Grand Teton - Car to Car
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Hi all, |
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If 1100 ft of gain per hour is your comfortable pace, I think you'll likely want to camp if you prefer the experience to be on the more enjoyable side of life. You could do it in a push, but I feel that pace won't lend itself to an enjoyable experience late in the day. |
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I enjoyed doing the Grand car to car at that pace (TH to upper saddle in 5 hours). |
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sandrock wrote: Hi all, A few thoughts: Check the weather. If you start at midnight with your pace, you will be on the mountain late in the day. If the weather is clear that may be fine, but otherwise you run the risk of being caught in a storm. I am sure it was a slip on your end, but you know that the Upper Exum starts quite far below the upper saddle? Finally, your hiking time is only as small part of the equation. How quickly can you move through several thousand feet of 3rd to low 5th class terrain? In my opinion, in a day climbs are often easier overall but tend to be long days. Best of luck!! |
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Philip Magistro wrote: Yes thank you. I meant the Lower Saddle. I'll be going with a friend that has climbed the route several times, so not too worried about time once we get on the route. |
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I'd highly recommend doing the grand in a car to car push. If you are fit and going at a good pace, getting to the lower saddle should take 3.5-4.5 hours. |
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If our climb serves as a vague reference point: |
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Starting at 3am would put you just before the lower saddle at first light to help make the scree fields go easier. Then keeping the pace, you'd summit at 9am and be back at the car at 3pm... ish |
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Here's a friend's Strava track to inspire you: https://www.strava.com/activities/1755229102/overview. About 5 1/2 hours from Lupine Meadows to the summit and 4 1/2 hours for the descent. After biking 22 miles from Jackson. And swimming a mile across Jenny Lake. And then the same in reverse. |
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Thanks everyone, I have a few more weeks until the climb so I'm going to do a lot of hiking and see if I can cover the distance faster. Sounds like aimjng for 4-4.5 hours is good. |
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Those FKT's, in addition to being irrelevant for anyone but the elite few, are for the shorter and easier Owen-Spaulding route. |
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Kinda like rgold's put...nice to spend a night up there (or two). |
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A big part of the reasoning for ctc is not having to stress over getting a permit.. |
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True, but when I was there last summer there didn't seem to be that much of a problem getting permits if you showed up at the ranger station at 6 am or so. But I didn't try to camp in the Meadows last summer so don't know how hard it might have been. (I took the picture on a ctc solo conditioning hike up South Teton, something that people almost always do ctc, sometimes including the easy scramble up Middle Teton as well.) |
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The other thing to keep in mind for going c2c on any route is the wait for the guides. I went up Lupine to the Upper Exum and was just under 12 hours, leaving at 1 in the morning, but we burned at least 2 hours waiting for a guided party to rap their 6 clients down the one rapel route. We met them just before they were setting rappels, and they refused to let us rap through. If you can't be moving through the moraine by 430am, it's going to get very crowded. We blew past probably 30 guided clients in headlamps, and being behind those groups, even to get to the base of the route, would be a nightmare. I passed a guided party just past Wall St., and the guide was very, very aggressive in not wanting me to move past, despite her being in a party of 3 and her two climbers being relatively unfit. If you can't be in front of these groups going cart-to-car, I would definitely walk in the night before and wake up earlier. |
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Colin, |
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Steve. you are a beast. even after 3 weeks of acclimation I felt pretty sick up on Buck Mtn and that's a shorter day than the grand.. Threw up over the edge of the north face but summited :) |
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I have also done the grand in a car to car push, and to be honest, I really think that it is the best idea in there. It took us something like 3.5 to 4 hours, not more. Oh man, I still remember that experience, it was back in 2016, and we actually started at 4 am as it was pretty hot outside. The best thing about that place, were the views! I still remember my dumbass brother!! He actually crashed his car in there, and he has done that soooo freaking hard, that he had to scrap it, as it was totalled and the engine was dead! He was soooo happy when he got the paycheck from https://www.scrapi.com saying that he got even more money from scrapping the car than if he would have sold it. |
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From my notes / comments on our OS. Descent time is completely dependent on how many other morons are up there. |
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Yvonne Clarkson wrote: If your post reads correctly, 3.5 hours car to car is among the faster times ever posted. I don't know if making suggestions off your elite fitness is relevant for the general masses. To do this you must have foregone rappelling, any ropes, most contingencies like a pack, spare jacket, food, and even much water carrying capacity. I'm impressed and inspired by your time, but it doesn't really lend itself to the logistics discussion of he common climber looking to do the Grand. |
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2 1/2 year old thread, folks. |