Jun 13 | Alaska Expedition Report: The Tooth Traverse

By Renan Ozturk

Where is alpine climbing going?  What is moving the sport forward?  Certainly remote exploratory climbing is always going to be significant, but with new objectives dwindling enchainments are an obvious challenge.   

The Ruth Gorge of Alaska, with the some of largest walls on earth, has always been a testing ground for climbing.  Most of the major formations have been climbed.  However, the Tooth Traverse stands out as a natural link up of some of the most iconic peaks in the Alaska range.  It is comprised of about  12,000 feet of rock, ice and snow. Last year's attempt with Zack Smith taught us a lot about the level of strategy, route-finding and planning it would take to pull this off in a fast and light style.

   This year with support including American Alpine Club grants like the Lyman Spitzer and Inspire Award we attempted the route in a team of 3 bringing Alaskan hardman and recent author Freddie Wilkinson on board.  

The bush plane dropped us the glacier we set up our veteran New Dome 8 on got to work on the project.  Within the 1st week we where able to climb "The Swamp Donkey Express", on the loose and unexplored south face of the Mooses Tooth.

It put up a fight:  We had to hack away at loose rock for 6 hours to ascend only half a rope-length...the bleeder pitch!

 

We were overjoyed at this small success because it was the biggest question mark on the skyline, it was possible!  After considerable rest down in basecamp, we gave the entire project a go from the beginning.  We encountered difficult conditions: what took us 3 hrs last year turned into an all day affair.  Making the transition from rock shoes to boots was time consuming.  On the pitch pictured below we tried to save time by climbing in our big boots.  This proved to be a bad idea since one of the senconds fell with the rope grating over the sharp edge, cutting it to the core. 

So, at the end of a taxing day we set up camp to try recover near the summit the sugar tooth: a rock island in the sky we chopped out of the snow.

We slept tightly in our small TNF prototype single wall assault tent: 1 man crammed in the back corner (Zack) and Freddie and myself sharing a custom lightweight 2 man bag, "the man sack".  With the best intentions we awoke early and completed the final snow fins of the Sugar tooth surrounded by beautiful twilight cloud layer, looking back at all of the rock towers we had navigated the day before.

  Unfortunately the reality of the situation was that we had dropped an ice tool and had a core shot (torn to the center) rope from the convoluted climbing the day before.  After much deliberation we retreated down the steep snow gully between the Eye and Sugar Tooth, our last logical point to escape before the point of no return.

 Considering the amount of terrain that lay ahead and the foul weather that came in it ended up being the right call.  At this point we are all back in civilization plotting the return as well as going through hours of video that will at some point form a creative short film...stay tuned and thanks for following, ~renan

 

Comments

[jan reynolds]

Hey there Renan.... I remember climbing with Jim Bridwell just after his success on Mooses Tooth with Mugs Stump.... worth looking up that history as a first of its kind, the bird is pretty amazing.... we then went on to do the first winter ascent for Americans, and the second in history in the Himalaya. I could tell you some stories from there that would make your hair curl (even more) and howl with laughter..... some day when I'm back at base at TNF, I think you'd all like to hear some of the old stories..... puts the new into perspective. Been following your work, intensely creative, but I still think my favorite was your short, heading out to climb, with the coffee pot, dog, skateboard and all.... the feeling of climber life came through, loved that.... I remember the days of living in a friend's garage in Boulder to climb..... janreynolds@pshift.com www.janreynolds.com

[mt surf]

Awesome inspiration Renan.

Stoked to see your video.

[Michea Westbrook]

It was great sharing the Ruth with you guys. Very inspirational stuff. I was one of the Anchorage boys you ran into while you were coming down Ham and Eggs. We were the ones with our ropes stuck. Heard the sad news of the events that happened just after we left on Freezy Nuts. Hope you guys try it again next year, it's a great traverse.

[oakley]

It's so lucky for me to find your blog! So shocking and great!

[dentist Bondi dental veneers]

Can't wait for something like this! I surely love these types of adventures yet don't have the time to actually do it. Great story and keep it up guys!