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Michel Dufresne and myself came to the Bugs July 1997, to climb the NE Ridge of Bugaboo Spire.
Michel picked me up at 5am; we filled up on coffee that I had made fresh 10 min ago. The highway was quiet at that time of day. We arrived at Radium in time for a bite to eat. We proceeded to head north to the turn off at Brico. The marshy flats of the great Columbia valley take us towards the long and forever long dirt road to the Bugaboos. We arrive at the parking lot around 9am; we quickly put wire around the car and eat some munchies. The grueling hike uphill, but a very pleasant hike. The Conrad Kane Hut comes into view after two hours of hiking uphill. We have lunch quite quickly, we want to get out there and do a route on Crescent Spire.
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Bugaboo Spire 3176 meters. NE ridge is the right skyline.
Michel and I climbed Paddle Flake III 5.10b the day before. I woke up a bit sore, I was not sure how I was going to do that day but we will see. We eat breakfast quite early in the morning; the sun was barely over the horizon yet. We set off for the unmistakable NE Ridge of Bugaboo Spire. The weather was kind of uncertain in her actions, there was snow in the air, as well as a bit of freezing rain. |
Michel on the snow part of the route at the pass. The climb starts up the white streak above the snow.
We solo climbed the west face of Crescent Spire to the pass. To our surprise we could see for a very long way, the system was blowing off and blowing off fast. We were starting to get quite happy. This was going to be the second time we attempted this ridge. I had this call of Mother Nature and had to find a decent shaded boulder. Michel continued on without me. I finished my little dubieties, pulled up my pants, put on my harness and gear, picked up the rope and pack, I had some catching up to do.
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Kelly Leading Pitch 1 of the NE Ridge.
From the top of the snow patch, I won the hammer rock scissors game and was given the first lead. We chose to climb the left facing flake line that went up to a nice belay. There are many different possibilities here at the ridge of the mountain. This pitch is rated around 5.5 and is really fun and enjoyable. Michel would follow and remove the gear. |
Kelly Leading Pitch 3 of the NE Ridge
Michel has a great pitch up the right facing flakes and cracks. The belay is at the top off all these flakes. The third pitch was an interesting one. Down climbing a few feet before continuing back up the wall. The rising traverse to the right, wild moves on the funky dike rock, with interesting gear. The belay ledge is hidden around a corner and on a good ledge.
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Michel D. leading pitch 4 of the NE Ridge.
Pitch four, off the great belay ledge is this immaculate 5.7 corner that Michel styles with confidents and speed. The belay ledge is another big and comfy lounge to view the next pitch with sweating hands. The next pitch just gives you a Willie looking at it. |
Kelly leading the Variation pitch 5.8 jam crack.
As a climber, we all dream of someday climbing a beautiful hand crack somewhere way off the deck, and on this ridge there is this exact pitch. This variation pitch can be climbed instead of the 5.5 corners into the 5.4 chimneys. This awesome 5.8 pitch is one of the purist 5.8 hand jam crack on the mountain. They are straight in and bomber. A must for anyone on this route, you must climb the pitch. Michel followed, cleaned the gear and racked up for the next part. We simile climbed the rest of the chimneys to the top. The climbing got easier and easier the higher we got. The clouds were blowing in now, and we decided we better get a move on it.
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Michel Dufresne on the top of the route, Now for the summit traverse.
We swapped leads when Michel ran out of gear and slings. I had all the gear now and so I kept going. When I ran out of gear and slings I stopped and brought Michel up. By this time we were almost on the summit ridge. The views past Michel were so rewarding that I was almost speechless. We regrouped all the gear and started heading along the summit ridge. |
Kelly on the Summit Ridge of Bugaboo Spire.
The clouds were all around us now, due to the fact we were at the top of the mountain and that we had entered the cloud line. The summit was interesting to top out on. There was this boulder problem that needed a piece of gear to keep the headspace going. The down climb was not so bad.
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Kelly on the Gendarme on the Kain route decent.
We figured we were almost done all the technical stuff on the north summit and going to the south summit was going to be easy. Well we were faced with this rappel of 10 m to a snowy ledge that was exposed and above the giant east face of Bugaboo Spire. I rapped down to join Michel on the snowy ledge. Luckily there was a rap ring in the mass of slings on the slab we had to get off. We traversed this interesting ledge system that would take us to the south summit. At last the South summit, a place I recognized from an earlier trip I did with Josee. I led the way for the decent. I rapped down to the notch on the Gendarme (seen in this photo) |
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Michel on the decent traverse on the Kain route.
I gave Michel a few directions to find the next rap station, and then the next, and so on. We arrived at the two-pitch traverse that we had to get out the gear again to protect ourselves from the thousands of feet below both side of this ridge. This was another high light of the complete traverse of the route. We rapped the final two pitches to the scramble. Down the ridge to the col. Boot skiing straight down to the glacier below and a nice jog down the snow to the hut.
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