Climbing up the North Dome in the Catskills . Navigation practice as Spring returns to a mountain crowned in rock and emerald moss
Previously: Part 1
Part 2
And so Steemit friends this is the third part of the first Spring climb up North Dome. We've arrived at a very passable cliff shelter but have decided to continue on, creating a gps waypoint as reference and continuing to navigate around the North side of North Dome as we return to the East and the Mink Hollow Valley.
I'm a bit fatigued; this picture catches me in that state pretty well I think...I'm not exactly Ueli Steck who passed away recently on the flanks of Mount Nuptse in Nepal. Ueli was renowned for his incredibly quick passages up the great mountains- he once climbed the North Face of the Eiger in less than three hours! Ordinarily a team of fully equipped world class mountaineers would take four days...
As previously described, trees experience very significant mortality up here due to the tremendous cold and wind...
A tree burl; yet another sign of tree stress on the Northern face.
I was once told by a very experienced Catskill climber that a good exercise is simply to follow the birch trees all the way around a mountain as an exercise in navigation. I used them here to stay at approximately 3100-3200 feet. The rocks buried under the leaves and debris made for slow difficult going.
Because they are still together they are still standing.
Looking North into the East West Valley that Spruceton Road runs through. I can tell I am on the north facing part of North Dome. I am guessing that ridge to the left is the flank of Mount Sherrill.
After upclimbing to get to the second ridge more quickly I enter the magical world at 3400 feet. I was out of the rocky talus at 3100 feet and moving among huge blocks of stone covered in moss. It has a timeless and prehistoric
quality about it.
Some more pictures...
Success! I can tell I have arrived above the Mink Hollow Brook Valley because the neighboring ridge line is now very familiar. In total darkness I would have looked down the slope that I could see and taken the bearing. If the direction was East I would know I had gotten there also. I would have known I was facing down the correct ridge because of the number of paces I had already travelled.
The frightening part of the trip and a learning experience. From the top this looked like a leafed up notch that would make for safe passage down this section of the broken cliff bands.
I began to ease down and just as my feet touched the log I realized I was poised above a 15 foot plunge. I also realized that the log was about to give way beneath my feet. That feeling is quite distinctive- you know you have made a dangerous mistake...and you know you might or might not escape. You are in the teeth of the mountain.
Notice how the leaves above the log blend with those below. But beneath past the upper leaves it is basically vertical.
In these circumstances you slowly ease off your pack...choke up your hiking pole...
and turn around fast and spike it in as fast as you can.
You try to get both hands on it closer to the point and your elbows wide. Also since it is likely that it won't gain purchase the first time the key is to prepare to spike down as many times as you can until you either gain a hold or run out of time.Also as you turn around you try to get the pole close to the center of your chest where you are the strongest.
If you run out of time your wide elbows will drag the leaves and debris together to slow you down and your elbows may (hopefully) snag on something.
Luckily the log didn't break and I was able to catch on the second try with the pole. So I eased my way out and pulled my backpack up after me.
I say learning experience but it is mostly 'practice'. I move quite slowly and patiently through these areas because I know such situations exist. The learning part might be that one never goes down a leafed slope with a dead tree without examining it from more than one angle.
Down at the pond, toward the Southern end. I drifted a bit toward the end, probably because of brush and because I began to navigate toward the sound rather than bias myself toward the North.
This is the South end of Mink Hollow Lake. I'm taking breather and looking around. What an amazing sound!
I will try to post a video with the sound. I am still learning how to bring in videos...
So this was my fourth trip up North Dome and a lot was learned. It began at 2:30 in the afternoon and ended at 10:00 at night...
not bad for a spring climb :)
As always my Steemit friends, please forgive me if I have sometimes focused more on the struggle than the beauty.
I only do this so that your journey is a safe and pleasant one should you give this a try for yourself.
It is from the struggle to navigate that Freedom comes, the Freedom to go in trackless places, to see things as the ancestors did- new and untrammelled. And in that sense of fear and awe the beauty and vastness can influence you that much more profoundly. Surviving to self reliance takes a good deal of humility but that humility is easy to come by out here :)
Please Follow me as I seek this Freedom.
PS. all pictures were taken with a Canon EOS 70D (18-55 mm lens, hooded because you need it hooded out here!)