North Face History

[Ann]

I'm writing an article for a Palm Springs publication on historic attempts on the North Face of San Jacinto. The idea is not to encourage thrillseekers but to celebrate the noble history of this route. Accounts go as far back as 1896 and include a 1938 climb by Ruth Dyar Mendenhall, who wrote about it in her book "Woman on the Rocks".

If you know historic tidbits (including modern "history" from the '60s and '70s, etc.) I'd appreciate hearing them. We are also looking for early photos of climbers on the North Face.

Thank you!

[Cy Kaicener]

Wikipedia says that the first known ascent was by Floyd Vernoy and Stewart White of Riverside in 1931
Here is a link to more recent climbs including a climbers log. Its a useful place to start.
http://www.summitpost.org/route/155928/snow-creek.html
http://angeles.sierraclub.org/hps/archives/hps01169.htm

[ajwoodzy]

A guy named Miguel Forjan has done the route 8 times (that's got to be the record)

[Perry]

Another guy has done it I think 20 times and has summitted in 5.5 hours. I forgot his name but met him once a few years ago. He's friends with a retired ranger.

With anything but perfect hardpack, I think it's safer to have extra-long points on crampons. Even the standard alpine hinged crampons lose traction on a steep incline with a thin slush layer on top of hardpack.

[neverwashasbeen]

I would point you to the Air Force. When I first became involved with the mountain, I met some members of the Air Rescue Unit that were stationed at March AFB. The unit number escapes me, 346 or something similar. One of their training exercises was climbing Snow Creek. They had just recently completed a 7 hour ascent when I met them. They also liked to make the trip from San Gorgonio to San Jacinto. This was when a letter giving permission to cross their land from Desert Water Agency was available for the asking. Needless to say, the air rescue airmen made many ascents.

Another source would be the Riverside Mountain Rescue Unit, they used to regularly climb Snow Creek for training in their earlier days, I know that my half dozen climbs of the route is no big deal to the old timers in that group.

One last source I'd suggest is old boy scouts. Former RMRU member and Boy Scout leader, Jim Fairchild, took many of his troops up on the North Face, even climbing Snow Creek in the Summer. He led a trip where two boys died at Falls Creek when they stayed behind at camp while the rest of the group went up the canyon and then wandered off a cliff.

Oh, for completeness, contact Dave Ezel (?spelling) who is now a High School teacher in Corona (I think). He was on the only ascent of the West Fork of Snow Creek that I've heard of, it was an epic from what he describes.

I know very little about the climb of Falls Creek, other than it's a nightmare unless there has been a extremely heavy snowfall with major avalanches which extend all the way to the isthmus. Because conditions are never good, it's rarely done.

Good luck with your article, I'll look forward to reading it when it's published.

[Cy Kaicener]

Anne posted this interesting story (posted on this message board earlier)
http://www.palmspringslife.com/Palm-Spr ... mp-Beyond/

Here is more about Ruth Dyar's climbs
http://angeles.sierraclub.org/skimt/text/basecamp.htm

[bluerail]

love that article Cy, and I can tell you that going up that thing 6 out of 7 weeks in a row this season, it really starts to wear on you. our last trip up we were cursed with soft, mushy, deep snow that made it seem like we'd never get out of there...it drained both of us and was so hard to gather the strength to summit I didn't know what to do. it was sort of an unearthly fatigue.

But we had also been on it for so many weekends in a row that recovery was never realized. We were wearing out.

Enjoying some other routes up your hill these days...but would really like to run into you friend. Maybe someday soon.

[Cy Kaicener]

Steve - The last two times I did Skyline I felt that unearthly fatigue after Flat Rock and that was without snow. At 7500 feet my legs were cramping. My body was trying to tell me that I am not 71 anymore. Nevertheless, I will go again on the first full moon in October at midnight unless my back is acting up again. Incidently, have you tried climbing snowshoes with the spikes in front. I dont know if that would work at Snow Creek. How much did you post hole in soft snow?

Here is a link to Greg Hill about climbing and skiing 2 million vertical feet in 2010 including 51000 vertical feet gain in one day
http://theadventureblog.blogspot.com/20 ... tical.html

[Cy Kaicener]

Ann mentioned that Carl Garczynski (of Indio) climbed SJ via Snow Creek 27 times. I could not find a climbing website about his accomplishments which included Mount Everest. I did however find his old metreological website.
http://cvwd.org/conservation/weather.php

[bluerail]

we went up SC again this past saturday, and ended up in one of the chutes near the SJ peak, having only been in there before with snow in it, the amount of historical noise on that side of the mountain was interesting. we found loads of old cans, hewn and/or milled timbers, very old electrical type insulators...etc. This was at about 10,000' right down the main chute from the peak. Anybody know what the living history might have been up there concerning any humans ?

btw....this is an incredibly hard trip, and I highly recommend against doing it, we had gotten in bad situations more than a few times and I doubt I will ever do it again.