Ascent Notes for: East Ridge - 5.6 popular Average Rating : 4.67/5

A really fun route, kind of like a classic Sierra traverse but with more bugs. Approached via Tiger Tower, the gully is 3 pitches of 3rd-very easy 5th class climbing that allows one to remain dry when the ledge appoach is seeping. Once again, another bad rc.com route description - I'd update it but the user who takes 20 minutes to do so gets no credit...

We opted to climb Tiger Tower/East Ridge in hopes of beating a few groupes that had started ahead of us to the side walk portion of Wolfs Head

Great route, makes for a long day in the mountains at an easy grade--exactly what I'm after, and this one is better than most routes! Spectacular knife-edge ridge.

I also had my closest call ever on the descent. We started in the dark (never a good idea), tried to drop back toward Cirque Lake WAY too early, and ended up rapping down a deep cleft above Cirque Lake. DO NOT DO THIS!

About 200 feet up in the dark about 1 a.m., I was unroped on a tiny ledge (big enough for half my right foot) with my left foot smeared out on a small dish, trying to pull a stuck rap rope. It came--but so did a heap of loose rock. I had nowhere to go, and a rock about the size of a basketball landed on my left thigh and came to rest there. HUGE bruise, limped back to camp (arrived at 6 a.m. or so) with my partner's help, and spent 10 days icing my leg with ice from a nearby snowfield.

On the bright side, the weather was crappy for those 10 days anyway, and afterwards my partner and I went on to climb Pingora before we had to leave. All in all, a great trip. But I'm much more cautious about descents, now.

Best rigde climb I've ever done.