Saddleback & Basin Mountain via The Ore Bed Slide, South Slide & The Northeast Shoulder Slide

Описание: A huge day we planned this day but because it was so big I had to break this down into two separate vlogs. This is a hike Jonathan Zaharek wanted to do for two years now and we made it happen! On this day we summit Saddleback via the Ore Bed Slide and after summiting Saddleback we descend the Saddleback Cliffs and then started our bushwhack towards the newly slid and cleaned up South Slide witch would descend us into the valley floor below. Keep in mind there are no trails anywhere near that side of the mountain so safety is extremely important as we are fully committed to climbing up and back out.. once we hit the bottom of the South Slide we transitioned over towards ( Big Pink ) a huge, steep and very long Reddish/Pinkish smooth Slab that starts our ascent up the Northeast Shoulder Slide of Basin. Big Pink faces SE but is on the Northeast Side of Basin. Big Pink I would say is my Favorite section of slab I have ever Climbed on a slide. It didn't look that steep but the higher you got the more intimidating and " Ohhh Shit, I hope I didn't make a bad decision" kept running through my mind. So after I got to a stopping point near a ledge I decided that I wanted to be even safer and put on my Vibram V-Alpha 5 toe shoes witch stick to slick rock better than anything else I have ever worn. So I'm pretty serious about my content... and no one else wanted to climb the slab "Except Brenden" and he had my camera. Even he was nervous and I saw him do something I have never seen. He reverse Crab walked up so that if he slide he would be in a safe position to recover lol.. So he got up, gave me the camera. At that point I was sitting there for like 15 min. I had gone up and down a 15 foot section of slap in front of me to test my Vibram 5 toes grip. I felt glued like a sticky tree frog. So I decided to crab walk descend the entire big pink slab so that Brendan could film me climb it... Turns out that's my thumbnail too :-).
Anyhow after Big pink we had to rout find a way up. Man it was steep!! but we had gotten to a point of a lot of cracks in the rock and we make our way up safely! After Big Pink it leveled out significantly and as we got to the top headwall it went straight up to the moon! It had lots of cracks and features and seriously grippy rock so we had no issues climbing!
This is where I end this vlog... Next Vlog will be our Bushwhack off Basin to see the Amphitheater and Descend the NEW Long and Short Amphitheater Slides that formed under it. We believe we are the first Ascent of these Slides. After getting back to Basins summit again we bushwhacked to a smaller peak next to Basin and Descended the Basin Brook Slide!
Stay Tuned for Part Two!