In the summer of 1965, Bill Buckingham and Lew Surdam visited the southern Logan Mountains, making the first ascent of Mt. Nirvana (9,097’), the highest mountain in the Northwest Territories. (The mountain’s name is being officially changed to Thunder Mountain by the Canadian government to reflect the local Deh Cho First Nation name.) While scouting for a possible ascent route, they first studied the southwest face but decided, “Any route here would be more of an undertaking than we were prepared for.” (See AAJ 1966.) Instead, they made the first ascent via the north face and north ridge.

The southwest face has been largely forgotten since then. There were no published pictures from the 1965 trip, and the only description of the face in Buckingham’s account was that it had “great exfoliated slabs.” I found only one other reference to this face, when Pete Ford and Bob Howell glimpsed the upper portion from a valley to the south (Canadian Alpine Journal 1972).

Researching topographic maps and Google Earth images revealed the southwest face could be up to 3,000’ and a mile wide at the base. Could such a huge granite face on the tallest mountain in the territory really have gone unclimbed for so long?

On June 28, Dave Custer, Susan Ruff, and I helicoptered from Watson Lake to the edge of the small, unnamed lake at the base of the southwest face of Thunder Mountain. After setting up camp, Dave and I set out on a scouting mission to photograph the face, so we could plan our attack. We scrambled up the crumbling northeast slopes of Peak A to reach a gargoyle ridge and then continued to Peak B before dropping back to our camp at the lake’s edge. [All peak names refer to the author’s map, which is based on a map by Bill Buckingham.]

The southwest face of Thunder Mountain is a complex system of gullies, arêtes, and ledges. Large patches of snow hid stubbornly in the upper, shaded recesses of the mountain, ensuring the faces and gullies below would be wet from runoff. Slabs on the lower half of the face gave way to vertical, broken faces on the upper half. A curious system of horizontal ledges appeared to split the face across the middle. Studying our pictures in camp, we hatched a plan to gain the summit ridge just north of Peak 33—the rocky southeast summit of Thunder Mountain—by climbing a ramp and gully system, and from there traversing northwest to the summit of Thunder Mountain.

On June 29 we scrambled to the base of the system, but rain developed and we retreated, caching our ropes and gear at the base. We stayed in camp the next day, waiting for a break in the weather. On July 1 we returned to our cache and began our ascent, trading leads for three pitches of moderate rock to the base of a third-class ramp. The rock was initially hand-numbingly cold, but warmed up as the sun hit. Surprisingly, we were able to ascend the ramp unroped all the way to the ridge crest. We peered north along the ridge to Thunder Mountain, with high hopes that we were almost there. However, we’d misjudged the distance, and there was still a lot of very technical terrain along the ridge to the summit.

We turned our gaze to the summit of Peak 33 as a consolation prize. To our knowledge, it had no documented ascents, and there appeared to be a climbable crack system along the north ridge. We descended the third-class ramp for several hundred feet, then climbed diagonally back up and right for three pitches, following Dave’s lead, to a flat area on the ridge. From here, Dave led up a fine crack pitch, then a short final pitch to reach the small, airy summit. We were surprised to find a cairn carefully balanced on the top, and a worn webbing rappel anchor leading off the northeast face to a glacier below. We estimated the anchor to be at least 20 years old. We later consulted Ragged Range expert Mike Fischesser, who had no knowledge of this ascent. Our ascent would appear to be the second overall, and our new route up the southwest face and north ridge involved eight roped pitches to 5.8. [Editor’s Note: It’s possible Peak 33 was climbed by Jack Bennett, et al, during a 1996 trip to climb the east face of Thunder Mountain (AAJ 1997). Pat Goodman, a regular visitor to the Northwest Territories, notes that many individuals have climbed in the region without reporting their successes, and that it’s not uncommon to find cairns atop peaks thought to be unclimbed.]

We descended the route of our ascent and staggered back into camp at 2 a.m.—a tiring 19-hour day. Rain set in again that night and continued for the next three days, occasionally mixing with snow. As we would find over the next month, sunny weather is hard to come by in the Ragged Range, and there’s a good reason the moss is so thick on most of the rocks. We spent the rainy days poring over pictures of the face, trying to plan our next move.

By noon on July 4 the rain had let up, and we hiked to the base of the left-angling ramp that begins between the summit of Thunder and Peak 33 (noted as Gully 4 in my photo-topo). A wet, mossy slab pitch led to a low-angle ramp and then a large granite bowl. Five more pitches alternated between solid rock, waterfalls, snow ramps, a boulder-filled tunnel, and a horrendous wet chute. By 10 p.m. we had reached a horizontal ledge system two-thirds of the way up the wall and it started to rain. We knew the rain could last for days, so we began a long retreat, reaching our base camp by 8 a.m. the next morning. The next few rainy days provided us with much-needed resting and reading time. We washed clothes in the small lake and even took some lightning-fast swims in the frigid water.

July 7 dawned clear, and we set off on the same ramp we used to climb Peak 33, hoping to use a long horizontal ledge system to reach the main summit of Thunder Mountain. Once diverging from our previous route, the ledges were mostly third- and fourth-class, with just a few narrow sections to belay and one short 5.6 pitch. We simulclimbed most of the ledge system and by midday reached a snowfield just 50’ above our previous high point from July 4. This traverse was considerably longer but much faster and more pleasant, with many options for rain shelter. Above the snowfield, Dave led four pitches up wet chimneys with tricky chockstones, until we were halted by rain. We retreated back across the ledge system and down to camp, but planned to return to this route. It looked like the chimneys and cracks provided a climbable route all the way to the summit.

The next four days were rainy, and I took the chance to do some scouting hikes in the area, scrambling up Peak C on July 11 and visiting the north cirque of Thunder Mountain, where two documented ascents have been made.

On the evening of July 12 the skies cleared and we returned to the ledge system. This time we brought bivy gear and slept for a few hours on a nice wide area midway across the horizontal ledge. The next morning we climbed to our previous high point and continued past some wet cracks requiring aid. Dave led seven pitches above the ledge, to within a rope length of the ridge crest. Now on a right-diagonaling ramp, the rock suddenly turned chossy and unprotectable. A system of wet, overhanging cracks directly above looked like they might continue to the summit ridge. My GPS showed us to be around ca 8,530’. This was as high as we could safely get in the conditions found. We retreated again, reusing some rappel stations from previous retreats. It was late in the day by the time we reached our bivy site, so we spent another night on the face before returning to camp the next morning in pouring rain.

As usual, rain lasted the next few days. I used the time to scout a potential route up the leftmost gully on the face (Gully 1 in my photo-topo) and to scramble to the summit of Peak D via its southeast rock and snow couloir.

Thunder Mountain allowed us a final weather window for a summit attempt. Based on our pictures, it looked like the horizontal ledge system we’d been using might cut farther across the mountain to another gully and ramp system, which Buckingham and Surdam had skirted on their first ascent of the peak. If we could reach the “slender needle,” noted by Buckingham, perhaps we could gain their route on the north ridge and the summit.

Dave and I embarked a final time up the ledge system as the last rain squalls pulled away the evening of July 16. Climbing through the night, we passed the large snowfield from our previous attempt and made it two more rope lengths along the ledge by 5 a.m. As we rounded an arête in the middle of the face, however, we discovered that a large section of the ledge in front of us was missing. It looked like it had fallen off the mountain, leaving a blank face. Dave tried to scout above and below, but any passage would require difficult and time-consuming climbing. We reluctantly retreated yet again, reaching camp with a few hours to spare before the weather turned bad again.

We now had only two days left to attempt the southwest face, and with both days predicted to be rainy, we began preparing for the next phase of the expedition. In between packing up and reorganizing gear, I managed to scramble up Peak E and Peak F on July 18. A brief window of clear skies on July 19 let us all climb several rock spires between Peak D and Thunder Mountain. A small cairn atop one spire led us to believe it was one of the “grotesque” aiguilles climbed by Embick, et al (AAJ 1976). Our plan was to rendezvous with another climbing party on July 20 on the east face of Thunder Mountain and attempt the more standard climbing route pioneered by Bennett, et al (AAJ 1997). However, four days of solid rain prevented the helicopter from bringing in the other party and the rendezvous plan was aborted. Over many hours of card games in camp and satellite texting with other members of the climbing party at Rabbit Kettle Lake, we decided on a new plan.

On July 23 the weather cleared enough for a helicopter to pick up Dave and Susan and transport them to the Cirque of the Unclimbables. (They would go on to climb the Lotus Flower Tower.) I decided to hike out solo to Hole in the Wall Lake and from there take a float plane to Rabbit Kettle Lake and paddle out the Nahanni River with part of the other climbing team. I loaded my pack with 10 days of food, overnight and glacier gear, and set off following in the footsteps of Buckingham and Surdam. I dropped briefly into the trees while rounding Gargoyle Ridge, then passed by a deep shale canyon and got back above treeline. I had no particular plan beyond roughly following Buckingham’s route to Hole in the Wall and scrambling up interesting peaks I passed on the way.

Peak G caught my eye after I crossed a river near one of Buckingham’s camps, so I dropped my heavy pack and scrambled up the steep, loose northwest ridge to the summit. I descended the north scree slopes as it started raining and found shelter under an overhanging boulder to cook some dinner. When the rain let up I decided to explore the valley just south of Gargoyle Ridge and ended up scrambling higher and higher until I crossed a small glacier and reached the ridge crest between Peak 31 and Eurydice. Peak 31 looked too technical to solo, but Eurydice seemed possible. I made it to within 50’ of the summit before turning back at a section of steep and wet, lichen-covered rock. The lichen here is tricky—when dry (a rare occurrence), it’s sharp enough to slice a hole in your pants, but when wet (common), it’s extremely slippery.

I camped beneath the Gargoyle Ridge that night and the next day explored more peaks. I followed a faint caribou trail through the scree around the base of Peak G and up the north ridge to the summit of Peak H. Here, I was enveloped in clouds and it started to snow. I waited for a brief clearing and spied a doable route up the glacier between peaks I and J. I descended to the edge of the glacier, waited under a rock overhang for an hour for the rain to let up, then donned crampons and got on the glacier. I reached the rocky col between Peak I and Peak J and scrambled along the knife-edge ridge north to the small summit block of Peak I. After retracing my steps, I dropped back onto the glacier and climbed snow slopes to near the summit of Peak J. The final 100’ was another knife-edge rock ridge, with stunning views through gaps in the fog to caribou in a valley below and jagged peaks in the distance to the east.

I returned to my previous camp that night, accompanied by the sounds of chirping ground squirrels and white marmots as I cooked dinner. The next morning, July 25, I set out with all my gear for the pass between Peak J and Peak 45, and then dropped to the edge of a pristine alpine lake. I set up camp next to a large, overhanging boulder, anticipating the usual rain that tended to interrupt my cooking every night. I briefly studied Peak 45 and 46 from camp, but they appeared too technical for me to climb solo. Several mountains due west looked appealing. I packed my daypack with glacier gear and set off across the sprawling, unnamed glacier to the east of Peak K and L. The glacier only had a few small crevasses, all exposed and visible at this time of the summer, so solo travel was relatively safe.

At the head of the glacier I crossed a small moat and then scrambled a talus slope to the summit of Peak K. Far down to the west, I saw Flat River meandering through a lush valley, with more imposing mountains on the opposite side. I soon dropped down the south ridge of Peak K, crossed briefly back onto the glacier, and then scrambled up the north ridge to the summit of Peak L. By now a squall had caught up to me and hail hit my helmet. I quickly scurried down the east scree slope and back onto the glacier. I returned to my small camp, cooked a delicious meal of noodles, and finished the day with a quick swim in the alpine lake.

The next morning, July 26, I rose at 4 a.m. in order to get a final climb in before anticipated afternoon weather. With my daypack, I descended to another lake and traversed to a series of small granite spires on the east spur of Peak M. I climbed three of these spires before scrambling up the spur to meet the southeast ridge of Peak M. A short fourth-class ridge traverse led to the narrow summit blocks, with excellent views of the upper reaches of Thunder Mountain to the northeast. I returned to camp by noon and packed up to continue my journey.

By now my pack was finally feeling a bit lighter, having gone through four days of food. I descended east to below the lakes, roughly following Buckingham’s route, but instead of dropping into the trees I stayed just at the edge of treeline and turned left into a remote valley at the base of Peak H and J. The weather rapidly deteriorated as I reached the head of this valley, with snow visibly falling on the upper mountains, rain pounding the valley, and loud claps of thunder sounding dangerously close. I had gotten pretty good at keeping dry by this point, and this valley was no exception, with excellent shelter options. I spent a relaxing night in the valley, and the next morning retraced my steps to the valley inlet, continuing east near treeline. I cut up the next valley left, diverging from Buckingham’s route and finding a pleasant camp at the edge of a dried-up tarn. I briefly considered climbing one of the peaks next to camp but decided instead to take half a rest day and enjoy the scenery.

On July 28 I crossed the talus pass above my camp to the east and dropped to the next valley at the headwaters of Nightwind Creek. I descended into the valley following fleeting goat trails, before turning east toward Peak 8. I scrambled up and over a tricky, rocky pass at the head of this valley and made camp above Beaver Lake. On July 29, after a bit of bushwhacking along the lake edge and following some well-established moose trails, I at last met up with my other climbing partners, Len and Ron, at Hole in the Wall Lake. Over the next two weeks, we flew by floatplane to Rabbit Kettle Lake and then paddled down the Nahanni River back to civilization at Fort Simpson.

Eric Gilbertson, USA