Forbidden Peak – East Ridge Direct
Daniel and I hiked up to Boston Basin in late October of 2005. It was a super crisp clear day, one of the clearest I’d seen. Unfortunately, it wasn’t meant to last. Even though there were good sunrise views of Johannesburg as we were getting ready to climb, clouds had moved in and had begun to rapidly descend over Forbidden Peak. We scrambled up snow-covered talus for over an hour hoping that the clouds would part, but it never happened. We descended and vowed to return the following year for a day-climb of the route.
We returned in early July, this time accompanied by Daniel’s brother Mark and Ari Lazier. We planned on doing it in a day so decided to at least bivy on the picnic tables at the Cascade Pass parking lot. I don’t recall exactly when we got up, but we hit the trail in nice daylight around 5:30 in the morning. I’ve learned to be thankful for nice trails and the trail up to Boston Basin certainly qualifies as “nice trail” and we made quick time up the 3rd class tunnel, past the various stream crossings, the avalanche debris, and so on. We were in the alpine slopes of Boston Basin in around two hours or so, maybe a little less. One of the niceties of the east ridge is that you don’t have to deal with anything like the couloir on the way to the route. At the base of the route, we roped up and I volunteered to take the first pitch. I figured that I’d lead the first few pitches and Daniel would finish off the last few. Well, I ended up leading the whole thing which was fine with me.
The climb is consistently 5th class, unlike the west ridge. In fact, this route is not just “a little harder” than the west ridge, it’s a good bit harder. Last year, I think we climbed the west ridge in 30 minutes or so, basically two simul pitches. The east ridge is more serious and sustained. None of the pitches are really “hard”, but they require care. Being riddled with gendarmes, the climb is subject to rope drag and I wore my shoulders out by hauling in two lines on each belay.
There’s a nice section of knife-edged ridge mid-way along the route. It was easily climbed by hand-traversing on the south side of the ridge. Both Ari and Mark, despite being super strong rock climbers, were relatively new to alpine climbing and were raving pitch after pitch. The east ridge was a perfect intro.
http://www.vimeo.com/6812120Somewhere after the knife edge pitch was the second crux of the climb – a vertical wall on the north side of another gendarme on the ridge that leads to a small notch. At the notch, I was back on the ridge proper and climbed the gendarme, then descended – more rope drag. The short wall crux wasn’t as technical as the true crux near the end of the climb, but it’s a good bit more exposed.
There’s the option to climb a gendarme right before the crux and then rappel down to the crux belay. We had some rain hit us on the middle of the ridge with more weather threatening and since the gendarme climb was only twenty feet or so, we bypassed it on the right to the base of the crux. I offered the lead to Daniel, but he was happy just to let me keep going. OK, no problem. The pitch is a Cascade classic – it’s technical and easy to protect. I pulled up on small crimpers to a huge horn that I was able to throw a sling around. I pulled up one more move and realized I was at the 5.8 move – an overhanging section of wall with small features. To the left was a perfect finger crack which took a small nut beautifully. The protection was perfect and I pulled through the short moves to a jug where I let my feet catch some air high above the northeast face. What a great feeling. I think Daniel said that was his favorite pitch out in the mountains. That saying somethin’.
All that remained now was a simul-pitch of 5.2 ridge. Some more weather moved in and the clouds dropped around Eldorado and Boston, but Forbidden remained clear, although, I was now leading in swirling mist that only added to the awesome alpine ambience. The summit was ours and we hung out and ate for a bit before heading down the east ledges. We made 6 rappels, if I recall and then headed across the ledges. We broke up into two rope teams. I headed out first and placed gear as we simul-climbed. Daniel unclipped the gear and left it for the second team who re-clipped and then cleaned. Happy to be back at the ridged, we put on our hiking boots and headed down the slopes to Boston Basin. We got back to the cars after dark, didn’t see anyone else all day.
