North America, Canada, Canadian Rockies, Bastion Peak, East Face

Publication Year: 1966.

Bastion Peak, East Face. From camp at Amethyst Lake in the Ramparts, on August 4 Jerry Fuller and I walked around the marshy north end of the lake and climbed snow and then glacier to the final rock walls some 1500 feet beneath the summit ridge of Bastion Peak. We crossed a crevasse and climbed two final pitches of very steep snow to bring us onto rock on the east face. We used pitons for safety on two pitches and then found faster going on a series of ledges that allowed us to traverse northward to a point almost directly beneath the summit. Route-finding was a major problem to get around ice patches and rock headwalls. A final exposed traverse above an ice sheath took us to a notch, above which the summit towered some 300 feet vertically above us. Jerry led a clever traverse, which took us to the key pitch: a difficult but marvellous crack system. It looked like an aid problem from the notch, but it went all free, much of it laybacks and counter pressure. A final short pitch took us out of difficulty.

Fred Beckey