Weart Mountain

Last year I visited this wonderful place. It had glaciers and lakes and big mountains. Unfortunately I wasn’t prepared for nor thought I had the experience to go very far that time. I camped at Wedgemount Lake and promised myself to return to scale one of these big mountains one day. This year I finally did. Guided by Matt Gunn’s new book (Scrambles in Southwestern BC) and a bit more research on the area I returned with a strong group of hikers to attempt Mount Weart – the second biggest mountain in Garibaldi Park, which stands at 2835m.

The five of us (Chris, Paul, Bogdan, Eugene and I) left around 1:30pm on Saturday and arrived near the trailhead shortly after. Bogdan and I were driving. I only went over two water bars and after scratching my tailpipe a couple of times I decided to park the car. Bogdan made it all the way with his 2WD. It meant another 100m of elevation gain for us but that didn’t seem like much at the time.

We started up the trail with Eugene setting a very rapid pace. I fell behind almost immediately and could no longer see any of them. Paul however waited for me to make sure I don’t hike alone. Later we caught up to the rest of the group when they took a break. Past this point Eugene, Bogdan and Paul shot ahead and I stayed behind with Chris who had his pace slightly slowed because of a burger he ate earlier. The heat was a bit of a problem at first, but halfway up it got quite a bit cooler and more comfortable.

We eventually caught up to Paul who fell a bit behind. A wasp that had stung him on the leg managed to slow him down to our pace. After 2.5 hours we reached our campsite at the far end of the lake where Bogdan and Eugene (who had arrived half an hour before us) had found some perfect spots that were wind protected, flat and smooth.

We set up 4 tents. Each person stayed in his own 2-person tent with the exception of Bogdan who decided to sleep out in the open. The wind was howling at that point, coming off Wedgemount glacier and keeping us quite cool. I went to prepare my dinner and the clumsy person that I am I dropped the food in the sand. I didn’t want to throw it away so I washed it a bit and ate it anyways, to the amusement of Chris who was laughing whenever I would start swearing about the sand in my teeth.

As the wind had started suddenly, so it had stopped with the sunset. The clouds were all pushed away leaving nothing but beautiful clear skies. Eugene went to bed first around 8:00pm. Eugene and Bogdan decided to wake up at 5:00am (better than 3:00am as Bogdan first proposed) so they would have time to prepare themselves a hot breakfast, tea and coffee. As they said they would take about 2 hours to finish before starting the hike, I decided to sleep until at least 6:00am. I only needed 10 minutes to eat my granola bars and get ready. The rest of us went to sleep around 9:30pm. I’m not used to going to sleep so early so it took me at least 2 hours to fall asleep. It wasn’t so great once I awoke again at 4:30am when Eugene and Bogdan were up and about.

At 5:00am sharp, Bogdan gave his wake up call. I tried to get some more sleep but after 15 minutes they started shaking my tent and throwing rocks at it. I got up quite grumpy and saw that Eugene and Bogdan were all ready to start hiking. Paul and Chris weren’t ready though so we decided to split up into two groups. Eugene and Bogdan were off in the darkness while the rest of us started at about 6:00am with the first signs of light.

I had expected the first section near the glacier to be the loose and gravely nightmare that I remembered from the year before but it turned out to be more solid. The night’s chill kept the ground more solid and moist. We skirted the glacier for a bit, walking on the edge of if for a short section until we reached a creek. We then started ascending the gravel to the left of the creek until we reached some solid ground. There were a couple of short and easy scramble bits and we then faced another glacier. We went to the left of it when we could and ended up on it for one short section. It was hard to tell where the rocks ended and where the glacier began because there was so much rubble on the glacier itself. Once we noticed we were standing on it however we walked to the left and hiked up a rocky section to avoid it. Chris just kept going on the glacier towards the next scree slope.

At that scree slope past the glacier I had to look at the guide for more instructions. It said to go to the left of another creek. Paul and I were not too eager to lose the elevation we already had, just to get back on that section. Paul continued straight up the scree while I traversed to that section. The traverse turned out to be a nightmare. The slope was very steep and the boulders I was crossing were huge and very unstable. I crawled over them making sure to spread my weight such that I didn’t apply too much pressure on any of the rocks. My heart was racing and I didn’t enjoy being in that situation. Luckily it was short and I quickly reached slightly better ground. I ascended up following Chris who had arrived there at the same time from the glacier. The terrain was easier now but I had to pay special attention that I don’t follow right under Chris. We then reached a short section of steep snow with two paths around it. The path on the left had small loose rocks but looked like it was getting a little tough near the top while the right part had big boulders but looked more manageable. Chris took the left side while I took the right. Ascending the snow wasn’t an option as it was frozen solid and we couldn’t even take one step up it without sliding.

I made it over the boulders quite quickly and reached a bowl and a snowfield. I called Paul to come that way too and he traversed to where I was. Chris caught up shortly after. We could see the final ridge ahead but had this big snowfield blocking our path. At first we thought it was a glacier. We looked left and right and couldn’t see any bare land we could cross. I didn’t feel very comfortable crossing it and said so. In the meantime we saw this rock slide coming off the ridge. We couldn’t see what caused it but were happy not to be under it at that moment. Shortly after we noticed two puny people walking up towards the ridge. It was Eugene and Bogdan. Now we knew what caused the rockslide.

I decided to hike up a bit higher on the ridge we were on to see if there was another way to get to the main ridge. From higher up I could see that the whole path was blocked by this snowfield. I then remembered reading about it and the lack of crevasses and the solidity of the ice/snow convinced me it was just snow and not glacier. We were wondering how the other group crossed and kept looking around for tracks on the snow. Chris eventually spotted their tracks although it looked more like goat tracks than people tracks. On closer inspection we could see that only the front of their feet managed to make a mark in the snow because it was still quite frozen. We started traversing it, making sure to stick to the flat sections. It was still early in the morning and the snow was very solid and very slippery. Near the end, we had to kick step up a bit until we reached solid ground again.

At this point we had to traverse to the left according to Matt’s instructions but Chris said he’d rather go straight up. Paul agreed and after I looked at the route up I agreed to follow too. After all that walking on loose rock, some scrambling on good rock felt amazing. There were tons of holds everywhere and I felt so much more secure than on the entire route up to that point. Virtually no serious exposure and the route up was just plain fun. We quickly reached the top ridge.

The views from the ridge were simply spectacular. Weart glacier was visible now and we were awed at the immensity of it. The sun was reflecting off its ice and cracks, crevasses and seracs were visible everywhere. We had a 360-degree view. We could even see The Table, The Black Tusk, The Tantalus Range and hundreds of mountain chains in all directions. Looking back over the ridge, we could see how it connects Weart and Wedge and how it would probably be possible to traverse from one mountain to the other over it.

We took many photos and continued up the ridge towards the summit. The route was quite easy to start with but half way up it got quite steep and the elevation was finally starting to be felt. It was a lot tougher going up and my pace was drastically slowed. Paul led ahead with me close behind. Chris disappeared from view as his pace was slowed by the many photo ops he was stopping for.

The last section got really nasty. We had veered off a bit too much to the right and it was just a nightmare. The rocks were all big and looser than anything we had come across up to that point. It was frightening to crawl up this stuff. Every step felt like you would unleash an avalanche of rocks that would sweep you off the mountain all the way down into the glacier below. To make it worse, I was starting to feel the elevation more and had a slight dizziness. A bit stressful, watching ahead to make sure Paul doesn’t drop any big rocks on my head, while struggling to spread my weight evenly across the rocks to make sure I don’t dislodge anything on Chris below, all while fighting a slight dizziness and feeling more tired by the second. I was glad when I finally reached the peak. Wasn’t even that excited about being up there. I just wanted to get out of that death trap. After a few minutes of sitting down I was starting to feel better and took lots and lots of photos. Looking around the summit it looked as though we were sitting on some giant cairn. Paul was even saying how one small tremor and that summit would be slightly lowered as it dropped everything from the top.

It was 9:30am. Our entire group was at the top including Eugene and Bogdan. The wind was howling, the sun was shinning and the views were unreal. Even mighty Wedge didn’t look so big at just 70m above us. There were glaciers everywhere you looked and chains of mountains as far as the eye can see. We could even see Wedgemount Lake where we camped, and lower down, Whistler village.

We traded stories about the route up with Bogdan and Eugene. Bogdan was telling us how he attempted going up a chimney to gain the final ridge and dislodged some big rocks. One of these rocks cut his leg a bit above the knee while the rest tumbled down as he barely managed to hold on and not to be dragged down with them. This was the rockslide we had noticed earlier as we were coming up. We were glad he made it up safely. It was a good thing his instincts told him to test out the route while Eugene was safely out of the way as otherwise it could have been a lot worse.

Bogdan and Eugene left the summit shortly after we had arrived and then I followed after them. The elevation was starting to bother me again and my dizziness was increasing. I had experienced this exact sensation before when I was in Peru at 3400m so I recognized it right away as a sign of AMS. I was a little surprised to feel it at just over 2800m but I assumed the exertion made things worse. I had to get down so I didn’t wait for Paul and Chris. This time I stayed to the right where the path was clear. It was easy. I was a little annoyed I took that other route on the way up, as this would have been so much nicer and safer. I made it back down to the ridge quickly and waited for Paul and Chris to arrive. My dizziness went away and I was feeling great again.

We then descended the same route we came up. The way down turned out to be quite a bit easier. We somehow managed to find more stable routes this time. Either that or we were getting used to the dance. We reached the snow patch that we went around before and we could see the tracks that Bogdan and Eugene left behind. Paul decided he would glissade down the same route. Near to the bottom of it he lost control and started sliding towards the rocks rapidly. Luckily he managed to slow himself before he hit the rocks. I followed on the same route I took before, over the boulders. Chris followed behind and he attempted the snow too, also with dangerous consequences. He lost control almost immediately and headed straight towards the rocks I was climbing over, at a rapid slide. Luckily he didn’t catch enough speed to hurt himself and landed safely. He followed on the rocks the rest of the way.

We were then descending towards the unnamed glacier where we ran into a couple of people (very lightly dressed) that were headed up. Paul and Chris decided to just traverse the glacier this time. I went on my own around it. It meant scrambling a bit over good rock and descending again over some more scree but I didn’t feel comfortable risking the glacier. We had both arrived at the edge of the glacier at the same time so I was happy to have taken that route. We then had to scramble down some more good rock to get back on the scree facing Wedgemount glacier. Past that I started walking down this slightly sloping, big granite slab as Paul accidentally unleashed half a dozen rocks. He screamed “ROCK” at me and I turned around to see them flying towards me, bouncing over the slab. I had just enough time to jump twice as the rocks bounced under me. Paul was laughing later that I was lucky I had my gymnastic skills to perform those quick moves.

The last section was short and not much of a problem. The soil dried up in the sun in the meantime, which made the boulders looser but it was still easier than what we had done earlier. We reached the campsite shortly (7 hours after our departure that morning) and spent a couple of hours relaxing, eating and packing up. The weather deteriorated past this point and clouds were rolling in. It got quite a bit cooler and we were feeling a bit sorry for the two lightly dressed people that were probably freezing at the top at that point.

We left the campsite with Bogdan, Eugene and Paul going ahead. They got to the car rapidly. Chris and I took it easy on the way down, slowing every step with our poles to protect our knees. I normally run downhill but after the previous week’s pain for running down from Williams Peak, I wasn’t planning on not being able to walk again for days. We reached the car in about 2 hours and found Paul waiting for us. Bogdan and Eugene had left already.

This was a tough and very memorable hike. It was probably one of the toughest I had been on. The route wasn’t much fun because of the many scree sections and the instability of the rocks but the views more than made it worthwhile. I don’t plan on returning any time soon, although that area still remains at the top of my list of favorite places to be.