Mt. Steele Yukon Canada Trip Report

This is a trip report from my 2010 spring trip to Mt. Steele in Canada's Yukon territory. We spent 2 weeks in this amazing place. UPDATE* We added Greg Hill's video from the trip to the bottom of this TR.



After 30 hours of driving from Revelstoke B.C. we were there! Kluane lake and the airstrip for Icefield Discovery.

Dave got busted by this plywood RCMP.



We organized out gear and food for the 2-3 weeks we planned to be up on the Walsh Glacier. Our Pilot for the chariot was named Donjek... the same name as the glacier that connects alot of the St. Elias range. With a name like that how could we not trust him?









Base camp 1- 10000' Thanks to The North Face Canada for the luxurious digs- Dome 8



We rested for a day. Sleeping at 10000' seems to set in motion the feelings of high altitude. We toured up to get acclimatized the following day and got a good view of our objective. Mt Steele 16644"!



We had a few more acclimatization days before we started moving gear and food from our 10000' camp to our 12000" camp. I never thought 12kms and 2000' of gain could be so flat! We did this 2 times to get all our gear in position.





We were now finally in position to actually get close to this beast. It seems to be so decieving, the distances are visually close but everything is so over scale that a 3x rule was in place. 3 time longer than you think! We didnt get it this day but we did however get close enough to realize that summiting from our 12000' camp was going to be a long day. But with the endless light it would be feasible. Weather was our main concern. To attack this south face we were going to need perfect light to navigate the enormous features that lay ahead.



A few more restless weather days had us chomping for a break in the weather.

Then we got it!
As we neared the technical terrain of Steele we realized that the face was going to be too icey and exposed for a ski/ snowboard descent. Which just meant we would summit with out them and descend the 3000' of ice by foot. I was very grateful that I had made the switch on my split to dynafit toe pieces and rando boots a few years ago. Cant shred them all I guess!



Summit shot! Highest Ive been.So Sick!!



Our descent was long and arduous.





We were all feeling the altitude, so we thought it would be smart to go sleep at lowers elevations for a few nights. So we packed up camp 2 to head for the luxury of the dome.



The weather rolled in and trapped us in the tent for the next 3 days... We checked weather and saw a small window coming , followed by a large coastal disturbence. We all agreed that getting out before the coastal front showed would be good. Since the crews from Logan could not land a plane due to fog we would be next on the waiting list.

Thanks to the crew: Greg Hill, Aaron Chance, David Sproule and Darek Glowacki

Thanks also to TNF, Black Diamond, Icefield Discovery and the Yukon for being just so darn awesome!