University Peak north face

Kelly Maas and Linda Sun from the Sierra Club’s Peak Climbing Section picked me up after work yesterday for the 7-hour drive to Onion Valley. We were going to the east side of the Sierra Nevada, where we’d meet up with 4 more trip members the next morning to climb University Peak.

We drove over 10,000-foot Tioga Pass under a cold, star-filled sky and then took a dirt road from Deadman Summit to Obsidian Dome, where we parked our car and laid down our sleeping bags in the sagebrush. It was almost midnight, but the moon and the Milky Way still lit up the huge ponderosa pines around us. The elevation, about 8,000 feet, would help us acclimatize for the next day’s hike while we slept.

When Linda’s alarm woke us up at 5, it was 40 degrees and still dark. A common poorwill sang from the trees and the sky had just begun to lighten in the east. We changed into our hiking clothes, put away our sleeping bags, and were back on the road in 20 minutes.

We finished the drive to Onion Valley, at 9,200 feet, at 7:30 in the morning. There, Kelly, Linda, and I got ready for our hike and then waited for the rest of the group. Hank, Rob, Dara, and Sassan gradually showed up at the trailhead and we got on our way around 8:30, a half hour late. Linda, suspicious of the late start, made sure everyone brought their headlamps in case we finished after dark.

The trail from Onion Valley to Kearsarge Pass is a beautiful one, climbing through a wonderland of granite peaks and tall pines, crossed by wildflower-lined streams and roaring waterfalls and dotted by deep-blue lakes. Among the sagebrush, curl-leaf mountain mahogany, and pinemat manzanita were bright red Bridge’s penstemon, orange buckwheat, wavyleaf Indian paintbrush, and Leichtlin’s mariposa lily, which I’d just seen for the first time less than a week ago on the way to Tyee Lakes. In the greener areas near streams I saw bold orange Kelley’s lily, magenta fireweed, white Coulter’s daisy, and white yarrow and poison angelica.

Not long after we started our hike, we got our first view of University Peak and the route we’d take to its summit, the north face. As usual, the pictures I’d looked at before today hadn’t prepared me for how big it really was, rising over 3,000 feet above the valley.

After passing Gilbert Lake, we left the Kearsarge Pass Trail on the signed trail to Matlock Lake. We didn’t stay on the path for long, instead heading directly uphill through the forest toward Bench Lake. From the north end of Bench Lake, we could see University Peak’s north face more clearly, looking to me even more imposing and improbable than it had before: loose, steep chutes, ribs clogged with enormous boulders, and walls of granite split into vertical fissures.

After a short rest, we hiked over to the east side of Bench Lake where a solid Class 2 ridge led to Lake 3460 m at the bottom of the north face route. We stopped for some water, then traversed around the south side of the unnamed lake across a loose fan of scree to the more solid rib that runs down the north face. The terrain on the rib stayed mostly Class 2 with a few Class 3 sections, our group making its way over and around appliance-sized boulders lying on mostly solid gravel. This terrain continued for thousands of vertical feet, steadily draining my energy.

A few hundred meters below the ridge, we climbed solid Class 3 granite with some awkward moves that made a few of us nervous, but on the descent we found that this section was easily avoided by staying to the climber’s left.

Near the summit ridge, we stayed north of the crest on Class 2 ledges, sometimes descending a little. We reached an apparent impasse near the summit, but a cairn showed the way through a small window between large talus. We all squeezed through it and kept on our way.

When our ledge came to an end at a granite wall, it was about the width of a sidewalk and angled slightly toward a hideous cliff that no one went near. Opposite the cliff was a snowfield some 20 feet high blocking any simple path to the ridge. I was ready to call it quits until Linda and Kelly kicked some steps up the snow. I was hesitant to follow, since a slip on the snow could mean falling off the ledge, but I tested the steps and they were firm. I made my way up, mindful not to look behind me at the cliff, and soon found myself above the snow on solid granite. One more brief scramble and I was on the summit.

The entire group summitted at 2:30, 6 hours after we started. The views were stunning: endless brown and gray mountains fading into hazy blue distances, towering over vast basins filled with forests, meadows, and wandering streams.

We signed the summit register notebook (which was completely soaked) but didn’t linger, since we had a long way back. I didn’t like the prospect of having to descend the snowfield to our little ledge, and I was eager to get it over with, so I was the second one down after Linda. I clawed the snow with my hands, numbing my fingers, but the downclimb was straightforward and I found myself once again standing happily on rock.

We descended the way we came, angling right to avoid the awkward Class 3 from the ascent. After that, we naturally veered left into the fall line and off the rib, toward the broad gully in the middle of the north face, where we could plunge-step down the sandy slope. But this wasn’t without its perils, as one of us sent down some football-sized boulders, nearly hitting Hank’s arm.

The loose rock notwithstanding, the descent was easier than the ascent, and I took time to enjoy the scenery and wildflowers. Up there the flowers were strictly alpine, offering themselves only to those who expend the effort required to come see them. They grew in sparse, isolated clumps on the steep rocks: bright yellow alpine gold and purple, pungent sky pilot.

After the rock fall, I’d had enough of the loose scree and traversed to the right, back onto the rib, where I once again had solid footing. But the fall line got the better of me again, and I dropped down into the chute to the right of the rib too soon as I tried to angle toward Lake 3460 m. The chute was quite loose and I had a few exciting moments where I was sliding down the mountainside on a carpet of rolling rocks; I would step back, worried I’d set off a chain-reaction rock slide otherwise. But as I neared the lake, the talus became more solid and I rejoined the rest of the group.

A low-angle snowfield gave Kelly a chance to boot-ski down to the lake, which he did in fine style. I followed, squatting down on the snow and glissading as far as its angle allowed – much more fun than walking on talus. Down at the lake, a few of us joked that it was the only fun we’d had all day.

We trekked back onto the Matlock Lake Trail and then the Kearsarge Pass Trail. Walking on maintained trail again was a breeze, but I’d forgotten how long the return to the car would be. But there were no worries. The sun was setting and the mountains were glowing amber under purple clouds. The wildflowers looked even more colorful than they had in the morning. And, as I walked, a nearly full moon rose and I watched the last light slip from the mountains across the Owens Valley as well as University Peak.