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New Route on Robson's Emperor Face
By Dougald MacDonald
Colin Haley and Steve House leapt into an open weather window and quickly climbed a new route on the massive Emperor Face of Mt. Robson, the highest peak in the Canadian Rockies. On May 23, a good forecast inspired the two to drive north from Seattle, and the next afternoon they helicoptered to the col between Robson’s North Face and the Helmet. Early the next morning, they descended an icefall to reach the foot of the Emperor Face’s steep headwall, above the lower reaches of the Mist Glacier. The two chose to climb the gully system to the right of the 1978 Jim Logan-Mugs Stump route, the first line completed on the face. Haley led the first block of seven pitches (each "pitch" averaging 80 meters in length), and then House led a block of seven harder pitches averaging 55 meters. House found difficulties up to M7 during his final two leads on the headwall. These last few pitches were shared with the Logan-Stump route, and House found three fixed pitons on his final lead that were left by Jim Logan when he led the same pitch in 1978.
They topped out on the headwall at 10:30 p.m. and chopped a small ledge for a bivy, then continued up two easier mixed pitches the next morning to reach the Emperor Ridge, which they crossed to Robson’s upper Southwest Face. After traversing all the way to the Wishbone Arête in deteriorating weather, they climbed past that route’s weird ice gargoyles to reach the 12,989-foot summit in a whiteout at 1 p.m. They descended by the Kain Route, then descended the Robson Glacier on May 27, still in whiteout conditions, and walked out to the road early on May 28. This was House's fifth trip to Robson to attempt the Emperor Face, and his fourth time actually starting up a route, dating back to 1996. Several of those efforts were with Barry Blanchard, who finally completed his own new route on the face, Infinite Patience, in 2002 with Eric Dumerac and Philippe Pellet. Dates of Ascent: May 25-26, 2007 Source: www.cascadeclimbers.com, Colin Haley , www.metoliusclimbing.com
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