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Intermediate Alpine Climb - The Chopping Block/Northeast Ridge

Two day climb of Chopping Block via Upper Goodell creek trail and Terror creek climbers trail approach.

Rodica Manole Rodica Manole
August 15, 2025
  • Road suitable for all vehicles

  • The Goodell creek trail was straight forward to the split with Terror Basin train with some fallen logs easy to negotiate and light bushwhacking. 

    The Goodell creek is non existent,  it's just a dry bed but the creek before Terror Basin trail turn out (about 3.5 miles in , 5 min before the trail split) has plenty of water and l don't think it will dry out later in the season.

    Once we passed the turn out the climbers trail is still relatively easy to follow with some exceptions in some bushwalky areas where you have to think twice about where you are heading without getting in trouble. We made it to the Terror Creek crossing around 9:15 and we ended up fording it in a mellow area upstream from where is the  sign for climbers trail going uphill. We loaded up on water ( at least 2 l each) from Terror Creek because we were not expecting to find any until up high above 5500 ft (and we were right, we finally found first signs of water on the slabs around 5700 ft from where we loaded 8 l each). While carrying the water weight on our way up to the 6350 ft camp , we discovered additional water sources up to 6100 ft...they were actually plenty...oh, well...at this point we were committed with that weight and just push to get to the camp. 

    Would those water sources make it through the end of the season? It's hard to say because the slabs were completely dry  and there was not much snow up high on the Barrier. Also, the Crescent Creek Basin is melted as well excep the snow fields below Terror and Degenhardt.

    No snow on the actual climbing route either  but the second pitch which takes you through some mossy ledges was wet and kept the rope leads on their toes a bit (the climbing was very easy though).

    We lost the climbers trail between Terror Creek and Terror Basin turn out the second day on our way out ( we ended up on an older fainted path we did remember from our years back approach for Terror) which crossed some beautiful Hobbit like huge boulders covered in moss with hidden wholes getting ready to swallow us). We made it work and eventually connected with the booth path we followed on our day in which turned out to be a bypass of the boulders area climbers probably established in the last few years.

This was a two day climb with a party of 6 in Southern Pickets via Upper Goodell trail approach and Terror creek climbers trail which eventually took us up the ridge from where we scrambled it to Stump Hollow and All way the ridge connecting the Chopping Block and the Barrier in the  Crescent Creek Basin .

Camped on the ridge at around 6350 ft. We were so exhausted from the heat of the day, the steep approach and the bushwalking we had to deal with on the ridge and decided to not go for the actual climb the first day and instead wake up early and climb it on Sun.  We didn't have enough daylight to climb and rappel with 6 people.

The NE rock climb itself is great. Great rock, fun moves. Grade felt like 5.5-5.6 ( last pitch is definitely 5.6). We climbed it in 4 pitches, 3 rope teams. It was great to locate some rappel stations and leverage them for belays as well (after proper checks) , saving us time building gear anchors. The summit is huge and you can definitely bivy up there (but you need to carry extra weight which is something l would not do). 

Coming down, we did 4 single and 1 double rappels. Paying attention where the rap stations are on your way up is crucial. We could probably do 3 singles and 1 double). We did add some webbing and hardware at least for 2 of them.

Timeline:

Saturday (started at 6 am) - almost 11 h day:

TH to Terror creek crossing - 3:15 h

Terror creek trail to the ridge start - about 1:45 h

Ridge, slabs scramble to the Chopping Block / Bartier ridge: 4.5-5 h (slow going due to heat and bushwhacking).

Sunday - started at 5:30 am from camp -- 18 h day camp - climb - camp - hike out:

Scramble to the base of the climb - 45 min

Climb all 4 pitches with all 3 rope teams - 3.5 hours (first rope team topped out at 9 am, last at 9:45).

Rappels- 2.5 h

Left camp at 2:45 PM

Back to TH at 11 PM

The last 4 miles on autopilot were painful.

Gear:

3 x 60m ropes 

3 x racks up to 3 (most of the lntermediate students doubled up on some pieces)

8 slings (double / singles) per rope team

I don't recall placing more than 5 pieces (+clipping the anchor) and that was on the last 5.6 pitch).

Great climb with a great group of Everett Intermediate students but now that l did that approach twice ( first time in mid-June 2021 for Terror) l would definitely prefer the snow we had in 2021 instead of the bushwhacking we had to deal with this time.

If increasing efficiency and having a shorter day the second day are priorities,  then.l would recommend to go with a party not bigger than 4. I under estimated how long it would take us with a party of 6 but in the end everything worked  well for us even though we didn't make it in our beds until 2:30-3 am in the morning.

And don't plan this trip before an international trip and a long flight like l did (l barely had a few hours to sleep and pack before l had to get to the airport).

TR pending corrections and some pictures to be uploaded.