Cantata Peak South Face
by Tom Choate, Scree 9/90

The club trip on June 2nd and 3rd was a good one for the summer of good weather we have had. Some showers and clouds on Saturday made us doubt the forecast and I was surprised to have six of us walking in, with Pam Kirk already ahead of us and two promises for Saturday evening. The trail on the west side of the South Fork of Eagle River is very good these days, although the beginning is unmarked until you enter the subdivision and there still isn't a parking area. After a rest at the bridge, we worked across to the old mid-valley track and continued over intermittent flooded sections to the foot of Eagle Lake. Finally, across the rough talus route to the octagon, we joined a reclining Pam and chose tent sites. It continued to improve, all except for the summits, so within an hour I led a group on a recon of upper Symphony valley.

Years earlier, when climbing Calliope, I had noticed gullies on the south face of Cantata leading through the lower cliffs to the scrambling above. I could find no one who had tried this face, although the "standard" route traverses onto it from the west ridge (in its upper reaches) to avoid gendarmes. Just past Symphony pond I climbed a snowy moraine hill and studied the face with binoculars. The prominent, deep gully not only penetrates the cliffs but there was enough snow to minimize the amount of garbage rock on the route. But it is subject to stonefall and leads to the right of the summit and uncertain traversing. Two more gullies to the left penetrate the cliffs almost to the bottom, where they merge above a small cliff. The left one ends directly at the summit and was my choice.  Arie, a seasoned climber from Holland, was skeptical and so we moved higher for more views.

Suddenly, the view opened and we hastened to the top of Triangle Peak for a good look around even though it was 7:00 p.m. On top a group of Dall sheep emerged from the south face, hearing Arie approaching and fled by only 40 feet from me, where I sat, unnoticed on the summit. Intermittent views improved as we descended the southwest ridge and rapidly hiked the flat tundra on the divide between Symphony and Ship Creeks. A quick glissade to another bench with thawing lakes and then a final slide down their outlet stream brought us back to our original route, arriving by 9:00 at the octagon.

Stephen came in late, so eight of us responded to a 7:00 am start on Sunday, in good weather. The hour of walking through scattered brush to the step above the pond was pleasant and ice axes came out for the snow above, particularly for the going around the left side of the pond and up to the gully. Here Ken Zafren declared it looked too ugly and fears of rockfall generated eight climbers, so he went off on a photo mission over Triangle Peak.

The rest of us were surprised to find the bottom cliffband an easy scramble and soon were kicking steps rapidly up the gully above. The move leftwards to the next gully was a bit hard to find, but everything went smoothly with only one mere steep step. Stan and Peter got well ahead of their old leader on the easy upper slopes but everyone was on top well before lunch. What a view! The north side drops spectacularly to Eagle Lake and rises again precipitously to Hurdy Gurdy. The deep gorge of Flute Glacier was even more impressive and the route from there to our summit (done last year) looked pretty mean.

The trip down was surprisingly uneventful despite softened snow. No rocks fell on anyone and although marginal, the ropes were never brought out on the steep places. We even had plenty of time for a pub stop after we reached the cars. Arie made sure that we compared superior Dutch beer to the pitcher we ordered and I think it fitting that his first club trip and first Chugach summit should have been a possible new route.