Trip Report
Basic Alpine Climb - Mount Fernow/Southwest Slope
Successful overnight trip. Camped in upper bivvy basin.
Ian Lauder
- Sat, Aug 19, 2017 — Sun, Aug 20, 2017
- Basic Alpine Climb - Mount Fernow/Southwest Slope
- Mount Fernow/Southwest Slope
- Climbing
- Successful
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- Road rough but passable
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Snow patches in places, but can be avoided by traveling on rock. Need crampons to descend into the basin on the approach.
8/20/17 - Overnight trip.
Started 8:30am at trailhead, 3 hrs to Leroy Basin, 3 hours to upper bivvy basin (~7000ft), 6am start next morning, 6 hours to climb camp to camp, 3 hours back to Leroy Basin, 2 hours to cars. 17hrs round trip.
Steep snow with some transitions across steep loose dirt on the descent into the basin. Went down the middle. Another party had tried going down climbers left side and the moat area and spent a couple hours trying to find ways down by the time we showed up.
Climb is pretty straight forward, go up right side of the waterfall for awhile, then cross over to left side, continue up into upper basin contour right to the big snow field. Head up the boulder field after that and turn left till you see the chockstone gulley, go under the chockstone and follow cairned path. Stop short of the final col and scramble up rocks to the summit.