Sentry
Mountain
height: 2,435
m (7,987 ft)
Elevation gain:
1,050 m
Ascent time:
Descent time:
Scrambling and a little mountaineering with Mark.
Although we did make the summit of Sentry (eventually!), this mountain definitely warrants a return trip. Clear weather to see more of the splendid view, less ice to enable us to stay on the ridge throughout, and several hours of additional daylight to attempt the south summit would all probably contribute to a better overall experience, although I'm certainly not complaining about this one.
From the road, the ascent looked as though it would be problem-free – very little snow and warm and fairly decent weather. Of course, looks can be very deceiving, especially in the mountains, and especially in the coldest month of the year.
Thankfully, we reconsidered our initial plan to travel light (no rope, harnesses, or heavy winter wear) and pretty much took everything. Within an hour, I was wearing my Gore-Tex gloves, three layers of clothing and my balaclava, due to a cold and constant west wind, that didn’t let up for one minute of the 8+ hour day. Another hour and our 10 m rope came out, and further up we were forced to use the 30 m rope - yet another reminder that you can’t be too prepared when scrambling in the winter months.
The first section of the mountain lived up to our expectations and was very easy and straightforward. At the first highpoint, the view of the false summit block and intervening ridge was terrific. The ridge started to narrow and travel, as well as the scenery, became increasingly more interesting and exciting. Unfortunately, we also started to see the worst thing possible on the ground beneath our feet – ice….and lots of it! We were forced to crawl across a couple of mildly exposed sections that we normally would have simply walked over. We also roped up to traverse these parts. Even the brief detour around the notch that Kane mentions became a challenge, as again we had to descend rock covered in a thin layer of ice.
More elevation….more ice! With the false summit block much closer now, we could see that the entire thing was covered in a layer of ice. There was no way we were going anywhere near it and so we opted to leave the ridge and traverse snow and ice-free scree slopes to the right, in hopes of circumventing the icy terrain. Fortunately, we were able to make our way around the block (enjoying some beautiful rock scenery along the way) and plodded back up to the ridge. Unfortunately, that first false summit block was only a minor taste of what was ahead and after continuing very slowly and cautiously along the ridge for a short distance, we found ourselves confronted with an even scarier looking wall of ice-covered rock. We looked at a couple of routes, but they both appeared to be suicidal and so our options were to call it a day, backtrack down dicey terrain at least several hundred vertical metres and find a way around the right side, or get down to the scree slope just below to find an easier way around.
With time becoming an issue, we chose the third option and quickly set up to rappel down to the scree, where the cliffband was the lowest. We were lucky to find a huge jutting outcrop of rock to place a sling around and did the short rappel with ease. This proved to be the last obstacle of the day and after traversing around the dangerous block, a 20 minute grind up snowy scree slopes brought us mercifully to the summit. Given that we both thought that we would fail on numerous occasions during the trying ascent, this was actually a pretty sweet summit to achieve. The only downside was that after spending almost the entire ascent seeing the summit bathed in beautiful sunlight, by the time we arrived, cloud at about 2,500 m had moved in, denying us the terrific view we were expecting. We sat at the summit, shivering in the bitter cold, for 30 minutes before we decided that the clouds were not going to grant us a better view.
The descent was very easy. Perhaps part of the reason we persisted in making the summit was that we could always see an easier descent route and so were never too worried about descending some of the “iffy” terrain we had come up. Naturally, the sun came out and once again lit up the summit, when we were far enough down to completely rule out going back up. We could have descended easy scree slopes almost to the bottom, but chose to traverse left and gain the ridge again, just for fun and to see more of the eye-catching scenery of the mountain. Right before regaining the ridge, a short, but tricky little climbing section caused us a little angst. It was only about two moves, but not easy in scrambling boots and thick gloves. Overall, a great day - we got way more than we bargained for on this trip, but isn’t that what makes the mountains great?!
Heading up the ridge to the more interesting sections
The ridge begins to narrow here and there are numerous pinnacles and drop-offs to negotiate passed
Off the ridge and on the south slopes to avoid the icy sections
Mark takes a scenic diversion to survey the upper slopes of the south side of the mountain; the peak behind is a possible extension of the trip
Interesting rock scenery on the south slopes
Back on the ridge, on the treacherous icy upper slopes; this part of the route was sheer ice with a thin layer of snow on top; we had no intention of trying to ascend the rockband at the right
The summit (left) and the short, but exposed ridgewalk to it; this was the point where we backed down a short distance and then rappelled to scree slopes below
The rock we rappelled off is at the lower centre of the photo
At the summit, looking back along the ascent route (but not the one we took!)
Checking out the beautiful rock and snow scenery on the way down
More great scenery
Traversing the south slopes, with the second summit at the right
A short climbing section to regain the ridge