Rhino Peak: The East ridge

Looks like you guys had a lot of fun, was it a one day up and down?

Thats awesome.
Can this route be done with ropes?
Is there another way up that can be done without ropes?
thanks

Beard wrote: Is there another way up that can be done without ropes?

Mashai Pass or Rhino Pass. Or really any high berg pass with some traversing added...

So yesterday, myself and Mike/Hobbit had a crack at this route. The exposure creates some incredible views (and makes you a tad scared to trust your gear).

So the MCSA RD says 3 pitches:
1: 25m D
2: 15m D
3: 8m E

Gavin's guidebook says:
1: 35m F1
2: 15m D
3. 30m E3

We did the same walkin as Viking and Macc. We stayed right on the lower pitch, setting up a stance halfway up on a ledge (with a massive block to anchor off), thus splitting the first pitch into 2. D grade seems fair, a few moves that were noticeable, but mostly easy. Gear was adequate and rock was good.

Pitch 2 was easy, the crux move was fairly easy, and the rest was really easy.

The difference between Gavin's 30m and the MCSA 8m is probably that there is a very exposed and proper "scramble" between the 2nd and 3rd pitch. We roped it up, and I rate it was harder than anything lower on the route.

We took ages to get to the top pitch. As the RD says, friction up a slab and traverse out right. Mike got a fairly good cam in at the top of the slab, but didn't manage to get the traverse part right. The top looked like it required pulling through an overhang on good hands and friction feet - not sure how it was E grade, though. Mike rates he could have done it if he was fresh and it didn't have a massive amount of air on bad gear (he was just out of reach of the piton). He took 3 cracks at it, on the 3rd the cam popped and he decked (about a 5m fall), but came out without injury.

It was already 5PM, and we knew we would be finishing in the dark or would be benighted. So we decided to drop to the walk-out ledge between pitch 1 and 2. There was nothing to anchor an ab for the "scramble" between pitch 2 and 3, so I downclimbed it on belay, and placed gear. Mike downclimbed it and removed the gear - not idea, but I couldn't see a safer option.

To ab down the middle pitch was easier in that there were anchors, but they weren't ideal. I had also not brought a knife/scissors to cut my tat, so I had to leave a 20m long piece up there. The final choice was between an anchor that Mike rated would be good, and I couldn't get it to budge, but it didn't look stable and the direction of the ab would be in the direction it would be most likely to fall. There was a worse rock that I decided to use, mostly because the forces were in a more favourable direction. My selection turned out to be adequate, and we both got down safely.

We walked out along the ledge, between pitch 1 and 2. My GPS tells me we were 90m from the summit cairn at one point. We hit the top of Mashai Pass at 7PM. The pass was misty, and we were tired, so we only got back to Swiman Hut by 11PM (we did stop at the camp for showers along the way - the hot water was off at Swiman Hut), but still, very slow progress. We took 17h to cover 18km.

On 3 November, Chris Keit and I did Rhino Eastern Arete route.

We left the car park just before 5AM. It was misty at first, but we were above it by PIllar Cave:

The route basically follows the righthand sky line:


Accessing the East Ridge:


The crux pitch as seen from where the East Ridge is joined, it was rather wet:


The route as seen from the ridge:


Looking back towards Little Rhino: