1. Slesse Peak (7800' 5.0) 7/94, with my dad.
After our annual family July 4th trip to Seattle, Nancy and the kids 
flew to Cape Cod, while I began what I hoped would be several weeks of 
climbing projects.  My dad and I drove up to Canada in cloudy weather, 
hoping the forecast for clearing would come true.  The final section of 
logging road is threating to wash out, but we arrived near the trailhead 
in the afternoon, meeting a Utah party of three which was camping there.  
We considered camping there, but instead, we hoofed it up the trail.  
Heck, it is only a 3000-4000' gain to the high camp!  The trail is 
fairly nice, and we crested a ridge near sunset with our first view of 
the peak, dark and slightly enshrouded in clouds.  My dad built a great 
fire while I fetched water from a snowmelt pool, and soon we were 
cooking dinner and drying out clothes/boots in front of the fire.
    The next morning, the Utah folks buzzed by in a helicopter, which 
was taking them around the mountain, to the base of the classic NE 
Buttress.  We were doing the SW Face, but I hope to do the NE Buttress 
someday, and hopefully my familiarity with SW Face will help with the 
descent (in late hours or darkness).  The route is interesting, taking a 
stairstep path up the face, then up the edge of a snow gully (there were 
"cat" tracks up to here).  Finally up a steep buttress in the fog and 
traverse back left on ledges to the summit ridge.  We waited (i.e. my 
dad snoozed) about 2 hours on top for the fog to clear for wider views, 
but no dice.  Reversed the entire route (no rappels).  Back at high camp 
after another dinner at the fire, we spotted the NE Buttress party 
topping out at 8pm.  They made a big rappel down the upper face, but 
unfortunately the rope hung up, and it got dark when they were 
retrieving it.  They had to bivvy on a poor ledge, and they dropped by 
in the morning for a brief chat.  They gave me a laminated topo of the 
route drawn by Fred Beckey, and traded kayaking stories with my dad.  
They were sound asleep at their truck when we got back to the road in 
the early afternoon.  On the drive out, I could see a great looking 
rock-tower mountain from Chiliwack.  It turns out we had just climbed 
it!