The Alpine Bike-Ski-Climb Triathlon

Mount Conness on the east side of Yosemite is a great natural playground. My friends and I have always looked at it as the perfect place to combine great skiing and climbing into one trip. Conness has some world-class alpine routes on its north and west ridges, as well as its massive southwest face. It is also blessed with great late season skiing in the chutes that drop off the northeast side of the mountain and also on the Conness Glacier itself. The idea would be to climb up to the summit plateau, drop skis there, continue down to the foot of the west ridge, climb to summit, then ski back down. Easy right?

Well, not really. 2006 proved to be a massive snow year in the Sierra and the road from Tioga Pass up to Saddlebag Lake was still gated closed last weekend. This is no problem for a cyclist -- you simply pile 75 pounds of climbing, skiing and overnight gear onto your back, and then climb onto your poor bike and ride to the mountain. My friend Abe and I did just that made it a mountain trifecta -- an alpine triathlon.

We also stretched it into a two day trip so we could savor the skiing a bit more and not risk getting caught out on the open should a storm hit. In the end, we just escaped one of the most intense electrical and hailstorms I've ever been in, so our timing was excellent. The skiing was sweet and the climbing even better. The cycling was average at best, but riding bikes was of course just the gravy on the trip. In fact, right as we dismounted our bikes at the trailhead, a ranger pulled up in his pickup truck and told us that he had just opened the road up. D'oh! Oh well, the story wouldn't have been quite as good without the insanely stupid bike schlepp.

Me on the bike, heading up the Saddlebag Lake road

Abe on the bike, looking happy despite being unable to shift out of the big ring on this 10% grade dirt road.

Ascending the waterfalls to Alpine Lake

Abe navigates the crux of the east ridge approach


Yours truly near the top with the entire east ridge approach route behind me.

Success! Reaching the summit plateau gives a fantastic view over the granite monuments of Tuolumne Meadows


Abe drops into the Y-Couloir.

The run down the Y-couloir and Conness Glacier was superb. We debated a second lap, but tomorrow was a big day for us and rest was definitely in order. We skied back to camp at Alpine Lake (seen here, ice covered), where I found a marmot having my shoes for dinner. Little bastards will eat just about anything.

The next morning saw a beautiful dawn, but with a few broken clouds and red skies ("red sky at morning, climber heed warning..."). The West Ridge is a pretty committing route with poor retreat options. A storm could have very bad consequences if it hit us on the route. But the skies looked OK for now, so we decided to march on to the base of the route. Of course, when you do the West Ridge, you basically climb the mountain first, then descent the other side. When this is all over, we will have basically climbed the mountain three times.

Sunrise over Cathedral Peak. Getting down to the base of the route from here was more treacherous than the climb itself -- scary downclimbing over ice covered slabs and scree. Yikes!

But we made it alive. Abe leads up the first pitch. Steep at the bottom!

My turn to follow. Abe's head is visible at the top of the pitch.

I'm hanging on several hundred feet off the deck, wondering if Abe is able to safely belay and take photos at the same time.

At the summit (third time's a charm!). As you can see in this photo, the skies are still clear. Within minutes, clouds began building in the west so we hightailed it back to camp.


We packed all our gear up as quickly as we could and started skiing down. It hit us quickly. Abe skis down as the rain starts.

This is where the trip began sucking. Huge hailstones popping off my helmet, huge thunderclaps all around us, rivers of freezing water to walk through. Brutal. And I'm wearing a half-eaten shoe.

Back at the bikes. Still have to ride back down to the car in the freezing rain, but there's a car heater and dry clothes waiting for me. All in all, a very successful trip.