Some Squamish Photos

[Anders Ourom]

I thought local netizens might like the following photos, taken at the Stawamus Chief on December 1st. The night before a full moon, and a clear winter night. I went up in mid-afternoon, hoping for some fresh air, scenery, and to measure the vertical height of the Grand Wall route. I wasn't quite able to do the latter accurately, but narrowed it down to 410/420 m, from the point one ropes up at the bottom of the Flake, to the place one unropes at the top of the Roman Chimneys. (The amount of climbing is probably 30 - 40% more.) I did get some exercise and views.

A first view - attempted assault by a tree on the Feldhammer memorial kiosk, at the start of the Grand Wall trail. A near miss. (Oddly, some trees were planted in his memory, in Israel.)


Sunset on Garibaldi, and the Squamish/Cheakamus Valleys.



Peaceful Howe Sound, glimmering in the sunset.



And the shot I was hoping to get - sunset and moonrise on the second and third summits, and Garibaldi. Not often visible.

There were less than five minutes when both sunset and the moon were visible. I've seen sunset and moonrise from the top of the Chief before, usually in late evening in summer. But never with this timing.

[thebigchin]

How were you going to measure the height? Altimeter?

[Anders Ourom]

Yes - it was a trial run, using a watch-altimeter. I've done a bit of geology/survey work, so zeroed the instrument before, during and after, and got pretty consistent values. For example, the height where I parked and at several points on the trail, measured much the same going up and down, despite the time lapse. And the height at the south summit was close to that mentioned in several references.

The altimeter is probably accurate plus or minus 10 m, maybe 5 m. Good enough for what I was doing. The base of the belay tree at the start of the Flake was 109 m, and the large flat area 40 - 50 m above the top of the Roman Chimneys about 560 m, so the net is about 410 m. It was icy and getting dark, so I didn't go to the actual top of the Chimneys.

When it's a bit drier, I want to go back and remeasure, using both an altimeter and GPS. I'm not certain that the GPS will work at the base of the wall, but it's worth a try. (A friend who works in remote sensing offered a unit, said it was accurate plus/minus 10 cm, and asked if that would be good enough...) Anyway, I'd like to measure the maximum height of the Grand Wall, the height of the Grand Wall route, the evelations of the three summits (there's a benchmark just below the second summit), and perhaps the height of Zodiac Wall. Just a little science project - of course, most routes are longer than the height of the wall they're on.

[Brendan]

Anders,

IMO, the "most" accurate way to measure any route would be with a laser range finder.

I'll be doing that next summer with my Leica CRF 1200 - ranging each individual pitch (anchor-anchor) as well as from each anchor to the ground, on most of the major multi-pitch routes in Squamish. Should be fun.

[Anders Ourom]

Brendan, maybe we can join forces for at least part of the time. I'm a little curious, plus some accurate information on lengths and heights may be useful for the history project. For total wall heights, or vertical for the longer routes, I'm fine if it's plus/minus 5 m.

Does your gadget work only line of sight, or? It's a concern with a GPS - there's a fair amount of clear area at e.g. the base of the Grand, and with half the sky being blocked by the wall, getting enough satellites may be a challenge. I guess one can always go up a few m to somewhere with a bit more sky, and adjust.

[Brendan]

Anders,

My laser range finder is a Leica CRF 1200, and only works in the line of sight.

Either way, if you can see the ground below you, you can range exactly how high the wall is.
For example, if you were climbing the Grand Wall, you would range the ground from the belay at the top of Perry's Lieback, then you would range Bellygood Ledge from the Flats. Add them together and you have the vertical drop. Alternatively, you could just range from the ground up to Bellygood, if you don't feel like roping up.

Anytime you want to get out and just let me know!

[Anders Ourom]

So I finally got back measuring on Saturday, while on a fossicking expedition to the Chief's three summits.

For background, BC Parks' publications show the following elevations:
1st summit: 610 m
2nd summit: 655 m
3rd summit: 702 m

NTS map 92 G11 shows a survey mark on the 2nd summit, at 2,138' = 652 m. I don't know how the elevations of the first and third summits were measured.

I set my altimeter to m at the front counter of Valhalla Pure (close enough - it's just above sea level), and went from there. The pressure dropped slightly during the afternoon - when I zeroed the altimeter on the way up and then down, the later elevations were a bit higher. Allowing for that, I got the following elevations:

Grand Wall start: 120 m (the base of the tree at the bottom of the Flake)
1st Summit: 606 m
Grand Wall finish: 504 m (with harness!)
2nd Summit: 640 m (at the survey pin)
3rd Summit: 684 m

(A bunch of measurements and adjustments deleted, for simplicity.)

Adjusted for the known elevation of the survey pin, the heights of the three summits measured at plus/minus 618, 652, and 696, which seems reasonable.

The net height of the Grand Wall seems to be 384 m, or 1,260'. I'd guess plus or minus 10 m.

Amusingly, I ran into Neil and Ian Bennett on the way up, and thought about getting help from a pro. Neil could probably measure it to within a millimetre, as he's a professional land surveyor.