Mark Kerns bumbling around on the Jackson/Johnson ...
Description
Not as good as the neighboring Culp-Bossier, but still a worthwhile route on a sublime alpine wall. More of a mountaineering route than Culp-Bossier, it wanders around finding the path of least resistance until running smack into a superb, exposed 5.9 pitch at the top. The middle section of this route is often simul-climbed and overall, I'd say its the easier of the two routes. To approach, park at the Bear Lake trailhead and hike for a mile and a half on well-marked trails to Emerald Lake. Hallett's Northeast face looms overhead, and if you're lucky, you'll be just in time for alpenglow. Scramble up above the left side of the lake to the base of the face, aiming for the second of three distinct buttresses. A vague prow divides the upper part of the second buttress in half; the route starts directly below this prow, about fifty feet to the right of a huge broken corner system.
P1-Climb up light-colored 5.6 rock and enter a prominent right-facing, left leaning dihedral. after 30 ft. or so, traverse right, climb a short crack, and belay on a ledge (5.6, 140 ft.).
P2-climb up past rappel slings, follow a crack over a roof, and head right across a slab to a belay (5.6, 120 ft.).
P3-traverse right around the corner on easy rock, go up an easy groove, and stretch out the rope into a recessed area (low fifth class).
P4-continue up and right on broken terrain to the base of a giant flake/pillar (with a yellowish tint when viewed from the ground).
P5-climb the corner formed by the pillar's left side in one long 200 foot pitch or two short pitches (5.6).
P6-from the ledge atop the pillar, cut back sharply left up a corner system, passing a confusing section of down-climbing in mid-pitch (5.6, 160 ft.). Belay on another good ledge. (Many do 2 pitches here to avoid rope drag).
P7-climb the beautiful corner above the ledge past old pitons and worthless bolts--your own pro will give you more confidence--and belay on a ledge at its top (5.9, 130 ft.).
P8-A short, meandering 50 ft. finds the top of the wall. Descent: the easiest way involves hiking up talus until a gully appears leading down to the northwest. Follow it down to the base of the cliff (bearing left about 2/3 of the way to avoid getting cliffed). This gully is EXTREMELY LOOSE and being in it with other parties should be contemplated with considerable trepidation.
Also, it can hurt to mention that this route starts in the same spot as the Culp-Bossier. Unfortunately, this makes for considerable crowding on that first pitch.
Route finding in the mid section can be a problem on this one. The crux pitch is great but the bolts look like they e about to fall off under their own weight. What the guidebook doesn mention is that there are two tallus gullies close to one another. We took the wrong one which looked easier and ended up rapping. We saw many rap slings so people must get confused often. Take the first gully, even though it appears steeper!
A better descent in my opinion is the East Ridge of the First Buttress as described in Rossiter. Walk left (east) from the summit along the ridge. Soon you reach a point where your are forced back right a little, go out to this point and look below you for a rap anchor. Do one 75 rap, then scramble down a gully, eventually winding back north to the base of the face. From here you are about 5 minutes below the start of the route. Ive not done the standard descent but have heard lots of complaints about it.
It's true that the bolts on the crux are utterly worthless, but I found excellent placements all over this pitch (a #4 Friend/#3 Camalot helps a lot), contrary to what I had been told...Ive never taken, or seen, the wrong (second) gully that Kris mentions, but you definitely want to take the very first thing that resembles a 3rd class gully. It is steep, but not really dangerous unless you go the wrong way or if someone is above you.
I climbed this route today but I got off route on the last two pitches. From the right edge of the ledge at the top of the yellow flake, I climbed a right-facing corner 5.6 to a ledge. From the ledge, I looked for some sign of the route (preferable the old bolts) but I didn't remember much and I had forgotten the guidebook. There was a small ledge to my left and below, which I now realize I should have followed. Anyway, there was a crack that led out over the exposed wall on the right at an angle of 45 about degrees. I took this crack. It was the best pitch of the day. As soon as you leave the ledge, you have 700 feet of air beneath your feet! There is some fixed gear but it was highly questionable. I pulled out two pitons with my fingers. The crack turned upward after about 50 feet and a shallow right-facing corner took me to a wonderfully exposed pedestal of flat rock where I belayed. Think _pizza pan_ belay. The final pitch climbed over a series of small overhangs and then followed easier corners to the top of the wall. I would love to know what this is if anyone knows? Or what it's rated? I thought there were a couple spots of 5.9. We used 60-meter ropes. If you look at the topo on page 230 of Rossiter's High Peaks guide, I believe it is the crack that goes up and right (unrated on the topo) from the ledge _ pitch above the top of the yellow flake.
The 5.9 rating on this climb is misleading. As one route description that Walt Fricke did get right in his old guide he says, "Most of the climbing is low fifth class with spots of medium fifth. The 5.8 (apparently easier back then) move on lead 8 is sufficiently out of character with the rest of the climb that it is normally faked with a spot of aid." Considering the climb in that light it is a terrific alpine outing. I thought the hardest move was at the end of the first pitch up a steep crack before the belay. It's a long reach to good holds and if you're tall not a problem, but for me it was the only portion to give me pause. The 5.9 move near the top is just that, a move, grab one piece of pro and you're past it.
Did the variation that Brad B. talks about ([unnamed] crack in topo of Rossiter Guide-Headwall variation 5.8?). The first pitch, is very exposed up and right to a good belay ledge (old TCU and a few ancient fixed pins), the final pitch was loose, mossy and dirty, [definitely] not as memorable as Brad B.'s experience. Anyhow, that's my 2 cents on this variation. Cheers!
Climbed with Phil Wortmann this Saturday. We started on "in between" aka Right Dihedral. After three pitches, we decided to traverse right and finish on Jackson Johnson. We climbed the last 4 pitches of that route. The only things to say are; route finding is a bit more tricky than most big walls in the area, the top 5.9 move feels much harder after a long day of climbing (the bolt is way too old and spooky to trust but there's a nice place for a #1 cam several feet above it). Also, we did not really look at the descent beta as closely as we should have, and ended up dropping down into Chaos Canyon. Though this was a bit tiring on us, it wasn't the end of the world, and a little bit of perseverance got us out safely and back to the car well before dark. Finally, the route was completely dry this time of year, even with the heavy winter snowfall this year. After having done it now once, we will definitely have an easier time route finding next time out!
Re crux: not sure if I climbed this properly... I went up the left corner, well left of the rusted 1/4" bolt with the spinning "gunsight" hanger. All I can say is getting back out of that corner and above it was a hell of a lot harder than 5.9, that is, without "grab(ing) one piece of pro". I would also add: DON'T get stuck up in that corner. It was most unpleasant.
I had a great time on this route and thought it was really good. The crux pitch is wild, but not that difficult, with good gear. Fun stemming looking down between your legs 800' to the ground. Route finding was easy with info from here and from the Gillett guide--keep angling right until you have to angle back left. One hint that was useful was the "step down" in the original post. At the point where you can make a short step down and keep moving left, there is a corner directly above. The step down hint convinced me to move left to the next corner which leads to the crux corner.
Hallett Peak
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