Mount Phillips North Spur with Simon Richardson

John Scurlock photo

We sat at Dana Ruddy's dinner table, noting how rare it was to have three people together who had climbed the Emperor Ridge on separate occasions. For I had been telling Simon's story inaccurately when I introduced him, saying that he hadn't summitted Robson due to a storm on a prior visit to the Rockies.  Of course he had, as befits a Scot with a thousand first ascents to his name.

Could we have made it to the beautiful flowered bench above the Berg Lake trail without Dana's local beta? His great grandfather, Jack Hargreaves, did the second ascent of Robson. To say that Dana is THE dark horse of Canadian Rockies climbing of the last decades is to wildly understate his knowledge of the range.  If Jesse Milner, nicest Robson Valley local and former park warden, hadn't passed on his tips for the day long approach walk would we have felt so fresh as we traipsed through the wildflowers a mere four hours from the parking lot?  Apart from that, learning the lore of the area and appreciating the sharing spirit of the Jasper locals is half the fun.

The other key to the adventure was obviously Simon, past president of the Scottish Mountaineering Club, whose track record of long, adventurous outings in the mountains is incredibly impressive.  How do you find a huge unclimbed line on Mont Blanc in 2018? 

How do you find a new line like this on Mont Blanc in 2018??

 How many times can you have "good luck with the weather" in the coast rabge of BC before you have to admit that something else is going on?  When Simon showed up at Calgary airport with a photo from John Scurlock I didn't have a clue where Mount Phillips was (it is the mountain just north of Whitehorn).  But Dana and Jesse certainly did, and they said they had both longingly looked at the north face.  Which was just fine with Simon because as he put it, "I have always wanted to climb a North face in the Rockies, and to do a first ascent in the Rockies." So off we set with four days of food during the first good weather window of the summer of 2019.

Over the shoulder, a trade route, in certain circles.

We whistled at imaginary grizzlies as we approached the Phillips glacier, and camped just to the west of the Hargreaves Glacier at 2400 m.  Waking at a very Richardsonesque 12:30 (I negotiated the extra half hour) we took two and a half hours to approach the north spur, which unfortunately was quickly revealed to face the rising sun.  

Simulclimbing the lower easy ground was key to get up high before the snow turned completely isothermic.  Our weather window was about to mark the end of the spring cycle, and I was certainly glad to regain the spur at half height, even if it did take me the better part of an hour to create an anchor.

Smiles in the sun now that we are back on the spur and off the snow slopes.

Classic north face climbing in the sun.

Slithery slush avalanches would entrain more snow on the face whenever a rock was dropped, and large wet snow avalanches would appear on the glacial bench below.  Gullies that promised easy climbing would be perfect in colder spring temperatures, but with bare hands on rock once back on the spur I couldn't complain.

Simon is wise enough in the mountains to tilt things in his favour.  "How often am I going to be back here really, so why rush?"  So we had light bivi gear and could have made this gravelly shoulder a hundred meters below the summit our camp spot if we had run into slower climbing.

All smiles on the sunny shoulder.

All that was left was a cat-walk ridge to the top, with stupendous views over the wonderful wilderness to the north. Now that I have seen the views I am curious to look at a map to determine what we were faced with. Suffice it to say that the Swift Current glacier and beyond are impressively wild terrain.

By strange coincidence (?). the first ascent of Phillips was made by Norman Collie, one of the great pioneering climbers of the Scottish Mountaineering Club, so now Phillips has two FAs by stalwarts of the SMC.

Really wild mountains here.

Peak wildflower season on the way in, and peak wildflower season on the way out.

Sometimes it is worth going for a walk to see what is around the next corner.  After roughly 10 trips up the Berg Lake trail I finally ventured off the beaten track, and found some pretty amazing vistas.

Thanks to Dana for the history lesson and context, to Jesse for his unselfishness in sharing his beta, and to Simon for the idea, the psych, and the much needed organizational skills.