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Climbed half way up Sea of Vapors with my buddy, Blitz, yesterday, Feb 1. Didn't see any gophers, hoping for a bunch more winter. There is a 'modern' trail blaze marking the short cut trail into the drainage -old timers use to blaze trails by whacking a scar into tree trunks with a wood axe ... this blaze was picked in with an ice pick!
Good trail leading to the route right now. The route is challenging. Postscriptum is thin at the crux with patches of rock showing through and a fragile spooky curtain for the right foot. I don't think that it will support many more ascents, treat it delicately. The bolts that make for the uncomfortable hanging belay at the top of Postscriptum are corroding, as are all of the fixed pins on the Whipper Traverse. We stepped down one meter from the aforementioned bolt belay and drytooled across 2 meters of rock to get to the Sea (I climbed to the top of the Postscriptum ice and placed an overhead screw, and clipped the first rusty piton before climbing back down to the belay, then one meter down to start the traverse). Thin and serious climbing for 10 meters. I placed a couple of 12 cm screws, one 16, two angle pitons, and clipped an old rusty knifeblade. Having a couple of stubbies and 4 x 12 cm screws is nice (I tend to place more gear than many, no one has ever been able to convince me that taking a 60 foot fall is better than taking a 20 foot one). 30 meters out from the Postscriptum belay the Sea becomes a proper green and blue ice climb, and it is getting more water up there and will get fatter yet.
Happy trails, Barry Blanchard UIAGM/IFMGA Mountain Guide 1 403 609 4615 cell 1 403 609 1321  
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