Mount Shasta Avalanche gulch, Mt Shasta CA 08/08/2015

Summary

Location: Mount Shasta, Mt Shasta California
Date & Time: 08/08/2015 02:00 AM
Distance: 12.5 miles
Duration: 12 hours 45 minutes
Difficulty (1-5): 5, This cannot be considered a hike, serious climbing skills in ice and snow are required.
Official web page: http://www.fs.usda.gov/stnf/ 

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Story

I wanted to do another big challenge before the summer ends and even though i have read that climbing Mt Shasta Avalanche gulch trail in August is unsafe i ignored that advise. Later you will find out why i regretted that decision.

Climbing Mt Shasta summit in one day is cruel, total elevation to gain going from Bunny flats parking to the summit is about 7000 feet, and have in mind the distance is only just above 6 miles so that will give an average elevation gain per mile more than 1000 feet!

Mount Shasta 14,179 feet high active volcano

Me checking out the mountain the day before summit attempt

I started the hike at 02:00 AM from the Bunny flats parking lot, From bunny flats the trail starts easy for about two miles when you arrive at the horseshoe camp, here you can fill up with water from their wonderful well.

After the horseshoe camp it is starting to get more difficult especially for me since i was climbing in darkness for about four hours. There is tons of lose rocks and gravel everywhere. This section will go from the horseshoe camp up to Helen Lake that is a constantly frozen lake, this is where the snow / ice starts.

Climbing up towards Lake Helen with only a headlight was difficult due to all the loose rocks

Lake Helen is constantly frozen, this is also where the snow starts, time to put on some crampons!

Now it was time to put on the crampons since it was really icy and slippery, at first i had some problems with them since i just bought a new pair but after some practice it all went well. At this point i was still only using my trekking poles since they helps the legs conserving energy which was needed later.

After Lake Helen it starts to be more steep and from here there is no trail to talk about, i headed up pretty straight to try attempt the Red banks from the left side.

When i climbed here there was a lot of big rock falls that really scared me. This is the way it is in August and one of the reason you should not do this in this month.

After about an hour i entered the Red banks zone and this is where it gets crazy. The climb elevation is about 1500 feet and it is extremely steep, sometimes 45 degrees angle. Here you have to replace your trekking poles with an ice axe, maybe not you need it to climb but in case you would make a fall here you really need the axe to be able to self arrest. If not you will make a nasty fall....

The beginning of the red banks section, from here it doesn't look so steep, but believe me it is!

Looking down from the middle of the red banks

The chimneys, exiting the red banks, this section is insanely steep

The end of the red banks are really steep and here you basically have to use your ice axe to pull yourself up the last part. This part was really scary to do since the ice was so hard so it was difficult to get a good grip. But i made it and the worst part was over, for now...
After you exit the Red banks you reach a plateau where you will get a chance to recover a bit before doing the last summit attempt.
After getting some rest i started to climb the misery hill that is a big pile of small rocks, the climb up here is very annoying because the rocks are so loose and all the gravel are so soft so for every two steps you make, you slide one back.
But still its not so high and pretty simple to make even with tired legs.
After reaching the top of misery hill there is only a short final push towards the summit at 14,179 feet.
For me it was a huge satisfaction to make it up there since nobody thought i would make this in August since it is supposed to be so dangerous... which it was  

Misery hill, a big rockpile

A Glacier after exiting the Red banks

First view of the summit after climbing the Misery hill 

View from the summit

View from the summit

After spending some time on the summit just enjoying that i made it it was start to head back down again and this was were the problems started.

Reaching the red banks again it was so icy so even with crampons it was very difficult to find good steps.

Sliding down was out of the option since first of all it was only ice, seconds thing the entire Red banks was covered with holes, bumps and rocks.

Yes, this is perhaps the biggest reason to not do this climb in August, but here i was and i had to get back down.

I started to reverse slowly down using my ice axe and crampons and to start with it went pretty good even though it was difficult.
But since there was a lot of rock falls on this part i was most likely to stressed to get down quickly and lost concentration for just a second and then it happened so fast...

I slipped in a very steep section and started to quickly slide down. I had my ice axe and i know how to use it properly in cases like this. Problem here though was that it was so steep and so icy so even though i pushed as much as i could my speed didn't slowed down at all.

I guess it only lasted for three seconds but it felt like forever. Maybe i slide about 30 feet and i was so lucky because just there was a big pile of rocks that i hit really hard. Lucky you might say..., yes it was because if i hadn't ended in that rock pile i would have slide about 1000 feet more and that would have been really nasty.

Now i got away with a lot of bruises, twisted knee, scratches over entire left side of body and a swollen ankle. But i was so lucky nothing worse happened.

This scared me so much, i have never been really afraid on a mountain before but this time i was.
But luckily at this point i guess i had so much adrenaline in my body so i didn't hardly felt any pain at all and could continue like normal, the pain came when i was back at my car.

The rest of the hike i was so cautious and went really slow.

After a total of 12 hours and 45 minutes i was back at my car, happy to have made it to the summit, but felt really bad since it was so close i got in real trouble.

So my advise to you is, never do this hike in August! It is way to dangerous because of all the ice, no snow and all falling rocks.

The day after i had to visit an emergency room because of all the pain after the fall i made. Nothing dangerous but a broken tail bone can really hurt a lot....

BTW this was the equipment i carried, excluding drinks and food.

My equipment for Mt Shasta excluding drinks and food