Mt. Shasta - Casaval Ridge

21-22 May 2004 - by Sid Rao

Trip leader: Art M Participants: Sara B, Frank P, Alfornso P, Benson D, Sid

Fri: We decided to camp at Horse Camp instead of going to high camp at 9,600' on casaval ridge, in order to avoid the wind

Sat: Started at 1:45 am and started following the ridge, it was calm for the first few hours but as we gained altitude winds picked up. We didn't carry any pros or rope. Followed the tracks most of the way saving us some energy.

Route finding is not too difficult, we pretty much stayed with in 100' from the ridge through out the hike on the west side just follow the route that is most comfortable. There were some sections of around 40 deg along the way.

At around 12,600 is the "Catwalk" which is supposed to be the crux. The most difficult part was the approach since it seemed like nobody had been on that route for a while and we had to plough through waist deep powder. The catwalk itself has exposure but is wide enough. There was also a short class 3 section at around 12,300'.

The wind was getting fiercer as we went up. Reached bottom of misery hill around 1:45 pm and by now the wind was making it difficult move and it carried snow with it which stung in face. There was no one else on the mountain. Given that the peak was atleast an hr away and the wind was not going to die down, we decided to head down.

Few quick glissades got us down to campsite by 4pm.

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