Day 4 - Waller Minaret
Things got significantly tougher today. The northernmost of the Minarets, Waller's easiest route is class 5.2, though the route description is rather confusing in Secor's book. We started from Agnews Meadow, using the Shadow Lake Trail to Ediza Lake. Six of us made it to Ediza in under 2hrs, then another 1.5hrs to the crest at a pass just south of Ritter Pass and just north of Waller Minaret. Interestingly, this quite useable pass is not mentioned in Secor and offers a much easier route to Waller than the suggested Ritter Pass. There was more than a mile of snow on the northeast side of the crest starting about halfway up from Ediza. It was moderately suncupped and quite good for cramponing in the early morning. It was a collective effort to find a useable route to Waller's summit via the West Face/West Ridge routes that we tried to follow. The last hundred yards follows the crest over an impressive array of exposed blocks, mostly class 3 with a bit of class 4 and much exposure off two sides. The summit register was placed by the SRC in the 1990's and there were only a handful of entries since 1994. Interestingly, Doug Mantle had been up there twice. More interestingly, the register had actual signatures from Jules Eichorn and Ted Waller, the first ascentionists, that were collected from them before the register was placed.
Aside from those six, we had about seven other participants that went to Volcanic Ridge, Clyde Minaret, or just out for a stroll to Ritter Pass or around the loop (Shadow Lake Trail - Minaret Trail).
Michael G. maintains the yellow jersey lead by a slim 15minute margin. Tom G. holds the King of the Mountain (polka dot) jersey with 9 summits in 4 days. We have no participants under 25 signed up this year, so the White jersey is unclaimed. If any youngsters want to show up for a day next weekend, the jersey is theirs' for the taking.
Tomorrow we're heading to North Lake and Piute Pass for an ascent of Matthes Peak on the Glacier Divide. More snow and crampon/axe work is expected.
stat sheet