The Grand Traverse 

Notables:
FA: Steck, Long, and Evans, ~21hrs, 1963.
Speed record: Rolando Garibotti, 6:49, 2001.
First winter traverse: Mark Newcomb and Stephen Koch, ~3 days, 2004

A write up from my near Traverse.

For those that might have interest in doing it I uploaded an "attempt" of a route topo here:
www.pataclimb.com/climbingareas/tetons.html
the photos with the lines can be helpful to get an idea of what you "are up against".
cheers
rolo

Thanks for the topo.

-Sick

Thanks so much for the excellent photos and route description Rolando! Did the Cathedral traverse for the first time using just your photos cause the words were accidentally left behind. Seems we did a different descent from Owen (stayed on the east side of ridge longer) and must have missed the climb out of the gunsight notch (rapped to far) and scrambled to the south before heading up to the grandstand. This variation did allow us to get some water but sounds like we missed some nice rock pitches. Oh well, a reason to go back!

don't underestimate this traverse because of some of the speed records (6hrs, 8hrs, even 16 hours) posted, and don't underestimate the difficulty or overestimate your ability. Unless you peg it exactly (ha!), expect some of the 4th class soloing to become mid 5th with extreme consequence, some of the mid 5th to become difficult 5th, and some of the 5.8 to feel much much harder than the 5.8 you may be used to. Imagining being tired while planning is one thing, being totally wiped with miles to go is another, so some experience being exhausted at altitude is helpful. since it loves to rain in the tetons, I'd suggest going as far a you physically can on day 1 - there are bivy spots and water everywhere.

One 8mm 70m rope is perfect for rappelling off peak 11,??? into the gunsight, and off the grand. 3-4 tricams, 4-5 nuts, 4-5 cams (yellow metolius tcu-gold camalot) + 8-10 shoulder slings is a good rack for the north ridge. almost everything else can be soloed (maybe a pitch on the middle, and the cone)or rappelled. The second pitch of the NR from the grandstand can be soloed easily to the traverse into the italian cracks, and if you traverse to the O/S chimney from the 2nd ledge, you can put the rope away.

if you rap off spalding's summit (to avoid a high consequence downclimb) double check the rap - I pulled a key nut keeping the slings on. I put it back, but not well.

We did the Cathedral Traverse on July 20-22, 2012, which would normally be considered early season, but it was a low snow year, so maybe this counts as mid-season.
- We needed crampons and an axe to get down to & across the Koven col, and in a couple other places. Lightweight aluminum crampons were ideal for this.
- There's a good bivvy spot just below the summit of Owen, on the E side of the S ridge.
- The Ortenberger/Jackson book describes a descent of Owen's W Ledges that's different from Rolando's description and supposedly avoids the need for rappels, but we never found it.
- From Gunsight Notch we traversed left about a rope length along a sloping ledge down and around to the E face of the Grandstand, then did a meandering climb with a few mild 5th class sections before we got to easier ground higher up on the Grandstand. This was easier but probably took longer than the route that Rolando describes.
- A couple of us used approach shoes the whole way, but 5.7/5.8 with approach shoes and big packs wasn't much fun and slowed us down a lot on the N Ridge of the Grand. The people with rock shoes moved much more quickly on the steep pitches.
- It took us much longer than expected to get from Owen to the top of the N Ridge of the Grand. We didn't get to the summit of the Grand that day and bivvied where the 2nd Ledge crosses the W face of the Grand (just before the Great W Chimney).
- Neither of our bivvy spots had running water, but they were both close to patches of snow or ice. An MSR Reactor stove came in handy for melting snow.

@Rolo: Thanks for those topos.
@Martin: I greatly appreciate the beta & conditions update.

-Michelle