It is Finished!

I am happy to announce that after 750 miles of driving, less than ten hours of sleep in three days and lots and lots of Gatorade, we have successfully summited Granite Peak, Mount Cowen, and the Grand Teton in under 72 hours! It is the first time that these three difficult mountains have been done together in such rapid succession.

Out of the nine climbers that began The Alpine Triple Crown, five of them succeeded in climbing all three peaks. Of the other four, three of them managed to summit Granite on Day one and the Grand on day three but were unable to complete Mount Cowen due to fatigue following an 18 hour day on Granite Peak. One other climber, Lena Petersen decided to fore go an attempt of Granite Peak or Mount Cowen due to unexpected medical issues earlier in the week, but joined the rest of the climbers on Friday to summit the Grand Teton. Weather conditions could not have been better and the entire trip went off without any large hang ups. It was a wonderful blessing.

Due to the speed we were traveling at and exhaustion, we were unable to stop between climbs and post blogs and photos. Following is an account of our three days of adventures along with some great photos. I will be posting the story in three instalments, one for each day.

For those of you who sponsored a climber with a donation to the homeless shelter, you will be receiving a short photo show on CD within the next month to thank you for your support. If you have not sponsored a climber and would like to still do so, we would be very grateful. Our goal was to raise $10,000 for the Homeless shelter. Currently we are only a little over $5,000 and are badly in need of donations to reach our goal. Please see the top right of this web page for donation details.

Tuesday the 12th and Wednesday the 13th Granite Peak

After weeks of training, organizing, and fundraising the day of departure had finally arrived and we packed four cars with all the necessary gear for four days on the road. Lee and Dads IGA in Belgrade was gracious enough to donate all the food necessary to feed all the climbers and the support crew for the entire trip. I cannot thank them enough, they made the trip possible. If you happen to be shopping at Lee and Dads please let them know you appreciate their support of our event. Tuesday afternoon myself and Jess Lohmeier went and picked up the food and barley fit it all in a minivan. We unloaded everything into my back patio and under the supervision of Granny Spencer, spent three hours organizing food, tents, clothing, etc. to be loaded in the vehicles.

Once we had everything somewhat ready to be loaded, Travis arrived and we loaded my Subaru outback and Travis Honda Element, along with Jers Jeep and Lenas VW to the brim. Everything from crates of Gatorade to camp stoves to climbing ropes and coolers of food were stacked in every open space, leaving barley enough room to pack people.

We drove to the Spire climbing gym at 5:30 pm and met everyone that would be joining us on our adventure. At 6:00pm our convoy of four cars was on the road, headed towards the Beartooth Mountains. It had begun!

The first car arrived at our campsite in the village of Alpine at about 9:00 pm and we unpacked and started preparing for the start of our climb that would begin in a few short hours. The remainder of the team had arrived by 10:00 pm and after loading our packs with sandwich's, energy gu, rain jackets and water, we went to bed with the alarm set for midnight, a mere two hours away.

I awoke at 12:02 am, the first one up, and was greeted by a wonderful moon rising above the towers of rock surrounding the basin we were camped in. The moon was only two days away from being full and as our adventure continued, it would grow larger each night and provide us with light during our early morning approaches.

I got water boiling for oatmeal, woke everyone else and slipped into my shorts, running shoes and down jacket. Within 20 minutes everyone was fed, geared up and in the car for a short drive to the trail head. After some last minute touches such as sun screen and a swig of water, we left the trail at 12:45 am, Six climbers in all. Brandon Smith and Casey Ambrose would be arriving late from Bozeman and would not begin the climb until much later that morning. They became known as the PM crew, due to their late starts.

As we started the long 15 mile approach to Granite peak, our group of climbers started to spread out along the trail, each climber settling into their own pace and "zoning out" as they followed the blue circle of light cast by their headlight on the trail ahead of them. Two hours into the approach, I found myself with Joe Wagner, Ross Lynn and Jer Sinnema cresting the edge of Froze to Death Plateau and stopping for a minute to watch as falling star after falling star arced across the crystal clear sky above us. We were catching the last part of a meteor shower that had been going on for the past two days. We were now at the point in the approach where we would leave the trail and have to navigate across five miles of boulder fields to reach the start of Granite Peaks East Ridge. We made excellent time and were have way across the plateau in three hours. Jers amazing navigation skills saved us as I started to get disoriented in the darkness on a rock strewn plateau that stretches 3 miles wide and 7 miles long. He get us pointed in the right direction and by 5:30 am we were only a short distance from the beginning of the East Ridge. The temperature had dropped to below freezing on the plateau and the wind had picked up to a steady 10mph breeze. Dressed in running shorts and light weight t-shirts, we were forced to keep moving at a fast pace in order to stay warm. We finally stopped for a short break just as the sun started to warm the eastern sky behind us and turn the horizon into a gradient that went from orange to red to blue to black.

At this point, Jer stopped to wait for the next party of climbers and Ross, Joe, and myself pushed on into the growing alpine light. We descended 1,000ft into the saddle that separates Granite peak from Tempest mountain and stopped once again for a brief minute as the full view of Granites North Face came into view in front of us. It was stunning and terrifying all at once. Such a massive, intimidating piece of rock that rises over 2,500ft from a basin far below us to the summit block still thousands of feet above us.

We shed our jackets as we started the technical climbing and the sun started to warm us. Above us lay just under 2,000ft of climbing which we would do un-roped in order to maintain our speed. In the mountains, speed is safety. We had to be off the summit as soon as possible to avoid bad weather that would most likely be moving later that morning.

We moved quickly up from the saddle along the East ridge,the North face and Avalanche Lake far below us on our right and mountains, snow, and rock as far as our eye could see on our left. We soon reached what is referred to as the Snow Bridge, a section of snow 40 ft wide that has to be crossed in order to continue the climb. The Snow Bridge is considered by some to be the crux of the climb. If you slip during the 40 ft, you are in for a 2,000ft slide over snow, ice and rock that has been the cause of many injuries and serious rescues on Granite Peak. Needless to say, we crossed safely and continued up towards the summit. As we climbed higher, the sun worked its way down the ridge above us and illuminated our route in a brilliant orange light that felt wonderful on our backs.

We soon arrived at the hardest section of rock climbing only 200ft below the summit. We were at an elevation of 12,500ft and every time we stopped to catch our breath, our ears were ringing and we were heaving due to the lack of oxygen.

We had ascended over 7,000ft since leaving the trail head that morning. (the recommended rate of assent to aclamatize is 1,000ft a day!) With a few deep breaths we pushed on, climbed the last 200ft of technical climbing, passed another climbing party of four, and summited at 7:55. 6 hours and 10 minutes after leaving the trail head!

It felt amazing.

After 20 minutes on the summit, we started our descent. We moved quickly, stopping only briefly when we passed the rest of our climbing team on their way up from the saddle towards the snow bridge. They were feeling good but moving at a slower pace than us. After sharing a quick snack with them, we continued on, climbed the 1000ft back up to Froze to death Plateau where we glanced quickly behind us for one last look at the beautiful mountain we had just climbed. From there we crossed the five miles of rocks and boulders on the Froze to Death Plateau and descended almost non-stop, the 13 miles back to the trail head, jogging the last four miles or so. We were back at the car 11 hours and 56 minutes after leaving! An amazing time considering most people take at least two days to climb it with some taking as long as five days!

We stood in a glacial creek for almost an hour, letting our legs and feet have a wonderful ice bath and then promptly fell asleep to wait for the next team of climbers and for our amazing support girls to cook us dinner.

The remaining climbers returned 6 hours later after dealing with snow and rain on the Plateau and moving slower due to altitude. All in all, it was a huge day that was very successful. Brandon and Casey both succeeded in summiting as well, all though they were a few hours behind everyone else and luckily had good enough weather to summit later that afternoon. Day number one, eight climbers summit ed Granite Peak!

I will pick up here with the account of Mount Cowen.