Ingalls/E. Ridge

Date: 8/26/2006
Route: Ingalls E.Ridge
Difficulty:5.7
Climbers:Ken Hahn, Chris Kirsten, Claire Cramer,Sabrina Oesterele

On Saturday morning we left the Seattle Park and Ride at 4am to head up to Ingalls to do the East Ridge of Ingalls Peak. This was my Intermediate graduation climb. Ken somehow manages to be fairly awake at this crazy hour and starts to sing in the car. We get to the Esmerelda Basin at around 6:45 and start hiking by 7am.

We arrive at Ingalls lake to see the blue/green colors in the lake coming out. After a short break we gain the slabs and head up the shit talus and scree to gain the base of our climb. It's already started to get hot and the biting flies and other random bugs have started to come out. Ken and Sabrina take the first rope and start up the first pitch. Most of the rock is fairly loose on this section with some sandy areas. I lead on the second rope with Claire behind me.

The second pitch is an interesting combination of face climbing and an unprotected climbing of some slabs to gain the next belay.














The third pitch required a downclimb and crossing an exposed notch. The person leading this pitch can easily be "lowered", but the follower does not have that many options, so you either have to downclimb or sling the rock with a tied runner and use that. The last half of the pitch is pretty fun and is mostly face climbing with exposure leading up to a knife edge whale back type ridge.



The last pitch proved the most difficult where you are required to get yourself inside a cove. Claire wasn't entirely comfortable with the crux so I volunteered to lead it. There isn't alot of places to put protection except lower which didn't excite me, but up I went after I slammed a #6 nut in. A slightly overhanging roof impedes the way, and proved to be suck ass with my large pack on. I think it's time to invest in the small grivel day pack. After this move, I saw the summit boulders and traverssed across a couple of ledges, not bothering to put anything in because I was psyched. In retrospect, this probably wasn't the smartest idea but I lived. I brought up Claire and we all enjoyed the summit before preparing to head back down. 3 rappells got us down to the point where we could scramble the rest of the way to to talus.

























We also ran into a huge family of mountain goats on the slabs. We were able to literally walk right up next to them and they seemed to care less that we were there. We all mutually agreed that they probably saw us scrambling and thought we were crappy climbers compared to their abilities moving throughout the rock. We got to the cars just as it was starting to get dark and we all agreed that a stop at infamous Mexican Restaurant was in order. Margaritas were on the menu and nearly put us on our ass. A good trip. Credit goes to Sabrina and Ken for taking the great pics. Thanks guys.