North Joffre Creek Horseshoe Traverse(Casiope, Saxifrage, Oleg)

Alexis planned to do the traverse in 3 days but since just the two of us, we were hoping to do it in 2 days to avoid the bad weather system coming in on the 3rd day. 

We parked our car at the plowed parking area on the North side of Duffy lake road at the start of the logging road in North Joffre Creek.  A trip report on Bivouac suggested to take an  old spur parallel to the swamp north of  the creek to avoid zig-zagging through the swamp. We followed the plowed road  to the right but we turned around because we were not sure if it was the right road.  We, then took the lower spur which led to the swamp. We followed a set of faint ski tracks on the swamp,  those were probably from Stano's attempt a couple weeks ago. 

   

After reaching the bottom of the snow covered rock-slide, we decided to put our ski crampons as we were started sliding back on a steep section. I struggled using crampons and completely falling behind Alexis. It definitely drained out my energy going through the rock-slide. We decided to follow a set of skin tracks crossing the West side of the lake but  in the middle of the lake the tracks veered off to the right, switch-backing the north slope. Instead, we ignored following the tracks and continued ascending on the West toward the col between Saxifrage and Casiope. As we gained elevation between on the shades and the sun I could feel the temperature dropped down.  After reaching the col, I just couldn't feel my fingers anymore. I became worried I would get frostbite again. We dropped our bags at the col and started heading toward the North facing slope of Casiope, then followed the SW ridge to the summit. I walked to the summit with my hands tucked in my armpits.  I have  chosen just to boot pack while Alexis on skis. The views were amazing but we didn't lingered around at the summit  because it was too damn cold.

                                                        

                                                           

 

 

We got back to our bags and continued walking higher to the bottom of the SE ridge of Saxifrage where we planned to camp for the night. Once we were at the camp site, Alexis broke a bad news to me, he broke a small piece on his binding.  Although,  he could still ski with it, he had be very careful with his turns.  As usual we were exposed to the elements. We quickly set up our tent and sought refuge from the wind inside. At this point my fingers started swelling and throbbing so I took my time to warm them up by putting them in my crotch. We had a very calm  and cold evening. I dressed up warm with two down jackets in my sleeping bag while Alexis slept  on his underwear and base layer.

 

The next morning we got up at 7:00am, had a quick breakfast and started our first attempt on the SE ridge of Saxifrage but only got turned around due to what it seemed an exposed scramble higher up on the ridge. We tried the East face, half way of the face we started traversing to the NE ridge, again we found ourselves on a difficult scrambles just below the summit. We backtracked to the face and climbed directly on  the East face. The slope was a bit steep, I would say between 40-45 degree max to the top.  Stellar weather and to compliment with that a  stunning view from the summit. Again, we didn't stay too long at the summit as we were falling behind with the schedule. The descend from the face was painfully slow for me,  Alexis had to wait for me at least half an hour at the bottom. 

 

 

   

     

       

       

        

         

We continued  heading North through the East col of Saxifrage. We skied down to White lake, North of Saxifrage. The slope was definitely an avalanche prone, from the top I could see some avalanche debris at the bottom. 

Once we were on the lake, we put our skins on and started contouring around towards the ridge, across Saxifrage, and soon we were on a creek drainage of Spetch. We got up to the open valley on the South side of Mt. Olds and Oleg at noon, then continued higher up to the hanging plateau just below the col between Oleg and Olds.  It was clearly, we needed to stay another day so we decided to camp there. We dropped our bags and boot packed to the col with Mt. Oleg as our objective to bag and Olds the next morning if we get lucked out with the weather.

           

           

           

We had an option to exit early  in case  we get  trapped in bad weather  in the morning by skiing through North Creek, OR just simply brave out the weather and finished the traverse.  Of course, we both wanted to finish the traverse.

         

That night, Alexis showed me his blistered finger. I didn't know he got frostbites on the first day, I never heard of him complained about it. This is quite interesting because few years ago I almost lost 3 fingers  on a climb and on the same year Alexis got his, as well. This makes my fingers very sensitive to cold.

We woke up in the morning with light snow and low visibility, but we could still see Mt. Oleg and Olds in the distance. We broke camp and started boot packing to the col. I was pretty confident that we would be able to pull through the traverse despite the bad weather. We got up to the col and the wind picked up, and on top of that the visibility had became worse.  We managed to ski the flat top glacier unroped, then decided to rope up once  we  started to descend on Place glacier. I led Alexis to think that it was only a mellow crevasses and short descent to Place glacier. Oh boy, I was wrong. We've seen big, open,  and some are partially covered crevasses. 

     

Since, I'm only 100lbs and Alexis has more control with the skis, he let me skied first. It was definitely challenging navigating through the glacier in whiteout. 

     

After reaching the South end of  the Place glacier, we then started to ascend on the SE shoulder of Cirque Peak up to the high point where we had to descend  to the North Joffre Creek.  We went through zero visibility and very strong wind. Thankfully, we had GPS  to navigate in the whiteout. I was scared to ski down to the East basin as I couldn't see the bottom of the slope, all I could see were some bare rocks poking out on a steep slope. Alexis suggested to do  a high traverse until we get down to the basin. 

   

Once we were on the tree line, Alexis broke his binding completely, at this time, the whole heel piece broke , he said he will be able to telemark with it. Luckily, we were just 1km away from the logging road when it happened. We strapped our skis at the back  and booted to the logging road , then skied the logging road.

   

                       

   

                           

                         

The 3 hours time what we thought to get back to the car turned out an all day love and hate event trying to navigate through bad weather.

Another great trip with Alexis. It was definitely challenging traverse under difficult weather.

Date: February 8-10, 2014

Trip: North Joffre Creek Horseshoe Traverse

Route: North Joffre Creek

Approach: North Joffre Creek, it depends on snow condition but any type of cars could make it to the trailhead 

Gear Used: Glacier and Avi gear.