I spent the past 6 days in the Bugaboos climbing on the East and West faces of Snowpatch Spire, McTech Arete and the Beckey-Chouinard.

The Bugaboo-Snowpatch Col was in fantastic shape most of the week, with huge bucket steps until the last few meters of gravel. People were going up and down all hours of the day and night (often without crampons) with very little rockfall hazard. However, yesterday I noticed a rapid deterioration with much more rock exposed, very thin snow at the top, and also the middle of the second rappel. This are will require more caution from now on.

There were a couple of small afternoon thunderstorms, but all of the normal routes were pretty dry. There’s still a small snowpatch above the Cooper-Kor, so the last couple of steeper pitches are probably wet.

It was nice to have a 70m rope to clear the last hole associated with the bergschrund when rappelling off the South Howser Tower yesterday. A 60m rope would leave you in between the crevasses and would make it trickier to get down safely, although still possible as you can step down and across it.

Photos all from yesterday July 30th.

Overall excellent conditions in the Bugs. Enjoy the rest of the alpine rock season!