After having seen the imposing form of Sir Donald from the Trans-Canadian Highway en route to Mount Assiniboine, I knew I had to come back. Aidan and I casually talked about doing it on the way home from our Bugaboos trip (this would have saved a lot of driving), but we were tired and lazy and decided to just drive back. Now, with the opportunity of being in the Seattle area over summer, I knew this might be one of my few opportunities to climb it. In fact, if I were able to climb Sir Donald this year, I knew I could call this a successful summer, though way less prolific than years past. So it goes.

An impressive sight from the road!

So, I recruited Daniel and Ari for the mission. At the last moment, Daniel was unable to go so I was left wondering if this would be a good idea just as a party of two (where filming isn't as convenient). When I looked at the situation and realized that this particular weekend was probably my last until late August, we decided to go for it. To maximize the best weather, we actually decided to leave Sunday morning with the hopes that we'd be fast and that we'd storm the mountain, returning to camp by early afternoon and thus back to Seattle by late evening on Monday morning. Things were not to go as expected.

We arrived at the Roger's Pass Visitor Center (below photo) quite early, around 4pm, I believe. We'd left early so as to get the requisite passes on time. I'd read on the internet that the Visitor Center closed at 4:30, but found myself questioning that as we approached - it was the middle of summer; it doesn't get dark until quite late. Why would they close so early?

Sure enough, the Visitor Center does close quite late (8:30) and we got started hiking sometime around 4:30 or 5pm. The hike to the meadows beneath Sir Donald was thankfully straightforward and easy, with a nice river and greatly receded glacier providing views along the way. Most of the time, the foreshortened view of Sir Donald is on the horizon to the left. From here, it didn't look too big. "Hmm, mabye we'll be down by noon", I thought. Then we turned left and started up a steep, gravelly trail that deposited us in a small basin beneath the west face where we set up camp. It was nice to have arrived early enough to allow for adequate time to relax before going to bed. A few drops of rain fell on us, nothing significant. There were mixed clouds as we went to bed.

Camp below Mount Sir Donald

The next morning was quite cloudy and the summit of Sir Donald was hidden in clouds. We began hiking up talus along the way to the the Sir Donald - Uto col. After 30 minutes of rock-hopping, we were on a comfortable trail that led to the col. Another party was up here and another showed up...both of them were on their way to Uto. No one was climbing Sir Donald today. It was understandable: though the pictures don't show it, from the col, Sir Donald is a sobering sight with it's long northwest ridge steeply climbing into the sky. On top of that, the col was very windy and the summit was still engulfed in lenticular clouds, an indication that the winds were even worse high above. Ari was visibly disturbed at the sight of the route. I practically had on every piece of clothing as we headed off. We could always turn around.

(l-r) Approaching the col, the view of the route from the col...the pic doesn't come close to doing it justice.  The arete is huge, steep, and high.

We started off on exposed 4th class grasping cold limestone as we pulled ourselves up the mountain. Not to far along, we encountered a party descending the route - two older gents who had spent the night on the route. They were in good spirits at least having talked about passing the time in a reasonably comfortable space that was protected from the high winds. We continued on. I wanted to solo as much as possible for the sake of speed, but we didn't get too far. We doubled the rope and I grabbed the rack and headed off intent on lots of long simul-climbs. I went for long distances placing very little gear. The general consensus on the description of the route was 5.5 steps with lots of 4th class. I thought it was a little more than that. 5.5 was a reasonable ranking, but there was a lot more 5.0 terrain that I was expecting. It was all there and mostly solid, but simply a lot more 5th class than I thought. Assiniboine, having a similar description, was a simpler climb.

(above) Ari, thinking "What am I doing here?" while enjoying the blocky but exposed climbing.

The "steps" weren't very short either. At one point a high steep wall was in front of me which was easily overcome by a left-trending crack that led to a wider crack trending back to the right that I was able to hand-traverse up. Eventually, I spotted one of the rappel stations that marks the descent that was set up in 2003. If you're wanting to climb this route, be sure that you go to the Roger's Pass visitor center and get the description of the descent; it will save you a lot of time.

(l-r) First view of something that looks like a summit,
Ari climbing with lots of air under him,
"How far below is that ice?!?"

Continuing on, we followed lots of blocky terrain with an occasional slabby section where the climbing felt "real". I tended to favor different sides of the ridge depending on how I was feeling physically - left for sun and wind, right for cold rock and shade. The exposure is great on both sides, but the air really tugs on the right side over the west face. If the rock looked slabby with cracks, I'd favor the right; otherwise, I'd take a little mental break and go left. It felt like we were moving slowly though. Eventually, I arrived at less steep ground and could see the summit, or what I thought was the summit, fairly far away. It was a steep, sharp, and intimidating pyramid. Well, it usually looks harder than it really is. "Another hour to the summit," I thought? It would be more than that. At this point, we were on bona fide 3rd class terrain - the first 3rd class of the climb. Ari went lead off for this part. We thought about unroping, but it would have been a pain to coil it, uncoil it and put it back on, etc. At the end of his lead at a nice rest spot, he wisely insisted on taking a break to eat since the summit would probably be exposed to the wind. Ari looked mentally drained. After eating, I took the rack and headed off again. At the top of the steep pyramid, I saw that I still wasn't at the summit. Another 15-20 minutes. We finally arrived on the summit and I wasn't keen to linger at all. It had taken us over six ours to climb the route - quite pokey. In order to get down in time, we couldn't afford to dilly dally. Strangely enough, I still had hopes of driving back this afternoon.

(l-r) Ari arrives to see the true summit,
standing on top,
the traverse off the summit on the descent

The first part of the descent involves descending down the opposite side of the summit block. This is mostly third class, sometimes loose, that leads down to a broad scree face. We followed cairns and ledges to a pathway that lead under the summit and back to the ridge. At the ridge, we opted to solo down instead of rope up. The climbing was easy but there were moments when the heart pounded extra as we made exposed moves around bulges or thin ledges. The description of the descent talked about "easy descending on the ridge leads to the first rappel station." It was quite a way before we arrived at the first rappel station. We made two rappels on slings and downclimbed a lot before arriving at the first station. Because we went so far, we were wondering if we'd missed the first one. But, once we got to the end of the second official rappel and saw the characteristic easy downclimb to the third rappel, we realized we were on route. At the end of the fifth rappel, we arrived at the station with the yellow tailings indicating it was time to go down the face. These rappels went quickly. Arriving at the base of the gully, we still had a good amount of downclimbing in front of us. We walked down more ledges with occasional 3rd and 4th class moves to the part labeled "4th class on the descent topo", which was actually a steep section of polished slabs. Fortunately, I found another new rappel station (not mentioned on the info at the visitor center but obviously installed by the same team). There were two rappel stations that took us to the steep moraine which we followed back to camp just as the sun was setting. There was no real thought of hiking out tonight; that would have been crazy. We just had a meager dinner, a lot of water, and went to bed.

(l-r) Heart-pounding downclimbing,
Rappelling (what a relief!)

The drive back the next day was pleasant. Ari basically slept the whole way and I drove in silence for 8 hours enjoying the views, never once getting bored. We were one day overdue, but had successfully climbed Sir Donald, which I'd wanted to do for a long time. To those wishing to climb the peak, the only advice I could give is to not underestimate the length of the ridge. Be prepared to solo much of the route or simul-climb efficiently. There's no way to climb the route in a day if you pitch the whole thing out. Also, more importantly, expect that you will be mentally drained by the constant exposure. If you're not accustomed to this, it can really sap your will.  Have fun!