Nisleheim - East Ridge, Valhallas, BC | 5.7 - 5 pitches
Most people that come up to climb in the Valhallas aim to climb Gimli. Some day I’ll come back for it! This weekend we went up to bag two peaks - Nisleheim and Wolfs Ears.
Our friend Mitch was driving through Rossland and stopped by for a quick bike ride… and ended up staying for 2 nights! On the third day, he agreed to join us on a spontaneous trip to the alpine.
We almost killed him on the way up (only to be revived with shots of MiO and a nap) and I forgot to give him tent poles.
As promised, we got to see goats! And many columbian ground squirrels. The goats are eager to lick some salt and the ground squirrels are keen on stealing food.
But I digress, we started Nisleheim at 3 pm. It took about 30 minutes to walk from camp to the base of the climb. The photo on the left below is Nisleheim. You climb the right (east) side and over and down the west side then walk the gully pictured to get back to the trail back to camp.
The start of the climb. The first pitch was probably a 5.4. The guidebook says to scramble - which is essentially what the first person needs to do because there are little to no gear placement opportunities - but followers can certainly be put on belay.
Pitch 2 (5.7 - crux pitch) started on a ledge to the right. From the ledge, you climb a small left-facing corner. There is apparently a set of bolts that you can belay from somewhere along this pitch that we missed.
Pitches 3-5 included lots of walking. Once again, the guidebook says these pitches include easy 5th class scrambling (I would prefer to have a rope).
But then we made it to the top! Not bad for an afternoon jaunt.
Getting down required some very real 4th to low 5th class scrambling. There were certainly some very high consequence steps. There are also rap rings on the ridge route that bring you to the north side of the Gimli-Nisleheim col.
The rest of the walk back is 3rd class scrambling terrain until you’re back on the trail.
Rewarded with cheese and views of goats and sunsets!
