The Tooth - South Face (Var.)

The Tooth is an exceptional climb that does not have a long approach and is about 1 hour from Seattle, right across I-90 from The Summit at Snoqualmie ski resort.  From the west, take exit 52 and drive north on Alpental Access Rd NE (from east take exit 53 and make your way to Alpental Access Rd NE) to the parking lot at the end.  I have heard that in the winter you cannot park in this lot, which will add some distance, but not excessive distance. 

The total length is ~5 miles, but it may seem longer as it did for us.  In the large talus field below Pineapple pass we lost the climbers’ trail often and stumbled and slipped over frost covered talus.  Considering the length of the talus field, I would expect that the optimal time to climb the South Face of The Tooth is before the talus field melts out, but after the snow has consolidated as the route to Pineapple Pass is avalanche prone.

Take the Snow Lake Trail for about 1.5 miles or so to the junction with the Source Lake Trail.  Continue straight instead of switch-backing up and to the right to Snow Lake (~0.5 miles past the junction, but it seemed shorter).  Somewhere before, in the middle, or after the small talus field above Source Lake (you should see it below you), drop in elevation slightly and cross the remainder of the talus field.  We found the easiest place to cross was to drop below the trail immediately when you arrive at the start of the talus field, but there are numerous trails on the other side of the talus field that will lead to one larger trail.  After you pass the talus field and are in the trees, find the larger trail that is fairly close to the cliff band above and follow this trail.  It will climb steep terrain, sometimes appearing that it ascends very steep mud.  These steep mud sections are generally bypassed on the right while ascending the creek bed, rejoining the trail shortly.

After some steep climbing through the wooded area, you will eventually reach the main talus field below the east face of The Tooth as shown below.  The red line indicates the climbers’ trail.  Once the trail flattens out at the beginning of the main talus field, it crosses to the left side of the talus field and is slightly above the talus field.  The climbers’ trail on the left side will bypass a good portion of talus; this is especially useful if the talus is slick due to frost or wetness.  I wish we would have known about it.  Expect the climbers’ trail to shed quite a bit of time compared to the traveling directly through the talus field.

Date: Sept 24, 2007

Eventually the trail crosses the talus field, climbing sharply towards the notch closest to the south face, known as Pineapple Pass.  As you approach Pineapple Pass, you may see some slings used for a rappel station half-way up Pineapple Pass.  Though it is apparently a class 3 gully, the gully to Pineapple Pass looks like some of the most heady, awful climbing around.  It is full of wet, slippery rock that may be loose, and it only gets worse the higher up you are.  However, if you plan on rappelling from Pineapple Pass through the gully, you may want to stash gear to avoid having to make an extra trip to collect gear later.  Pineapple Pass has little room to stash gear, especially since the South Face of The Tooth is a very popular route, and many people rope up to climb to Pineapple Pass from the west, meaning that collecting gear may require an additional rappel and climb.

Continue slightly south to the pass adjacent to Pineapple Pass, and climb over this pass.  As you down climb from this pass, you will notice a faint climber trail sharply climb to the right around a bend and up a mildly exposed gully.  You can either climb this very short, but mildly exposed gully, or continue down the hill through steep brush until you can pass the cliff band on the right.  Either way, as you head north, within 100 ft you should make your way up to the base of a short 30 ft cliff below Pineapple Pass.

We ended up prepping our stuff below Pineapple Pass and climbing un-roped to the pass.  We then roped up and dropped our stuff at Pineapple Pass, but nobody else was on the mountain that day, surprisingly.  Climb an obvious blocky system.  Much of the South Face route is fairly obvious where to go.  I found the first pitch to be the most awkward climbing of the day.  Continue up another shorter pitch similar to the first pitch.  The third pitch is easy class 3-4 shrubby ledges and ends at the base of the summit block and the last pitch.  The last pitch is shown in the picture below, where the green route is the traditional Catwalk, and the red route is the 5.6 variation that we did.  I highly recommend the variation as it was the most enjoyable climbing of the entire mountain, even better than the rest of the good climbing.

 

The first rappel station is at the top of the variation route with slings around a tree shown in the picture.  The remainder of the rappel stations to reach Pineapple Pass are fairly obvious.  At the center of Pineapple Pass, there is a boulder with multiples slings used to rappel the gully.  For a faster ascent, rappel from Pineapple Pass and be thankful that you didn’t attempt to climb up this gully.  As you rappel, there will be a second rappel station on climber’s right about 70 ft down the gully.  If you use this rappel station, you will have to down-climb the last portion of the gully, which isn’t great, but isn’t awful.  Alternatively if you rappel nearly 100 ft, there is a large boulder slung on climber’s left.  Thoroughly check this area to see if you feel comfortable using this boulder as a rappel station as it requires excessive amounts of webbing and the slope on the backside of the boulder makes for a scary rappel, though there is a small undercut that secures the webbing.  Hike back to the car and be back to civilization for a large beer.  Cheers.

There Is No Someday