Haeckel's NW Arête

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Donno

 
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Haeckel's NW Arête

by Donno » Sun Apr 12, 2015 11:35 pm

Anyone out there climbed the NW Arête on Haeckel?

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seano

 
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Re: Haeckel's NW Arête

by seano » Mon Apr 13, 2015 2:53 am

A couple of us did it a few years ago on the Sierra Challenge. The crux was getting to the arete from Haeckel Col, passing a little gendarme. IIRC you can bypass it by climbing a snowfield left of the col. The rest was pretty straightforward. See also: haeckel-northwest-arete-t59566.html

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Re: Haeckel's NW Arête

by fogey » Fri Apr 17, 2015 6:32 am

It is a classic fourth class route, with solid rock all the way and views that only get better as you go up. If you successfully follow Secor's directions you can avoid some climbing along the ridge that is a little harder in spots (maybe low class 5 by 21st century standards in one or two places, like the gendarme seano mentions), but at the price of dealing with more scree; traversing the ridge from Haeckel Col is a pleasure in itself, and doing it increases the return on the investment made in the long approach.

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asmrz

 
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Re: Haeckel's NW Arête

by asmrz » Fri Apr 17, 2015 3:59 pm

Did it in 2003, I think. We found the approach to the route very dicey, especially with aluminum crampons and ice axes. The snow field was rock hard and we almost didn't make it to the base. The trip was in mid July. We did the arete head on and found several 5th class spots and mostly clean climbing on decent rock. A few moves here and there that required attention, but nothing sustained. Good route. Avoid RJ Secor's description of the route. Whoever gave it to him most likely never climbed the real NW Arete.....

P.S. I should ad that Pen and I climbed something on that side of Haeckel that looked interesting and was an arete. Was it Riegelhuth Arete? I was never quite sure.
Last edited by asmrz on Fri Apr 17, 2015 5:48 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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ExploreABitMore

 
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Re: Haeckel's NW Arête

by ExploreABitMore » Fri Apr 17, 2015 4:43 pm

asmrz wrote:Whoever gave it to him most likely never climbed the real NW Arete.....


Alois, just curious what you're considering the real NW Arete? Seems like there has been a lot of confusion on this over the years.

My take on RJ Secor's description is that he is talking about the "ridge" on the right side of Haeckel ... which eventually goes just right of the snow patch up high on Haeckel, before swinging back left to the summit, seen on this photo from Bob Burd's site:

Image

His description seems pretty good for that one, doesn't it? But, if you're talking about the more serious looking arête to the left of the chute running between the two, I don't think RJ is referring to that one. Sure looks harder than Class 4 too.

I hope to climb that ridge on the right this summer. Even if it's not the NW Arête, it sure looks fun ;-)

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asmrz

 
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Re: Haeckel's NW Arête

by asmrz » Fri Apr 17, 2015 5:27 pm

You might be right. The right side of Haeckel is what RJ describes, but it might not be the Riegelhuth Arete.

Pen and I climbed the arete from the leftmost snow couloir in your photo. That arete is a bit hidden but goes straight to the summit of the peak. . We did not go up the steep, solid buttress in the middle. That looks a bit harder.

This is yet another historic route in the Sierra, put up by an awesome climber for his era and subsequently bypassed, used easier means, climbing via dirt gullies etc. to make it more doable. Riegelhuth was the real deal, so I cannot believe he would have gone via any gullies...Just like Mendenhall on East Butt of Muir or Eichorn and Underhill on Banner. 4th class meant something else to those guys...

I don't have the copy of the Sierra Bulletin right by me, but (if I remember correctly) it describes the route as the left arete from the top of the snow field. When you look at the picture, there is really not a striking arete from the right hand snow couloir, only from the left one. So, where is the real deal? A good question...

Some more knowledgeable people could chime in, that might be a good conversation.

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ExploreABitMore

 
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Re: Haeckel's NW Arête

by ExploreABitMore » Fri Apr 17, 2015 6:02 pm

Thanks for the feedback, Alois. Yeah, the arête on the right looks more like a blunted ridge than an arête. I don't have it near me to double-check right now, but it occurred to me I think the description in the 100 Sierra Classics book jives up more with what you're saying and not so much with Secor. Although, I seem to remember it being confusing, in general. Also, it seems like folks feel the "arête" on the right isn't too bad for a 4th class route, which as you pointed out, doesn't really jive up with some earlier accounts.

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Re: Haeckel's NW Arête

by fogey » Fri Apr 17, 2015 7:51 pm

I'm not sure how useful any of this is, but here goes:

This is the 1954 (Voge) Climber's Guide description of Riegelhuth's first ascent: "Route 3. North face. Class 3. The first ascent was made on July 20, 1933 by Jack Riegelhuth, who climbed up the northwest chimney and then the north face to the top." This is pretty clearly not what Secor calls the Northwest Arete. The 1954 book makes no reference to a route on the northwest arete.

The northwest arete does appear in the 1976 (Roper) Climber's Guide, which describes the starting point as being "the col northwest of the peak" and the route as Class 4, "thrilling and enjoyable". Roper still has "Route 3. North face", by then Class 4, but the description bears no resemblance to Riegelhuth's route: "From the small lake north of the peak ascend snow and slabs; then traverse to the right through a notch in a sharp rib. Finish via Route 2 [the NW arete]." From Roper's description of the NW arete starting point, his NW arete seems to be more or less the same as Secor's.

The picture in Moynier/Fiddler's book looks more like, and the description sounds more like, Roper's North face than either Voge's North face or Secor's NW arete.

My guess is that Voge's is the most authoritative description of what Riegelhuth actually did. I'm pretty confident that what Roper and Secor describe is what I climbed and what most people are looking for today when they head for the NW arete.

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Re: Haeckel's NW Arête

by Donno » Sun Apr 19, 2015 1:52 am

Thanks for all the info. I'm convinced the NW Arête is right of the shallow chute as described by granite4brains above.

I suggest the route left of the chute be called the North Ridge.

I believe Moynier's '93 Sierra Classics guidebook is in error describing this route. It is obviously not the "rightmost of the two jagged aretes leading straight to the twin summit spires" (that form the Chouinard-Sunwoo ice gully).

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Re: Haeckel's NW Arête

by Romain » Tue Apr 21, 2015 12:37 am

Here are photos from a NW arete climb last June:
https://plus.google.com/photos/10948290 ... 0547291601
We climbed the ridge to the right of the gully, which as I understand it is what most call the NW Arete. It is class 4 and we simulclimbed it. The other ridge to the left is considerably steeper as some of the photos show.

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Donno

 
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Re: Haeckel's NW Arête

by Donno » Tue Apr 21, 2015 2:21 am

Thanks Romain; it would be great to have some of your shots on the route page.

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Re: Haeckel's NW Arête

by Romain » Wed Apr 22, 2015 9:25 pm

Done. I posted 4 photos. Hope you like 'em.

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Vitaliy M.

 
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Re: Haeckel's NW Arête

by Vitaliy M. » Tue May 05, 2015 3:49 am

I climbed it as a part of the Evolution Traverse which I soloed in a day. Basically follow the ridge that goes from the nameless peak which connects Darwin and Haeckel. You can avoid bringing the crampons if you scramble up and north to the top of that peak. More summits! Or by joining the ridge sometime after.

When I was climbing the arete I chose some steeper variation that seemed to go up solid looking orange rock. Somehow two holds broke on me on that section. I was glad to be on top of my game and using 3 points of contact at all times. It was sort of unexpected on such a quality arete. So be careful! It is a really cool scramble overall. Tagging other summits on that ridge is possible and wouldn't take too much longer. Have fun!

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Re: Haeckel's NW Arête

by fossana » Tue May 12, 2015 1:49 am

I have a photo here showing some options for Haeckel.


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