Summit Elevation (m): 3416
Trip Date: July 24 2015
Elevation Gain (m): 2300
Trip Time (hr): 12
Trip Distance (km): 21
Quick ‘n Dirty Rating: Class 4/5 – you fall, you break something or more likely die
Difficulty Notes: Glacier travel over crevassed terrain, steep rock and snow with either a steep snow / ice finish or 5.2 exposed rock step.
Technical Rating: MN9; YDS (5.0-5.2)
GPS Track: Gaia
Map: Google Maps
After climbing Mount Sir Douglas on the weekend, I wasn’t expecting anything spectacular for the following week. To be honest, as much fun as Sir Douglas was, I was feeling a bit burnt out and thought I needed a week off. Then the weather got nice. Then Ben and I started emailing. Then I found myself planning to leave Thursday evening for a shot at Mount Victoria – North Peak! Darn it. Nobody said being a peakbagger was going to be easy. The north summit of Mount Victoria has been on my radar for many years already. It’s probably the one summit that I’ve made and changed plans on, more often than any other. Because it’s an easy approach, it’s usually the first 11,000er to get planned and then the first to get scrapped in favor of something bigger or more remote. Over the course of the 6 years or so that it’s been on my radar, most of my climbing friends have already managed to bag it on days that I couldn’t join them. Last year Ben and Steven attempted it. Both of them would have summitted if not for Ben’s crampon issues. As it was, only Steven managed to summit and Ben wasn’t going to try again until he knew for almost 100% that it would go. After several more false starts on it this year, Ben and I finally agreed to give it a shot on Friday, July 24th when a weather window looked to be opening in the Lake Louise area, just for us.
Interesting Facts on Mount Victoria
Mount Victoria is a long, very high ridge featuring two summits one km apart. Together with Mount Lefroy, it forms the backdrop to the view across the lake from the Chateau Lake Louise.
Although there is some confusion regarding the placing of the name Mount Victoria on this peak, it seems that it was named in 1897 to honor Queen Victoria who reigned over the British Commonwealth and Empire for sixty-four years until her death in 1901**. The mountain had previously been known as Mount Green after Rev. William Spotswood Green, a member of the British Alpine Club who visited the Rockies and the Selkirks in 1888.
There aren’t a ton of trip reports on North Victoria, but I’d heard from several sources over the years that it was anywhere from “easy rock and snow” to “moderate rock and ice”. Typical for Rockies large peaks, it’s all dependent on conditions and route choices. I think I was underestimating North Victoria.
Parks Canada discourages bivying for this peak, which is strange because IMHO getting a good nights rest and starting 2 or 3 hours earlier on a big peak is always the way to go. I understand that there’s a good approach trail that can be done in 2 or 3 hours, but it’s hundreds of meters of height gain and does take something out of you before you start actually climbing. One hint to save weight on the approach – there’s a clean fresh water source near the bivy site just before the glacier so don’t carry too much water on the approach.
The approach for North Victoria Peak is very easy and quick, but I was feeling a bit bagged when we finally started up the glacier right above the high bivy coral. Rain on Thursday had saturated the few inches of fresh snow that came down in the same storm and our forecast clear sky was already clouding over by 05:30 in the morning. We witnessed a unique sunrise over Lake Louise, now looking like a tiny puddle underneath Mount Whyte and Fairview Mountain – which were also looking more like hills than mountains.
We watched tiny headlamps flicker to the biffy as folks took early morning bathroom breaks from the Abbot Hut across the Victoria Glacier and above the Death Trap. As the day slowly dawned, we could see fresh snow on our route and clouds covering our summit. It was very chilly and we were glad to have our Gore-Tex layers on. So far this day was turning out differently than expected – something that occurs quite often on the big peaks along the Divide.
Our route was very different this year than last time Ben was attempting North Victoria. With plenty of snow coverage, Ben and Steven simply walked up the middle of the glacier on their snowshoes and Steven went straight up steep snow through the black band to the col. This year was obviously quite different. There were some scary looking holes on the glacier and with the warm temperatures, a dry year and now some rain making things even more of a mess, we wanted to avoid crossing as many crevasses on the glacier approach as possible. We started following some old tracks on climber’s right under steep rocky cliffs coming down from Collier Peak high above.
When the tracks went towards the glacier on our left, we started traversing high on avy slopes to the right (north of the main glacier). Our route will not work if there’s any avy hazard so please don’t follow it blindly. The recent snow didn’t help matters any, because it was of slurpee quality. Our crampons insisted on sliding around on it rather than getting a good purchase and on descent this caused Ben no end of headache with his technical crampons which don’t have anti-balling plates on them. The slopes were pretty steep – easily steep enough to slide – and right underneath us were some giant holes so sliding or losing purchase on our footholds wasn’t an option.
Ben carefully probed the glacier / snow slopes as we climbed higher and higher to the black band, clearly visible ahead. We did find some holes and we avoided many others. The worst part of our route was that we were paralleling many of the cracks – the most dangerous way to navigate glacial terrain because if the leader breaks through a snow bridge, there is a good chance the second is on the same bridge and both of you fall into the same hole! Again – please don’t just blindly follow our route if the main glacier is well-covered I would highly recommend that route.
One advantage of our route was that it presented us with a beautiful and safe bergschrund crossing to the black band. I never felt unsafe with any of the bridges we crossed. After utilizing a short ‘via ferrata’ (some cord used to rappel the ‘schrund) we climbed a final steep snow gully that dumped us onto the lower section of the infamous black band leading up to the Collier / North Victoria col.
The black band is notorious for giving people headaches on North Victoria. People tend to underestimate it and end up with snow, ice, verglass, loose rock and more exposure than they bargained for. This is very evident from the copious amounts of tat we encountered while moving through the steep, stepped terrain. We were lucky. The dry conditions which gave us glacier issues below, were perfect for the black band section above. We found the terrain moderate scrambling at best, albeit with some pretty steep exposure near the top. The terrain was full of little ledges that were surprisingly solid, especially compared to Sir Douglas 5 days previous! I guess that’s not a fair comparison… As we topped out at the col, past the 6th or 7th rap stations, we both commented on how easy and fun the black band was. Looking ahead up the northeast ridge, conditions looked a little snowy but the weather was holding and we pressed onward and upward. Our views to the west and north were still quite good at this point.
After a short traverse, we donned our crampons again and kept them on to the summit. The fresh few inches of snow made the rocks slick and a few sections of hard snow with some exposure encouraged us to simply keep the ‘pons on and bear with the scraping and grinding on bare rock that always sets my teeth on edge – like a nail going across a chalkboard. At first glance the northeast ridge above us looked pretty easy.
We both commented that the crux “didn’t look that bad” and kept going. I remembered that Steven had also commented on the crux terrain as he bypassed it on snow, that it “didn’t look bad”. As we like to say in the mountains, “you never know ’til you get your nose in it”. This is also true of the northeast ridge of North Vic. I certainly can’t say it’s the toughest terrain I’ve ever been on, but with the fresh snow, cool conditions and wind, combined with some very steep and exposed sections of rock just below the crux, it certainly wasn’t the easiest either. We passed two rap stations on our way up beneath the crux so this should give some indication of the seriousness of the terrain.
When we arrived under the crux, I knew immediately that I wasn’t freeing it in the conditions we had. It was slightly overhanging on climber’s right and there weren’t many obvious holds on the left either. There was one piton banged into a crack running up the middle, but nothing else. It was frustratingly short, but that didn’t make the 4 or 5 moves over it any easier! Ben thought he could free it and then throw down the rope from on top to belay me, but half way up he started having other thoughts. This is one of those cruxes that looks much easier than it feels when you’re on it! Eventually Ben sorted things out and managed to clip the pin before I put him on belay. Within about 15 seconds he was over the crux – I told you it wasn’t very long. Ben belayed me up and I was exceedingly happy to have that rope on. I don’t think I could have led this short pitch in crampons. Kudos once again to Ben for leading. I should mention that there is one thing about the crux description in the 11,000er guidebook that still confuses me after ascending it. The guidebook says;
The other option is to climb the 10-metre rock step, bypassing its prow via ledges on the left (5.3) and then moving back right.
Bill Corbett
The implication in the above description, is that the ledge traverse itself is the 5.3 crux, not the move “back right”. I looked climber’s left from near our crux but the terrain wasn’t that inviting. I think without snow, it could be traversed and possibly a gully that was out of sight could be the “moving back right” section before regaining the ridge. We certainly didn’t traverse any 5.3 ledges and I’m 95% certain we didn’t bypass the “prow”, but went straight up it, only very slightly climber’s left of the front nose. Hmmm. UPDATE: After emailing with Bill Corbett (author of the 11,000ers book) he agrees with the obscure description is going to remove it from the new version. The crux is indeed, exactly where we ascended.
After the crux it was a short ascent to the summit. The clouds weren’t lifting and we were rather chilly after dealing with the crux, so we didn’t linger long. After snapping some photos and signing the 2002 register (4th ascent party of 2015), we started down.
As we rapped the crux we saw two figures far below, just starting the northeast ridge. We waited for them part way down the ridge near one of the lower rap stations and after exchanging greetings we kept going down while they climbed above. He was studying to be an apprentice guide and she was his ‘practice client’. They were short-roped and moved efficiently towards the crux above us. We downclimbed everything under the crux, but a few of the moves felt a wee bit desperate. I was glad for the crampons since they gave me purchase on some tiny little holds that otherwise would have been way too slick to use.
From the col, we easily down climbed the black band, taking care not to slip on the little ledges while taking in the wild views all around us.
The snow gave Ben some crampon issues on descent to the bivy site – he has more technical than general mountaineering crampons and they don’t have very good anti-balling plates on them. I felt sorry that he was so unstable on the steep, exposed snow, because I could ‘simply’ walk downward most of the time, without feeling insecure at all. He told me later that with every step down, he felt like he could lose his grip and slide into the crevasses far below – not a pleasant way to walk down a mountain! Eventually we made it past snow line and onto old / hard snow and ice before the bivy and rock.
The hike out was fast and pleasant, with class II tourist-dodging as we approached Lake Louise itself. I really enjoyed North Victoria Peak. The terrain was varied, with snow, glacier travel, rock and great views all around. It was a wee bit spicier than I was expecting, which is also nice. Climbing gets boring if there’s never any surprises. Once again Ben and I proved a competent team and pulled off a safe and successful ascent.
