Dragontail Peak, Serpentine Arete

Going up is almost always fun.  Going down sometimes is not.  I had looked forward to climbing Dragontail for a long, long time.  For the first time in my alpine climbing career, I had Type 3 fun.  For those of you who don't know what that means, here is a basic rundown.  Type 1 fun is just pure fun.  Type 2 fun is not fun at the time, but in hindsight was actually fun.  Type 3 fun is not fun at all, but just suffering.  Maybe this was more like Type 2.5, but you get the idea.  I'm still glad I did it, but it really wasn't fun even in hindsight.  But that was my fault.  It could have been 1.5-2, depending on tactics and other factors.  Enough blathering.

I again had a lack of partners, and again turned to Cascade Climbers.  Again, it worked out fantastically well.  I met Taylor Brugh, who is way stronger than me, knowledgeable, and is an all-around great guy.  Turns out he recently met Matty P through SMR, and they have been doing stuff together.  Anyway, we decided on Dragontail, and decided to do it in a day car-to-car.  We met in Monroe at 3am.  I had "gone to bed" around midnight, but was basically unable to sleep.  We were hiking by 5:30.  We initially did well, but then missed the turn to Colchuck Lake.  Even after I had predicted missing it in the parking lot!  About an hour lost.  By the time we reached Colchuck Lake I was already starting to drag.  We made quick work of the moraine and quickly spotted the start of the route.  We stuck to the snow finger for as long as we could, which was a good move.

Moraine approach

Start of the route

We short-roped and simul-climbed to the base of the detached pillar, including the short 5.7 offwidth.  All led by Taylor.  I was breathing extremely hard.  The rock so far was clean and solid, with fun movement.

5.7 offwidth

We rested up at the top of the detached pillar, and prepared to pitch out the next two 5.8 pitches.  The first was the delicate face/finger crack.  I took that one.  I was feeling pretty horrible and hadn't been on anything harder than 5.5 since my leg injury.  But I thought that the first pitch suited my strengths better than the next, which was hand and fist crack climbing.  It was probably a good choice.  For 5.8, the climbing wasn't terribly hard, but a little heady.  I started up, then downclimbed once, then finished it.

Josh at the base of the 5.8 crack

Josh on the 5.8 crack pitch

Admiring Colchuck's North Face

Taylor follows the 5.8 crack pitch

Taylor easily punched out the next 5.8 pitch, which was equally clean and high-quality.  These two pitches are really the main attraction of the route.

Taylor leads the second 5.8 pitch

Looking down the second technical pitch

After that, the route deteriorated dramatically.  There was a little bit of solid mid-5th simulclimbing, but quickly the rock became more and more shattered and loose.  Wayfinding was tedious, only so as to not dislodge a rope-shearing rock or rain down massive debris on your partner.  We swung leads, covering the 1000-or-so vertical feet in a little over an hour.  I felt like an absolute slug.  I stopped frequently to heave and wheeze.  I prayed for the end to come.  I suffered.  Finally, the end came.  Actually, it was only a little after noon.  But it sure felt like I held Taylor back.

Rainier through Colchuck Col

The views of the Backbone Ridge and the Fin were spectacular.  I would say that I really want to come back and climb that route.  But given how much I suffered, I'm not really sure.

Colchuck Lake the the Fin on Backbone Ridge

Josh on the summit of Dragontail

Getting down was pretty painful.  Figuratively, and literally.  I lost a toenail for the first time in my life from all the pounding.  Coming down Aasgard is just as bad as people say it is.  Although, I will say that for me, coming down the Cascadian Couloir still takes the cake.  We strayed from the true trail toward the bottom and had to make one annoying rappel to reach the lake.  And then it was endless cruise control back to the car.  We made the cars around 8pm, 15 hours or so car-to-car.

I still think that Dragontail is a cool mountain and a worthy objective.  The route was just okay.  The positives of the lower route are negated by the crappiness of the upper route.  I do think that if I had actually been in shape, rather than trying a Grade IV climb car-to-car literally straight off the couch from a major injury, I would have had a much better time.  I do hope to climb with Taylor again.