Mt. Glasgow northern spur attempt

On Saturday myself and Matt Forshaw had a wander up a spur that extends off Mt Glasgow. Conditions were pretty foul, but it was good to be out in the snow, and off the trail. Our objective was the central ridge and summit in this photo, taken in warmer times from Forgetmenot Lake. There is no recognised trail up this ridge, although Tony Daffearn described a scramble on it earlier in 2009.

From the Elbow trailhead we crossed the suspension bridge then turned right. After 2.5 km we followed Glasgow Creek, staying on the right (west) of the creek. About 1.5 km after leaving the river, we reached a creek junction joining from a major valley to the west. This is the second drainage off the Glasgow massif, and not Glasgow Creek, which is the third. We then thrashed up the treed ridge-end to the SW, skirting a rock outcrop at the top by heading left. This was quite steep at the top and in places the powder was thigh-deep.

Once we hit the ridge conditions were miserable, but the crust was often strong enough to support our weight, and we followed the crest for several hundred metres, avoiding a cornice on the north side. Eventually we reached a knoll, visible as a flattening of the ridge in the photo above, prior to the knife edge section that stretches about 1 km to the summit at 9,300 ft. At this point we decided that the conditions merited a return to the pub, so we dropped down to the south, picking up Glasgow Creek. There was one minor cliff band to negotiate, but it was OK via a snow-filled gully. There was some impressive 'future generation' hanging ice on the opposite valley wall. Had we continued up the ridge far enough, we would have reached Mt. Glasgow, via the rather scary-looking route visible on the far right of this photo.

As it was, we descended fairly quickly despite deeper snow, passing the odd cairn and a lot of wolf tracks. For fun, we decided to wade the Little Elbow to finish off the day. It was good practice for ice climbing in the Ghost....or something. All in all we had a good day out despite the weather and I'd love to return and look further up the ridge to see what might be possible in better conditions.