Wedge, The
What a beautiful day!! I scrambled all year to enjoy a day like this! Due to a lingering cold for the past 2 weeks the climb was tough. I had to stop every 10 or 15 steps to let my knees 'thaw' so that I could keep climbing. I haven't felt this out of shape since the beginning of the year!
I highly recommend this scramble. I agree with Dave Stephens that the summit ridge is barely enough to be classified as difficult - although a slip here would likely not hurt much. (Mainly because you'd be dead) Compared to Lady MacDonald or Pocaterra I thought the crux was very short and if dry very easy. I wouldn't want to do it on ice though! I didn't get any good pics of the climb or the crux because I only had 9 photos left and I was concentrating so hard on getting to the top I didn't remember to take shots on the way up. For more photos of the route and the crux see Dave's site.
I started out nice and early and got to Wedge Pond at around 8 am. There were a few fly-fisherman on the water and the mist was rising as I made my way into the brightly colored forest and started up a drainage east of the pond. About an hour later I was on the ridge and heading for the base of the Wedge. Every step was a major chore but I pressed on.
An hour later and I was already high up on the steep slab/scree slope to the first summit. I popped out on the first summit and thought my knees would give out completely! Ignoring my weakness I headed across the ridge, only pausing briefly to contemplate the crux. 10 minutes later I stood on the main summit and began to drink in the wonderful views and the warm sunshine. I actually fell asleep for a while and it was almost two hours before I headed back down! All-in-all it was a very nice scramble - any scramble would've been nice in that weather! Going down wasn't a problem except for the small rockfall that I started! Good thing no-one was coming up. I had the entire mountain to myself and enjoyed that most of all.
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A beautiful fall summit day.
