We climbed Mt Victoria from Abbotts Pass August 14th. The route was in great shape with only the Sickle and the next ridge bump after it requiring crampons and an ice axe. I was amazed at how much ice had melted off the route since I was there 2 weeks ago.
We chose not to descend Victoria toward the Huber ledges after looking at a photo of the ice slope and bergshrund crossing getting to the Huber glacier. There has been a large amount of rock fall in line with where the bergshrund was easy to cross a couple of weeks ago and it looks like the bergshrund snow bridge is gone now. The overnight temps were also very warm and there was a significant amount of rockfall coming out of areas like this.
Of note the NW face of Lefroy has a lot of loose rock on the remaining steep ice and there was non-stop rockfall with rocks hitting the slopes which bounced well below the elevation of the last part of the Fuhrmann Ledges traverse into Abbots Pass. This is a significant hazard to this route as the temps never cooled enough to slow the stream of rockfall even overnight.
Silvia Forest was also in the area with a group and she reported good conditions on Mt Huber coming from the Huber ledges. The bergshrund crossing on Huber was easy to cross on an ice bridge and the upper face was 2-3 pitches of alpine ice. Mt Odaray was also in great shape with dry rock and the glacier was easy to navigate through the crevasses.
Kirsten Knechtel ACMG/IFMGA Mountain Guide www.kirstenknechtel.com
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