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Basic Rock Climb - The Tooth/South Face

Great 12hr car-to-car trip with well-prepared students and dialed instructors!

Evan Bush Evan Bush
June 12, 2023
  • Road suitable for all vehicles

  • Trail is in good shape. 

    Minor intermittent snowfields until Source Lake. 

    Regular snow starts just above Source Lake (~4,000 feet) as of June 11. 

    Creek crossing above Snow Lake was a bit tricky with partially-melted snowbank. We crossed creek, then ascended snow finger on creek's south side. Won't be there for long, but there are ways to cross the creek a bit lower. Arrive at creek, then assess. It'll go 

    Snow moat at ~5,100 is easy to navigate to get to scramble portion of climb. Scramble was wet but manageable. 

    Our team replaced hardware and soft goods on rappel anchors. See trip report for more details.  

We had a great day on The Tooth. 12 hr C2C. We started at 5 a.m. We were first on route and could climb without anyone on our tail for the duration. A group of two caught us on the lower rappels, but they were patient, we were efficient and we offered our rope on the last rappel. I definitely suggest an early start with like ours with a group of 6. It made for a smooth day and goodwill on the mountain.

Rob Busack, who was mentoring this climb, brought 100 feet of cord and new hardware on route. Rob replaced three ugly rappel anchors with new cord (tape on rope indicates the cord's manufacturing date) and added new steel rappel rings. One of the replaced aluminum rappel rings was so warn the metal was collapsing into a sharp edge. Yikes!

As for the climb itself:

The approach was straightforward, save for the main creek crossing above Source Lake. We crossed water, then ascended a finger of snow that remained (for now) in the creek bed. There were options lower down the creek to cross on rock. I'd probably suggest going forward.

In the morning, we encountered a sea of clouds that persisted until roughly 4,600 feet. The walls of the Pineapple Basin – which were sunny – emerged as we ascended, making for an ethereal sight.

The snow moat that sometimes presents a barrier was pretty easy to navigate. It petered out into talus and we only had to navigate steps down of about 1.5 feet, at most.

I hadn't climbed The Tooth yet. It was straightforward, solid and surprisingly fun climbing.

As mentioned above, the rappel anchors are now in tiptop shape thanks to Rob, so please thank him for his cost and service to this classic route!