Harvey - Pup Buttress

[MikeyG]

Can anyone comment on the "Pup Buttress" on Harvey - quality rock climb?

(Our alternative is to trudge up Wedge, but I think we may literally melt if we do that tomorrow)

Cheers,

Mike G

[crazymonkey]

My two climbing buddies tried this a month ago and ended up doing some sh*tty vertical bushwacking. They probably should have looked for beta, and would have had better routefinding luck if they didn't try it covered in fog. Type 2 fun...

http://cascadeclimbers.com/forum/ubbthr ... ber=481328

http://cascadeclimbers.com/forum/ubbthr ... er=1109663

They stashed water and were thankful to have it on the way down. It wasn't nearly as hot when they tried it as it is now.

[BK]

Its worth doing. Close to home and great view of the sound. Rock is "good", not bad as migth be expected. I don't remember any problem with bush either on route or the approach. Unlikey you'll find water.

One star as in, worth doing once

[thePeacock]

Agreed. Worth doing once. I posted a trip report of the climb from a couple of years ago here: http://cascadeclimbers.com/forum/ubbthr ... er=1109663 (also linked to above...just noticed.)

[MikeyG]

Thanks for beta - wish I'd asked for it sooner.

We gave it a go today - started in the wrong spot (too high) and got pretty sketched out on first pitch - 40+ feet up w/ no pro, downsloping dirty blocks and cracks slammed shut, no real way up). Was pretty happy just to find a piece good enough to bail off of.

Just FYI - we left a red dragon cam w/ white sling to bail off.
THIS IS NOT THE ROUTE - dangerous / R-rated climbing!
Get the cam if you want, I would not recommend it.

And the only pin we saw was actually on the approach ramp slabs - it had purple tat on it. The pin described in McLane is actually on the route, right?

[jstod]

I believe the pin McLane describes as being at the start of the route has been gone for a few years. When we climbed it (in 07?) we scoured what we figured was the start, looking for the pin… Eventually saw a relatively fresh looking rock-scar with a rust stain below it - looked like the rock had flaked off and the pin had gone with it.

I remember most of the climbing being pretty good once you got up the first pitch.

JS

[natsdad]

Just climbed the Pup a couple of days ago. There is a pin on the first pitch (in good shape, too) - but you cannot see it from the ground (or at least, I couldn't). It is in the "obvious" horizontal break that you traverse to the first belay and I happily clipped it. We encountered lots of poor quality rock on the first pitch, but better rock from pitch 2 onward. If you look for the chimney pitch and spot the small pine tree at its' base - that is the end of pitch 1.

Save a lot of time for the descent. Many, many rappels. Also, the gully eventually crosses the path, but that is not obvious if you get there in the dark ...when you are hiking down scree, keep a constant lookout for orange/red flagging to the sides - that's the approach trail (and it is a bit downhill of the boulder field which is below the 3rd class ramp.