttress should take 6.5-8 hours. I figured 3 hours to get around the mountain to the Buttress, and 7 hours of climbing would put us on top by dark. It's probably good that this plan was foiled, as these turned out to be quite optimistic estimates.

Do NOT use this anchor!

The good anchor/line is at the right edge of the col.
Follow the red crumbly scree up to the rocky notch on the right

Getting to the Goode-Storm King Col was straightforward despite the lingering fog. However the obvious rappel anchor was not acceptable. There are about a dozen slings wrapped around a large but rotten horn at the lowest point of the col, with a boot track leading to it. Not only is the horn suspect, but the rappel line is horribly dangerous: a long vertical-to-overhanging line with extremely loose, sharp rock. I wasted a bunch of time setting up a more solid anchor, got myself on rappel, and only then decided that the line was simply too dangerous for us. Way too much risk of the second kicking rock down on the leader. Way too much spontaneous rockfall in the landing zone. This was a good decision. Searching up and right (closer to Goode) we found a disused piton and nut anchor in solid rock that provided an easy, safe 10 m rap to the snow. The webbing had been almost completely chewed away by snaffles, and what was left was faded and brittle. Years since it was last used, but so much better in every way!  I seriously considered cutting all the webbing off the horn anchor, but didn't in case it is necessary when there is less snow. It's still there for now. Use at your peril.

By the time we'd discovered this superior descent, backed it up, and re-rigged it, it was far to late in the day to consider continuing up Goode. Moreover the weather had not cleared as predicted. We headed back to our camp hoping for a better opportunity in the morning. The mountain remained shrouded in fog until after sunset.

Looking straight up the NEB of Goode.

This was decision time. We could either go up Goode the following day and scrap the traverse to

Forbidden, or press on along the traverse. We no longer had time to do both. Given the possibility that the Wyeth Glacier high route might not go –we could be turned around without climbing anything– we opted for the former.

Even with a pre-set rappel anchor at the col, it still took us 4.5 hours to get around the mountain. The glacier descent from the col is not completely straightforward; I wouldn't want to do it in the dark. Accessing the buttress also proved to be rather time consuming, eating another hour. We climbed the glacier around to the left side of the buttress as Beckey recommends, one or two hundred feet above the buttress toe. A quick (slightly terrifying) scamper through a zone of tottering ice blocks led to a short 5th class pitch of solid gneiss on a diagonal line up to the buttress crest, starting about 20' above the obvious red crumbly ledge that I believe is the standard access point. If I ever do this route again I'll probably try accessing the buttress from climbers right. That looked like a much better ice-rock transition, but it isn't quite clear how difficult the first pitch of climbing on the buttress will be if you access it this way.

Amazing climbing on the lower NEB of Goode Mountain

We started up the buttress around 12:30, and made it to the summit at 22:00, just at the very tail end of nautical twilight. The climb was both better and longer than I had remembered. Pitch after glorious pitch of solid 4th and low 5th class climbing. If you find yourself off to one side or the other for more than half a pitch or so, you're doing it wrong, and probably missing some great climbing. There are two points where the crest you are on fades into the face, and you have to move right to gain the new crest. Do so as soon as possible in each case! At the first of these junctures I passed up a ledge system leading to the crest in favor of climbing straight up the face above. I suspect this was a mistake, as this pitch was the hardest of the climb; quite loose, with poor protection.

Grace pulls through the last of the harder 5th class pitches, high on the buttress.

The last few hundred feet up the buttress was a race against darkness. Even so, we stopped for a few minutes so Grace could stuff ice into her pack from a handy snowfield. Although it made climbing that much more awkward for her, we were glad of it in the end. On the summit we collapsed onto our pads and melted it for water, ate dinner, and passed out.

Buckner, Forbidden, Eldorado at dawn.

Goode summit bivy!

Dawn on the summit of Goode is amazing. The bivy site is the summit, so you just sit up and stare at 360 degrees of awesome. It feels like sleeping on a pedestal in the sky. Sleeping here is half the reason this is such an awesome climb.

For the whole trip I'd been a little worried about the descent, as we only had one 60 m rope. I had memories of a horrific intermediate anchor on the rappel into the Southwest Couloir: a 500 lb block on the sloping ledge "at 70 feet" that Beckey describes in CAG Vol 2. On my previous visit (2008) we bypassed it using two ropes, and I was planning to leave a gear anchor rather than use it. However, it turns out that said block is gone; it must have slid off the ledge sometime in the last 10 years! Instead, a solid horn is found at 31 m. It is slightly too far to reach with one 60 m rope, but a good 1-2" crack is available for an intermediate anchor, which we used to avoid soloing to the next rappel point.

Meadows above the burn, SW of Goode Mountain, Park Creek drainage

After that it was just backpacking. We descended to our high camp and had a long break, then pushed

on to Cottonwood Camp for the night. Six thousand feet feet of descent and ten miles of flat hiking. We sighted the bear box at dusk, ate our dinner in the dark, and passed out under the stars – until a mouse bit my finger, and another one scampered across Grace's mouth. Argh! I stumbled back to the bear box to get the bivy tent, only to find a pair of lambent eyes staring back at me from head height. Just a big velvety buck ambling along under the trees, but he gave me a nice shock.  Luckily the bivy tent deterred the rodents, and there was no further wildlife related excitement. We were back at the car by 14:00 the following day. Cascadian Farms. Burger Barn. Coffee. Coffee. Grandview.

Gear:

Rack: Nuts and tricams, single BD C4 from 0.4-2, BD X4s 0.1-0.3; 12 alpine draws and 4 long slings.

Rope: Single half rope (60 m), doubled over for the rick climbing.

Ice: Crampons, one ice screw, and one picket each.

Footwear: mountain boots – I never wished for rock shoes, but this is a personal preference. I know many folks who've used rock shoes on this climb, and been glad to have them.

Shelter: we used an XPED BIVYBAG DUO UL as our "tent" with two pickets lashed together as the pole. 300g of useful shelter. It works, but it's pretty miserable to be trapped inside of during a rain storm.

We used every piece of gear we brought, except the ice screw. You probably don't need the pickets unless you intend to descend via the Goode-Stormking col, or if you do AND are comfortable on exposed 45-50 degree snow without protection.

Vermin: There's a rat that lives on the summit. Protect your food/gear if you intend to bivy there! Both Flat Creek and Cottonwood Camp are crawling with mice.

Photos: