July 2004 

 

... Continued Leaving the summit of North Peak, I felt pretty good.  I was on familiar ground, having descended this slope a few years earlier, and I was beginning to think that I could handle the challenge of the north ridge of Conness.  I was encouraged by this route description from Alpinistas.org: [T]he whole climb . . . looks tricky, but proves to be pretty easy, even with a pack. You move left, find the ridge and then just go on up. The whole climb is on extremely solid rock with many, many fantastic holds and whopping big exposure. If you fell off, you would die a spectacular death, but you will not fall off. Any climber who is comfortable on 5.4 should have absolutely no trouble with any of the 4th class parts of the route, which is to say, pretty much all of it. This description was dead on.  The routefinding on the ridge is about as straightforward as it gets; the only marginally tricky spots are the first tower (which, counterintuitively, is bypassed on the left side via an easy ramp that hangs your ass out over the glacier) and finding the second rappel station below the second tower.  From there it is pretty much as the guidebooks describe -- follow the ridge to the top, staying closest to the edge for the spiciest climbing.
Note:  clicking on any photograph will present a full screen version.
	Our Route up the North Ridge.  Mark and Joel lead the way down the SW slopes of North Peak.  Our route up Conness is shown in yellow.
	NE Face.  Joel approaching the North/Conness saddle.  Notice the huge rock avalanche on the northeast face of Conness.  With all of the classic routes on the ridges, and crappy loose rock on this face, I can't imagine it gets climbed very often.
	North Ridge.  The pretty north ridge as seen from the North/Conness saddle.  In the shot below, Michael, Sam, Mark and Joel are mere specks at the beginning of the route.
	Below the First Tower.  Michael checks out the route up to the first of the two towers on the ridge.
	Ascending the First Tower.  Up until the first tower, the route is mainly a second and third class ridge that gets narrower and more exposed the farther you go.  Below the first tower, the fun fourth class climbing begins.
	The Cutoff.  Having climbed nearly to the top of the first tower, Michael and Joel take the cutoff across the east (glacier) side.  This is a pretty easy little ramp, but there's quite a drop if you biff it.
	Second Tower and Summit.  The view from the cutoff towards the second tower and the summit.  Sam can be seen in the lower right hand corner of the photo in the notch between the two towers.

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