Lone Pine Peak via Northeast Ridge [failed attempt]

[JosiahSpurr]

I'm itching to climb the South Face of Lone Pine Peak. Rediscovered this TR today upon doing an internet search with "highsierratopix" "south face" "lone pine"..... I pasted your posts into my emacs editor to "parse" them.

Eric1234 (op) listed his locations as San Diego, Santa Cruz, Bishop. My locations would be Topanga, Lone Pine, Ojai and Mt. Baldy. California is truly fantastic. I'm 58 years old and got here when I was 32. My small office space in Lone Pine is home, home, home given my limited income. Even with greater means, it would stay home for me because the Eastern Sierra just pulls me in every time. I climbed Mt. Langley, my first fourteener, two years ago in 2022, in a way that's kinda similar to this TR from Lone Pine Peaks NE Ridge. My route was inspired during a failed-attempt descent from Langley. While I was descending the long, low east ridge and making the left into the drainage with the old trail that I call "South Fork of South Fork of Tuttle Creek" I gazed at the dense pine forest that covers the north side of Diaz Creek. The forest wraps around a short hill visible from the old trail and I thought, "what's that? could I go that way?." Several years later, I went that way, and bagged my first fourteener (in 2022).

I honestly believe that it was four days of pure "fun" for Mark and Eric1234. You two had enough experience to try for the summit in winter. I worked on my route to Langley through the Diaz Creek pine forest for about five (5) years. All by myself. It was a long, long experience that chipped away at my inner resistances and defense mechanisms. The amazing part was that the 3 and 1/2 day round-trip to the top of Mt. Langley felt much easier than many of the shorter one-day trips between 6,000 and 10,000 feet in previous years. Even the 13-hour descent from 14,025 feet back to my car (at midnight) at 6,600 feet seemed easy because I was able to switch into "auto-pilot" mode. I knew the area of my descent route from many previous visits, and my legs and knees are very strong because I honestly don't like trails and I honestly love the Eastern Sierra. Now I'm itching to work on a modification of my route (seen on SummitPost) called "High Above the Fray" that will be as close to 100% ridge as possible. Mark and Eric2134's TR from Lone Pine Peak reminds me of what I want to do next.

pez_leon wrote: "I think someone should start the conversation." The TR on blog spot "peaksforfreaks" does lack reflection, and it's exactly trips like Mark's and Eric's that offer the most gold-mining of valuable lessons. Reflection is a "crucial component" in our mountain-based communities. I re-read the TR and Eric didn't mention thoughts of contacting SAR (one's local search & rescue team) or even having the equipment to do so. (This suggests that they weren't equipped or even willing to call for SAR, note the use of the word "lucky" here: "...possibly risking death, and if we are lucky, getting plucked off the ridge by Inyo SAR once the storm clears.") I would never put in a call to SAR. Putting someone else's life at risk is just completely unethical in my book. Nobody else should "pay" for my lack of skill, or experience, or introspection, or equipment, or patience or lack of time to complete a climb. I don't climb beyond my limits, I simply raise my inner bar and climb under it, not over it. For me, this is a multi-year process. Looking at the face of Mark in the "Lone Pine Peak Hilton," I don't see someone who exceeded his limits. It doesn't seem fair to allude to the alleged death of one of Mark's partners without further information, and the allusion borders on a "personal attack."

Climbing solo is a completely different game compared to climbing with a partner. Plus, I'm single with no children, which also changes the game. Upon a thorough, cover-to-cover read of "Mountaineering: Freedom of the Hills" I was struck by the fact that the only section in the book which couldn't offer clear-cut advice to the reader was whether or not a team climbing over dangerous ice & snow conditions should rope everyone up together, versus everyone traversing the dangerous part unroped. Die (or get injured) alone, or die (or get injured) and drag other(s) to a similar fate? Maybe the "answer" is to start with the "weakest" climber and ask her or him whether (s)he wants to be roped up to at least one other climber? When a trip isn't done solo, there's an added layer of inter-dependency. The climbing group itself has strengths and weaknesses, which are more malleable (they call it "teamwork") than the strengths and weaknesses of each individual, which tend to be more fixed at any given moment. When the needs of the weaker climbers are met and the group becomes stronger, all individuals are raised up by the increased strength of the group.

We spend a lot of time examining gear and the difficulty of routes and rocks, but we don't spend enough time looking inward and "grading" the skills that evolve with experience and "grading" what others would suffer as a result of serious injury or death. Then there's a level of introspection that seems to be completely off "the map," which I (and some psychologists) would call grading one's inner "shadow." Some of us have a death-wish, and I speak from experience. Psychologists note that nobody who has lived a full life can avoid suicidal thoughts during one's entire lifetime. Children seem to have an innate ability to resort to extreme solutions given their limited skill sets. As an example of a mountaineer with a serious "shadow" problem (whether or not she was aware of this problem), there's Alison Hargreaves:

(From Wikipedia:) "Before reaching Camp 3, they found a bloodstained anorak, a climbing boot, and a harness. They recognized the equipment as belonging to Hargreaves. From Camp 3 they could also see a body in the distance. They did not approach the body, so it was not positively identified, but they had little doubt it was Hargreaves and concluded she had been blown off the mountain during the storm. After the incident, Captain Fawad Khan, the Pakistani army officer who was the team's intermediary with the rescue services, claimed that he had urged her not to climb beyond base camp because it would be "suicidal" in the deteriorating weather conditions.[15][16]"

Was it one of those deaths attributed to external circumstances (rather than to suicide)? I would have taken the Captain's advice as if his experiences in his home country were my very own. Furthermore, she was funded by companies that sell stuff, I believe, and I also remember reading that she had financial stresses that were also felt by other members of her family.

It's best to climb the Mountain of Honesty before taking big risks in the mountains. Being honest with one's self, reflection, and introspection can vastly improve the mountaineering experience. I think I enjoy such experiences because they utilize my critical skills in a practical way (I devoured books in high school, classical literature, psychology, philosophy, poetry, etc.).

I think Wandering Daisy is right about: "The mistake seems to be not taking into account the possibility of getting lost on the descent." She referred to "what some cutting edge climbers are doing nowadays." And she wrote: "Everyone likes to write up their epic as heroic." And also: "That 'tone' is actually pretty common in today's popular climbing magazines." It's really false heroism to appear heroic in other people's eyes using appearances (and over-coming those apparitions) that are obvious from external circumstances. True heroism lies within, and with mountaineering such heroism happens before I begin to climb to reach a summit or objective. There are many layers of inter-dependency. When the storm hit and getting lost on the descent became a possibility, I would have chosen the seemingly less heroic alternative according to Norman Clyde's "aphorism" which goes: "It's amazing what one can do with enough food and enough sleep." Just sleep through the storm for as many days as the storm lasts. Doesn't sound heroic? (Well, Clyde carried books written in Greek into the mountains, along with his anvil, and the Greeks knew a thing or two about heroism). There was a gear inter-dependency because, in the crack which was a "Hilton" the hurricane winds seemed to be 80 MPH. I'm starting to become convinced that a solid-wall shelter is almost a gear necessity because it's the only way to get good, uninterrupted sleep (especially in freezing cold and windy conditions).

For fifteen (15) hours in the Lone Pine Hilton, "[t]here was no possible way for both of us to lie flat on our backs, and we tossed and turned all night in increasingly uncomfortable positions." Increasingly(!!!). An alternative would have been a straight twelve (12) hours of undisturbed sleep (maybe 10 at least) in a solid-wall "tiny house" (?), followed by continuing up the mountain, instead of down it. During the descent, lack of sleep was just as much a risk factor as the winter storm conditions. (Perhaps lack of sleep was a factor in getting lost?)

Wandering Daisy wrote: "At some point on a long climb, it is actually better to keep going because getting to the top is shorter and easier than descending." That would certainly be true if after, reaching the summit, the descent consists of rappelling down the South Face into Tuttle Creek. First of all, the Eastern Sierra is the third steepest escarpment in the lower 48 states (after Tetons and San Grabriels in So. California). Walking down it is hard on the knees. (Side note: After years of doing that, my legs and knees are in the top 1% in terms of muscle strength and hand/foot/eye coordination, so if 100 climbers started from the top of Mt. Langley and headed for the parking loop at 6,600' next to Tuttle Creek, after thirteen (13) hours there would be one hiker in front of me and 99 behind me, however, including prior familiarity with the area, the ratio might be closer to 1:999). Rappelling the South Face might take less energy and be less risky that reversing the route using one's knees and risking a sleep-deprived miss-step or loose rock and tumbling forward on a steep slope. (From the TR: "Our planned descent route would be a slog down the class 2 chute of the standard Northwest Slope." ok, but, why?). And, secondly, I would want to have the option of descending the South Face because I've done that before (I hope). Thus we've come full circle with a plan that has a better chance of reaching the summit, in a heroic way (minus the "heroic" story of bailing and risking one's life... "staying directly on the ridge became increasingly difficult"... "accidentally dropped one of my rock shoes"... "forced us onto the ridge crest, where 60-70mph winds screamed from all directions"... "hurricane force winds blasted us from every possible direction"... "shivering even under all our layers"... "sounded like we were jammed into the underside of a large freight train"... "dozing off back and forth"... "had probably fallen asleep but never fully seemed to loose consciousness"... "15 hours since we had crawled for our lives to this spot"... "temperatures in the negatives"... "both of us were totally out of it"... "tired out of our minds"... "the glory of salvation or be damned to spend another day out in this harshly exposed environment, possibly risking death"... "I was so incredibly tired"...).

"I remember waking up from one of my little naps (around midnight?) and realized that the wind had almost completely stopped. Now and then a slight breeze would come through the opening of the crack. I shifted my body around in order to gain a view of the narrow sliver of sky and mountains visible to the north, and saw a sky full of glittering stars and the numerous ridges and gullies of the massive mountain sparkling under the starlight. It was an amazing sight."

An amazing sight. The flat-landers are so impressed by an epic trip. Even harder is explaining to them those amazing moments that last a minute, at most.

There a so many ways to "grade" a "route" in the mountains.

What is the difficulty of the terrain? Class 1, 2, 3, 4, 5...

How many times have I climbed all or part of this mountain and the surrounding drainages and mountains?

Am I taking the gear that the experts recommend or have I thought outside the box? (I just bought 1,000 feet of 1/8 inch Kevlar "rope" with 5% stretch and 825 pound break strength and am amazed that it doesn't get all tangled up no matter how many times I flake it from one pile into another.)

How strong are my muscles?

How good is my body - mind coordination and have I experienced an inner crux where harder and harder routes seem to get easier?

How much time do I have to complete my objective and if I don't make it back alive, what will be the costs to society, friends and loved ones? Am I working for "the man?"

How afraid am I? How many "things" am I afraid of? What are they?

How much of my "analysis" (as in Sigmund Freud, not Carl Jung, who had an interesting parting-of-the-ways) have I completed as dictated by my earlier experiences and those of my ancestors?

Why am I going to go up there? (I do third-party deliveries and have over-heard a number of men talking to someone else where the young man says that he really likes being isolated away from other people).

The most important one, because it's the only way of expressing on'es individuality: What Am I Living For?

The Bee Gees said it this way:

I can think of younger days when living for my life
Was everything a man could want to do
I could never see tomorrow,
But I was never told about the sorrow

How can you mend a broken heart?
How can you stop the rain from falling down?
How can you stop the sun from shining?
What makes the world go round?
How can you mend this broken man?
How can a loser ever win?
Please help me mend my broken heart and let me live again

I can still feel the breeze that rustles through the trees
And misty memories of days gone by
We could never see tomorrow,
No one said a word about the sorrow

And how can you mend a broken heart?
How can you stop the rain from falling down?
How can you stop the sun from shining?
What makes the world go round?
And how can you mend this broken man?
How can a loser ever win?
Please help me mend my broken heart and let me live again.

( " Don't go talking too loud, you'll cause a landslide, Mr. Jones. " -- the Bee Gees, "New York Mining Disaster 1941").

( " My woman takes me higher, My woman keeps me warm... " -- the Bee Gees, "You Should be Dancing").

[Harlen]

When I first finished reading this amazing trip report, I thought that I would simply be commenting with gratitude to the OP for putting together such a finely crafted report. And truly, I must do so-- so thank you kindly Eric1234, for your efforts in the climbing, writing and photo documentation which combine to create this stellar report.

Then I got into the interesting discussion (some quite lengthy) about the relative value of such trips and the reports on them that follow. One thing that resonated with me was Wandering Daisy's point about the "create an epic" style of writing is an ongoing thing. Recall Tim Cahill's diatribe against the overblown, deathly struggles style of adventure writing. The titles of his books are in jest at such style: Jaguars Ripped My Flesh, Pecked to Death by Ducks, etc...

I see his point, and also detest falsified adventure writing, but this is not that. I found this report by Eric1234 to be an honest account of what happened out there, with photos to prove it! So then we get to the point about whether or not it is wise, or even honorable to stretch one's limits while climbing, possibly putting rescuer's lives in danger. Well Josiah's statement that he would never call for a rescue is one clear answer to that, which I for one admire. However, it has also been pointed out in these sort of discussions before that SAR folk know what they are signed up for, and many of them embrace the risk, without vilifying the rescued. I think much of this should fall under the old HYOH&DTT!(Hike your own hike & Damn the torpedos!). Thankfully, people still have a lot of freedom to choose how to live their lives. Consider the opposite-- in some scenarios it might become illegal to ever climb anything without ropes; sailing on the ocean without a partner could be against the law; the Sierra could be closed for travel in winter, and cross country skis, and snowshoes outlawed. Choose your favorite risky passion, and consider a law against it.

Back to this fine TR-- thanks again for sharing it with us, and congratulations on your successful climb.

p.s. I just realized that this post is about 9 years old!

[JosiahSpurr]

Then I got into the interesting discussion (some quite lengthy) [.....]

I shortened my long post, thank you. I took this photo at 7:30 this morning upon walking out of my office on E. Bush Street. The owl seemed mature and might have died from old age. After a coffee walk, I sat with Clifford, Frankie, Dave and Pete at the two benches on highway 395 that serve as the morning "watering hole." An eighteen wheeler is driving N on 395, and above it is pictured Lone Pine Peak.

[FrankPS]

What a gruesome photo.