Osceolas

January 1, 2020

Breakfast at the hostel this morning was entertaining. I sat down with my coffee just before 06:00 and someone cooking smokey pancakes set the fire alarm off. Everyone had to evacuate. Knowing it was not an emergency, I went upstairs to get my down jacket and boots before I trundled out to the parking lot with my coffee. I got a little bit of pleasure seeing the New Year partiers which kept us awake until 03:00 last night standing out here too, bleary eyed and still half tanked. The fire department finally showed up, cleared the building, and then we could return to our breakfast, and the drunkards could return to their beds.

The drive up the Kanc went smoothly as today the road was clear. Arriving at the trailhead was crux number two of the day, as a meter high wall of snow blocked this unplowed lot. We drove a bit further to the ski trail pull out, and parking there was not good either for a 2wd car. We turned around a found a pull out about a kilometer back up towards the pass, and hoofed the road to the trailhead.

We were pleased to see a well trodden snowshoe track from here, with only one postholer making a mess of things from yesterday. Hiking up to the base of the mountain was a short walk, but slow, as Kat was not feeling it today. We started the climb and finally about half way up Kat declared that she would go her own pace and I should just go ahead to the top and come back to meet her where we would both go down together. We split up, but I soon came to some very steep icy scrambles, and after pulling up the first exposed pitch with my ice axe I decided to wait for her so we could climb together. The going was slow, but we climbed up this incredible steep trail all the way to the wide summit of East Osceola. I scampered ahead to try to find the high point, which I think is on the far side, but it really is hard to tell in this forested viewless plateau. Not really a problem though, as there would have been no view anyway, since top of the mountain was completely fogged in at this point and it had in fact began to snow on us.

Hiking up the Greely Ponds Trail.

Our objective appears out of the gloom.

Summit of East Osceola.

As we started toward the main Osceola summit we decided to split up again. Checking the map showed pretty gentle slopes down to the col and back up to the next peak, so I scampered ahead while Kat followed at her own pace, me intending to pick her up along the ridge on the way back. It was very windy up here, and the blowing snow made for some big mountain feel, even though the trail was fully in the trees. At the base of the climb to Osceola, I came to an interesting feature. The trail went straight up a steep, icy, and rocky traversing ledge. I contemplated putting on crampons, but figured I would be taking them off again in about ten meters, so decided to just climb this with the snowshoes on. Along with some axe work, this worked, but was a little sketchy. I am glad I did it this way though as from here on up it was just a gently snow walk. Just before I reached the top, I met the first summitters of the decade coming down and stopped for a brief chat. They assured me that this mountain top was a little more obvious then the last one, which upon arriving I found a wide open ledge with the footings of an old fire tower. Unfortunately there was zero visibility, and the blowing snow was now turning into blowing freezing rain. I snapped a quick photo and then turned back. At the top of a steep section, I decided to put my crampons on for the crux move, but unfortunately put them on too early and ended up post holing for a good while before I finally arrived at said scramble. Climbing down was a careful slow affair, but I made it safely to the bottom.

Crux manouver up Osceola.

The bleak summit of Osceola.

I met a fellow here who was gearing up for climbing this move and he said that he had met Kat heading back about 10 minutes ahead of me. I quickly changed into my snowshoes and followed, but after seeing her distinct snowshoe tracks, I stopped to eat a bit before finally catching up to her on the descent off of East Osceola. This took a while due to the steepness. Kat switched to crampons and I remained in my snowshoes. Crampons were probably the better choice as she was able to move faster than me this way. At one point two dogs appeared and got under foot in a really steep section which was annoying and caused some yelling from the German. The owners assured us that the dogs were under voice control... just not under control enough to almost get stepped on with pokey shoes. That bit over, we continued on downward meeting some more dogs, but these ones being physically restrained thankfully.

Finally off the steeps Kat changed back into snowshoes and we walked the last three kilometers back to the car at a good pace together. I ran up the road to fetch the vehicle and then we drove back to Conway after a seven hour day.

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