July 10-12 we hiked from Moraine
Lake over Wenkchemna and Opabin
Passes, up to Abbot
Pass and down the Death Trap to Lake
Louise. The Moraine Lake
to Lake O’Hara
was generally good travel with typical snow for the year. The glaciers are
still well covered and crossing Opabin
Pass easy. Crampons were
not needed.
The Abbot
Pass gully was pretty
quiet for rocks, although the party behind us reported a near miss from rock
fall. There were numerous avalanches to size 2.5 from Glacier
Peak and Lefroy. Tempting though it might be for strong parties
that get to the hut early, Lefroy is not a good choice for an afternoon ascent
under these conditions.
I do the trip up from Lake
O’Hara to Abbot
Pass about three times a
year, and find the big gully up to the hut to be most dangerous early in the
season. The path that goes across the whole gully low down is not a safe one
for July since it is highly exposed to rock fall from both sides and avalanches
from Lefroy. Your best bet is to hug the left wall under Victoria
until you reach a large gully that often spits large rocks. Cross the gully
quickly and up again to the protection of the Victoria.
>From there you can cross onto the snow ridge in the middle.
No freeze overnight made the early morning descent through
the Trap easy. The big crevasse is well covered and should be easy to cross for
a few weeks yet. The Icefall was pretty quiet. It would take a really big ice
fall to reach the descent route, and in my experience big ice falls are
preceded by a number of small and medium falls from the same spot and every few
minutes as the ice deforms in preparation for the big event. Making the effort
to monitor frequency and size of ice falls as you head into the Trap is a good
idea before committing yourself. The most exposed section took our slow party
20 minutes to cross. A fast team could be through in 10 minutes or less.
Albi Sole
ACMG, IFMGA
via
Peter Tucker
ACMG Executive Director
ed@xxxxxxx
403-949-3587
403-689-4324 (mobile)