Hulk to Half Dome Traverse

This week while browsing through Instagram I noticed a series of posts from Alpinist Magazine. They do this thing on their feed where they promote the work of one climber/photographer for a while, often showcasing one trip or expedition.

This series, detailing Libby Sauter and Christy McIntyre's Hulk to Half Dome Traverse really stood out as a fantastic adventure for adventure's sake. Nice work ladies!

Wondering what exactly the Hulk to Half Dome Traverse is? Check out the first six photos of the series below. There are two more, but they're not on Instagram yet. We'll add them when they are.

This week as part of the #alpinistcommunityproject, we're sharing work from Libby Sauter, who recently completed the Hulk-to-Half Dome Ski-to-Climb Traverse on May 31 to June 6 with Christy McIntire. They hiked, forded rivers and skied into the Hulk (ca. 11,000’), climbed the classic moderate line Yggdrasil (aka The Red Dihedral, 5.10b, 1,500’) then continued down and across the High Sierra through a flooded Tuolumne Meadows to Half Dome for over 60 miles of travel. They then simulclimbed Snake Dike (5.7 R, 2,000’) and descended to Yosemite Valley where Libby’s mom waited to drive them back to Bishop, California. Sauter is a nurse specializing in developing world pediatric cardiac surgery education with Novick Cardiac Alliance (@cardiac_alliance). She set the female speed record on the Nose, El Capitan (4 hours, 43 minutes) with Mayan Smith-Gobat in 2014, and co-authored a story with Suzanne Ybarra for Alpinist 48 about doing a big wall first ascent in Chile to honor the memory of Michael Ybarra, Suzanne’s brother, who died in 2012; that story can be found here: http://www.alpinist.com/doc/web16f/wfeature-beyond-the-dusk. This is her first post. "Stoked! After making it across the flooded river that guards the approach to the Hulk, taking a slide for life down an icy gully early in the morning and self-arresting with my ski pole, I was amped to get to the ‘safe and familiar’ climbing portion of the tour with such splitter weather! Neither one of us had ever climbed Yggdrasil and weren’t sure what the descent conditions would be since the snow was at record levels. But it couldn’t be that bad, right?" [Photo] Christy McIntire @ljsauter @christy_mcintire

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“Chris McNamara rated the route’s namesake corner as a 5.9 with a 5.10b bulge at the top. Maybe it was the altitude, the slide for life from earlier that morning or the fact that Christy and I hadn’t climbed much all winter, but we both emerged from the dihedral panting and covered with gobies that would be increasingly painful as the tour went on. Thinking the crux was behind us, we relaxed, swinging long leads. With just the final two 5.8 pitches to the summit, Christy and I were met with a 60-degree snow slope guarding the final two pitches. I started planning to rappel down the route but Christy, the experienced alpine climber, pulled out her nut tool and proceeded to lead a scary snow pitch, adding a real Patagonia-esque flavor to the whole climb.” [Photo] Christy McIntire @ljsauter @christy_mcintire This week as part of the #alpinistcommunityproject, we're sharing work from Libby Sauter, who recently completed the Hulk-to-Half Dome Ski-to-Climb Traverse on May 31 to June 6 with Christy McIntire. They hiked, forded rivers and skied into the Hulk (ca. 11,000’), climbed the classic moderate line Yggdrasil (aka The Red Dihedral, 5.10b, 1,500’) then continued down and across the High Sierra through a flooded Tuolumne Meadows to Half Dome for over 60 miles of travel. They then simulclimbed Snake Dike (5.7 R, 2,000’) and descended to Yosemite Valley where Libby’s mom waited to drive them back to Bishop, California. Sauter is a nurse specializing in developing world pediatric cardiac surgery education with Novick Cardiac Alliance (@cardiac_alliance). She set the female speed record on the Nose, El Capitan (4 hours, 43 minutes) with Mayan Smith-Gobat in 2014, and co-authored a story with Suzanne Ybarra for Alpinist 48 about doing a big wall first ascent in Chile to honor the memory of Michael Ybarra, Suzanne’s brother, who died in 2012; that story can be found here: http://www.alpinist.com/doc/web16f/wfeature-beyond-the-dusk. This is her second post.

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“Who needs ices axes and crampons when you have nut tools and single-nut rappels? For the sake of carrying less kit, Christy and I opted (regrettably) not to bring proper alpine equipment. As the sun went down and the gulley began to refreeze, we couldn’t kick in sufficiently secure steps into the steep decent gully. With memories of my morning slide for life, we eventually opted to set up a few single-nut rappels, leaving some killer booty (brand new offset nuts!) for the wiser, better-equipped spring climbers!” [Photo] Libby Sauter @ljsauter @christy_mcintire This week as part of the #alpinistcommunityproject, we're sharing work from Libby Sauter, who recently completed the Hulk-to-Half Dome Ski-to-Climb Traverse on May 31 to June 6 with Christy McIntire. They hiked, forded rivers and skied into the Hulk (ca. 11,000’), climbed the classic moderate line Yggdrasil (aka The Red Dihedral, 5.10b, 1,500’) then continued down and across the High Sierra through a flooded Tuolumne Meadows to Half Dome for over 60 miles of travel. They then simulclimbed Snake Dike (5.7 R, 2,000’) and descended to Yosemite Valley where Libby’s mom waited to drive them back to Bishop, California. Sauter is a nurse specializing in developing world pediatric cardiac surgery education with Novick Cardiac Alliance (@cardiac_alliance). She set the female speed record on the Nose, El Capitan (4 hours, 43 minutes) with Mayan Smith-Gobat in 2014, and co-authored a story with Suzanne Ybarra for Alpinist 48 about doing a big wall first ascent in Chile to honor the memory of Michael Ybarra, Suzanne’s brother, who died in 2012; that story can be found here: http://www.alpinist.com/doc/web16f/wfeature-beyond-the-dusk. This is her third post.

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“The biggest crux of the whole tran-Sierra crossing was the rivers. Temps of 60 degrees during the day at above 9,000 feet elevation meant we were dealing with massive spring runoff on otherwise trickling brooks. Our third full day of the tour was basically lost to back tracking and side hilling up unnecessary canyons trying to find creek crossings we felt were safe. Eventually Spiller Creek and Return Creek got wide and shallow enough for us to cross safely, we just had to get a little wet and a little PG-13 in the process. From this day, we learned that we needed to stay above the 9,500-foot line so that we could have secure snow bridges. It meant a ton of extra miles!” [Photo] Christy McIntire This week as part of the #alpinistcommunityproject, we're sharing work from Libby Sauter, who recently completed the Hulk-to-Half Dome Ski-to-Climb Traverse on May 31 to June 6 with Christy McIntire. They hiked, forded rivers and skied into the Hulk (ca. 11,000’), climbed the classic moderate line Yggdrasil (aka The Red Dihedral, 5.10b, 1,500’) then continued down and across the High Sierra through a flooded Tuolumne Meadows to Half Dome for over 60 miles of travel. They then simulclimbed Snake Dike (5.7 R, 2,000’) and descended to Yosemite Valley where Libby’s mom waited to drive them back to Bishop, California. Sauter is a nurse specializing in developing world pediatric cardiac surgery education with Novick Cardiac Alliance (@cardiac_alliance). She set the female speed record on the Nose, El Capitan (4 hours, 43 minutes) with Mayan Smith-Gobat in 2014, and co-authored a story with Suzanne Ybarra for Alpinist 48 about doing a big wall first ascent in Chile to honor the memory of Michael Ybarra, Suzanne’s brother, who died in 2012; that story can be found here: http://www.alpinist.com/doc/web16f/wfeature-beyond-the-dusk. This is her fourth post.

A post shared by Alpinist Magazine (@alpinistmag) on Jun 21, 2017 at 7:11am PDT

“The views! This is what this tour is all about. The path we had to take from the Hulk to Half Dome isn’t set up to yield the best ski turns. There were a lot of heavily treed sections and short ups and downs that make for a million transitions. But when we popped out of the trees and started to get a look at some of those sweet Tuolumne Peaks, the route started to feel a lot more awesome. Here Mt. Conness (12,590’) shines behind me in its late spring conditions.” [Photo] Christy McIntire @ljsauter @christy_mcintire This week as part of the #alpinistcommunityproject, we're sharing work from Libby Sauter, who recently completed the Hulk-to-Half Dome Ski-to-Climb Traverse on May 31 to June 6 with Christy McIntire. They hiked, forded rivers and skied into the Hulk (ca. 11,000’), climbed the classic moderate line Yggdrasil (aka The Red Dihedral, 5.10b, 1,500’) then continued down and across the High Sierra through a flooded Tuolumne Meadows to Half Dome for over 60 miles of travel. They then simulclimbed Snake Dike (5.7 R, 2,000’) and descended to Yosemite Valley where Libby’s mom waited to drive them back to Bishop, California. Sauter is a nurse specializing in developing world pediatric cardiac surgery education with Novick Cardiac Alliance (@cardiac_alliance). She set the female speed record on the Nose, El Capitan (4 hours, 43 minutes) with Mayan Smith-Gobat in 2014, and co-authored a story with Suzanne Ybarra for Alpinist 48 about doing a big wall first ascent in Chile to honor the memory of Michael Ybarra, Suzanne’s brother, who died in 2012; that story can be found here: http://www.alpinist.com/doc/web16f/wfeature-beyond-the-dusk. This is her fifth post.

A post shared by Alpinist Magazine (@alpinistmag) on Jun 22, 2017 at 7:45am PDT

“Trying to make up time from our creek crossing day, we pulled a 15-hour ski day through Tuolumne Meadows. It is so flooded in there that we were jokingly referred to the Tuolumne River as the Tuolu-ssippi River. As the sun set, a nearly full moon helped guide our progress. We eventually opted to sleep just behind the glorious Cathedral Peak when we couldn’t keep our eyes open anymore in spite of our headlamps and moonlight. We started at 5 a.m. every day and fatigue set in as the trip went on. But we weren’t sure we were going to make it out on time, meaning Christy might potentially miss another shift at the Bishop, California, hospital where she works as a nurse because of a ski tour (again). So upwards and onwards we went. Over the course of the tour, our shortest day was 10 hours and our longest was 15.” [Photo] Christy McIntire @ljsauter @christy_mcintire This week as part of the #alpinistcommunityproject, we're sharing work from Libby Sauter, who recently completed the Hulk-to-Half Dome Ski-to-Climb Traverse on May 31 to June 6 with Christy McIntire. They hiked, forded rivers and skied into the Hulk (ca. 11,000’), climbed the classic moderate line Yggdrasil (aka The Red Dihedral, 5.10b, 1,500’) then continued down and across the High Sierra through a flooded Tuolumne Meadows to Half Dome for over 60 miles of travel. They then simulclimbed Snake Dike (5.7 R, 2,000’) and descended to Yosemite Valley where Libby’s mom waited to drive them back to Bishop, California. Sauter is a nurse specializing in developing world pediatric cardiac surgery education with Novick Cardiac Alliance (@cardiac_alliance). She set the female speed record on the Nose, El Capitan (4 hours, 43 minutes) with Mayan Smith-Gobat in 2014, and co-authored a story with Suzanne Ybarra for Alpinist 48 about doing a big wall first ascent in Chile to honor the memory of Michael Ybarra, Suzanne’s brother, who died in 2012; that story can be found here: http://www.alpinist.com/doc/web16f/wfeature-beyond-the-dusk. @suzanneybarrasocal This is her sixth post.

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