Mount Moran

Earlier in the spring of this year, Sir Loin of Beef and I received an invitation to join Bird Dog on a late August trip to summit Mount Moran in the Tetons.  With multiple spring and summer months to get in shape and sharpen up our climbing skills still ahead of us, we quickly agreed to attend.  As the months went by and our opportunities to improve our climbing and alpine skills diminished, a feeling of dread began to take root for SLoB and myself.  Reading descriptions of how to climb Moran, it was becoming apparent that this would be fun filled trip.  A climb of Mount Moran requires canoeing across a lake, porting your canoe for 20 rods, canoeing across another lake,

climbing a steep gully for about 3000 feet,

just to reach the CMC campsite.  As we had for our attempt on the Grand last year, we chose to employ the guide services of Exum Mountain Guides.  We were paired up with Silas Rossi, who willingly accepted the task of getting us up and down the Mountain and of course eating a Cheeseburger on the summit!

After reaching the CMC campsite the previous evening, we started the climb to the base of the CMC route at 4 AM.  After several hours of scrambling and climbing by headlamp, we were treated to a spectacular sunrise.

To get to the beginning of the CMC route, you must first climb over the rock structure named Drizzlepuss, so named due to the first climbers to gain it's summit being stuck in a light rain.  From the top of Drizzlepuss you get your first real view of your climb.  This view has been described thusly in 'The Climbers Guide to the Tetons',

"Once on top of Drizzlepuss, you are presented with a terrifying view of the CMC route, which goes more or less up the middle of the face to the left (south)of the black dike; most of the slabs appear impossible. However, take heart and down climb the very steep west face of Drizzlepuss toward the notch separating it from the main east face of Mount Moran."

Not surpisingly, as you can see from Wimpy's expression,

the view was a bit intimidating. 

However, we pressed on by descending into the notch separating Drizzlepuss from the CMC route.  From the notch, the CMC route began to seem more reasonable and thus began our ascent towards the Summit.

After several pitches of working our way from ledge system to ledge system, we  began to feel a bit more confident and capable of smiling.

Additional pitches found us atop the peak and ready to have some delightful WhiteCastle Cheeseburgers!

Our descent to camp was uneventful, as was the descent to the lakes and the canoe back to our vehicles.  Total time from CMC camp to summit, back down to camp, down to lakes, across lakes to car was approximately 16 hours of non stop fun.

Earlier in the spring of this year, Sir Loin of Beef and I received an invitation to join Bird Dog on a late August trip to summit Mount Moran in the Tetons.  With multiple spring and summer months to get in shape and sharpen up our climbing skills still ahead of us, we quickly agreed to attend.  As the months went by and our opportunities to improve our climbing and alpine skills diminished, a feeling of dread began to take root for SLoB and myself.  Reading descriptions of how to climb Moran, it was becoming apparent that this would be fun filled trip.  A climb of Mount Moran requires canoeing across a lake, porting your canoe for 20 rods, canoeing across another lake,

climbing a steep gully for about 3000 feet,

just to reach the CMC campsite.  As we had for our attempt on the Grand last year, we chose to employ the guide services of Exum Mountain Guides.  We were paired up with Silas Rossi, who willingly accepted the task of getting us up and down the Mountain and of course eating a Cheeseburger on the summit!

After reaching the CMC campsite the previous evening, we started the climb to the base of the CMC route at 4 AM.  After several hours of scrambling and climbing by headlamp, we were treated to a spectacular sunrise.

To get to the beginning of the CMC route, you must first climb over the rock structure named Drizzlepuss, so named due to the first climbers to gain it's summit being stuck in a light rain.  From the top of Drizzlepuss you get your first real view of your climb.  This view has been described thusly in 'The Climbers Guide to the Tetons',

"Once on top of Drizzlepuss, you are presented with a terrifying view of the CMC route, which goes more or less up the middle of the face to the left (south)of the black dike; most of the slabs appear impossible. However, take heart and down climb the very steep west face of Drizzlepuss toward the notch separating it from the main east face of Mount Moran."

Not surpisingly, as you can see from Wimpy's expression,

the view was a bit intimidating. 

However, we pressed on by descending into the notch separating Drizzlepuss from the CMC route.  From the notch, the CMC route began to seem more reasonable and thus began our ascent towards the Summit.

After several pitches of working our way from ledge system to ledge system, we  began to feel a bit more confident and capable of smiling.

Additional pitches found us atop the peak and ready to have some delightful WhiteCastle Cheeseburgers!

Our descent to camp was uneventful, as was the descent to the lakes and the canoe back to our vehicles.  Total time from CMC camp to summit, back down to camp, down to lakes, across lakes to car was approximately 16 hours of non stop fun.

Earlier in the spring of this year, Sir Loin of Beef and I received an invitation to join Bird Dog on a late August trip to summit Mount Moran in the Tetons.  With multiple spring and summer months to get in shape and sharpen up our climbing skills still ahead of us, we quickly agreed to attend.  As the months went by and our opportunities to improve our climbing and alpine skills diminished, a feeling of dread began to take root for SLoB and myself.  Reading descriptions of how to climb Moran, it was becoming apparent that this would be fun filled trip.  A climb of Mount Moran requires canoeing across a lake, porting your canoe for 20 rods, canoeing across another lake,

climbing a steep gully for about 3000 feet,

just to reach the CMC campsite.  As we had for our attempt on the Grand last year, we chose to employ the guide services of Exum Mountain Guides.  We were paired up with Silas Rossi, who willingly accepted the task of getting us up and down the Mountain and of course eating a Cheeseburger on the summit!

After reaching the CMC campsite the previous evening, we started the climb to the base of the CMC route at 4 AM.  After several hours of scrambling and climbing by headlamp, we were treated to a spectacular sunrise.

To get to the beginning of the CMC route, you must first climb over the rock structure named Drizzlepuss, so named due to the first climbers to gain it's summit being stuck in a light rain.  From the top of Drizzlepuss you get your first real view of your climb.  This view has been described thusly in 'The Climbers Guide to the Tetons',

"Once on top of Drizzlepuss, you are presented with a terrifying view of the CMC route, which goes more or less up the middle of the face to the left (south)of the black dike; most of the slabs appear impossible. However, take heart and down climb the very steep west face of Drizzlepuss toward the notch separating it from the main east face of Mount Moran."

Not surpisingly, as you can see from Wimpy's expression,

the view was a bit intimidating. 

However, we pressed on by descending into the notch separating Drizzlepuss from the CMC route.  From the notch, the CMC route began to seem more reasonable and thus began our ascent towards the Summit.

After several pitches of working our way from ledge system to ledge system, we  began to feel a bit more confident and capable of smiling.

Additional pitches found us atop the peak and ready to have some delightful WhiteCastle Cheeseburgers!

Our descent to camp was uneventful, as was the descent to the lakes and the canoe back to our vehicles.  Total time from CMC camp to summit, back down to camp, down to lakes, across lakes to car was approximately 16 hours of non stop fun.