Elevation Gain: 2,109m
Distance: 41km
Total Time: 12 hours 24 minutes
Date: October 12th, 2024
Tower Mountain is the slightly taller counterpart to the nearby Golden Horn and its namesake certainly fits the bill. It’s an eye catching summit and highly visible from all over the range. The standard route is a loose 3rd class scramble up a gully on the south west side and is often paired with a traverse from Golden Horn. Alex and I happened to be doing just that. We had finished our ascent up Golden Horn and were now traversing a long bench at 2200m to reach the start of the standard route.
As we traversed closer, we got cliffed out by a massive rocky channel and had to scramble up some shitty loose terrain to bypass it. The slopes were steep, hard packed and loose here and it made for a very tedious approach to Tower. Below us numerous cliffs blocked progress anywhere except upwards and kept us on our toes. Eventually we reached the large ledge system that wrapped around to the gully entrance of Tower Mountain. We were glad to have that part over and we now headed along the ledge, passing a large cave on the way. Two scramblers were coming down and reported no one above to our relief. The rock was already looking quite loose and now at the base of the gully it was clear we were in a shooting gallery.
We scrambled up some loose slabs for a ways and then cut climbers right up a network of benches and ledges. From there we stuck mostly climbers right hugging the steep right wall before entering the upper section of the gully again. Right as the gully started to get too steep another ledge appeared to our right and we followed this all the way out to the ridge crest.
Once on the crest, it was a short scramble up to the pretentiously large summit cairn. I think the views here were even better than on Golden Horn. Although the scrambling left something to be desired. We had reached the summit at 2pm, so we if we made a reasonable descent there was a chance we could make it to the car in time for sunset. Not wanting to waste any time we started down the ridge crest.
The terrain was quite loose and there were numerous high consequence sections so we took our time. Slowly and steadily we picked our way through the choss and slabs and before long we were back at the caves and then heading down the scree and talus field below. We rejoined with the trail and then it was just a steady march back to the car.
Of the two, I think Golden Horn was the most enjoyable. Despite being only class 3, Tower Mountain is a serious outing in my opinion. I wouldn’t climb it if anyone was already above in the gully and care is required on the loose rock.