The Slesse Massif Traverse
- Greg Luesink
- Jul 26
- 13 min read
Updated: Oct 29
"A Line Across the Sky" akin to Patagonia's Fitz Roy Traverse, but in Chilliwack's backyard.
As the last scouting mission for an even bigger project (pending write-up), I set off with my friend Mike to traverse the Slesse Massif, a jagged linkup of 6 summits: Labour Day, Station D, Point 2187, North Star, South Slesse, and Slesse Peak. I also made a short video about the trip, which you can watch below.
If you want:
the blog post continues after the video!
Here is the link if the embedded video doesn't work, click or copy into browser:
Background
In 2024, across the valley, Mike and I completed the Rexford Ridgeline Traverse (The Grand Ensawkwatch Enchainment). The entire trip, Mike and I cast worried glances across the valley towards the Slesse Massif. Our plan had been to traverse it as well, but conditions called for us to end the trip at Rexford rather than continuing. Amidst mixed emotions, we were both relieved, as the Slesse portion looked immensely intimidating.
In September of 2024, Ben and I did a comeback traverse and scouted the bottom of the "U" for the Silesia Traverse. For 2025, the obvious goal was to re-attempt the full horseshoe, and all that remained to explore was the Slesse Massif.
Some relevant history on the Slesse Massif route:
First attempted by Don Searl in 2006, the linkup did not see a first ascent until 2017, when Nick Elson and Julian Stoddart did the route in a mind-boggling 15 hours car-to-car. Ironically, just a few days prior, Wayne Wallace and Jenn Carter did a 3-day partial-traverse, bypassing South peak to save time. Both parties exited via Crossover Pass.
I figured that Mike and I could do the traverse in 2 days, since we're not nearly as fast as Nick and Julian, but hopefully could be faster than Wayne and Jenn. On our side was some (generally accurate) beta in the Alpine Select guidebook for the traverse regarding rappels and pitches, as well as the fact that the traverse was possible.
Trip Report
In late July, Mike was free for a last-minute weather window. We planned for a 1.25 day strike mission, leaving in the evening to get a head start on the traverse. Initially, we planned to exit via Crossover Pass, making a loop back to Slesse Memorial, as with the first ascensionists. In this case, we would sleep at the lower memorial and collect our bivy gear on the way down.
However, before leaving, we decided to give ourselves an extra advantage by shortening the traverse. Instead of looping back, we dropped Mike's van on the West side of Slesse, and Jas shuttled us to the Slesse Memorial Trailhead to begin our adventure. This way we would have a quick and easy exit down the Slesse Scrambler route and approach trail (which I was very familiar with) and could do so in the dark if necessary to decrease the amount of technical terrain we had to cover in a single day. This meant we'd have to carry our bivy gear for the whole trip, but that provided a buffer of safety anyways so we weren't concerned about the weight.
So, after packing our bags (Mike borrowed my 28L Firecrest while I used my 38L for testing), with food, water, and bivy gear, we set off at 7:45pm from Slesse Memorial, bidding Jas adieu as she drove back down the FSR.
As we ascended the trail, the setting sun lit up the adjacent ridgeline that we'd traversed in 2024, the Illusions, Nesakwatch Spires, and Rexford. The cool evening was welcome, and we made good time to the propeller cairn, arriving in 2.25 hours at 10 pm. Here, we at a snack, drank some water, and cozied up for a bit of rest (sleep might be too generous of a term) under the starry skies.
For bivy gear, I was testing out my -1˚C sleeping bag and a half z-mat. Meanwhile, Mike borrowed my puffy pants and slept in the emergency bivy bag on the other half of the z-mat.
We awoke at 3am, perturbed by the buzzing mosquitoes. Snacking on some trailmix, we headed off towards Labour Day Horn by headlamp. Thankfully, I was very familiar with the route, having done it back and forth several times for drop bags and climbing Labour Day buttress. It's not terribly hard, but a few streams and heather slopes require some navigating before reaching the boulder field.
Before long, the dawn began to illuminate the terrain around us, a welcome respite from the claustrophobic existence of travel by headlamp.
As we rounded the corner to the south aspect of Labour Day, we kept our ears peeled for the sound of running water. Our intention was to fill up to max capacity, as the Slesse Traverse in a low snow year would provide little to no refill opportunities along the way. Looking up at the cirque above, I was unfamiliar with the route up, as all the other times I'd gone a little further south. But, in an effort to save time, we quested up some snow-polished slabs towards the ridgeline. Facing two options, a) to take the long way by cross the heather slopes to the left, or b) to go direct by ascending a steep ramp system above us. We opted to go direct rather than go around. Unfortunately, we chose wrong, and we ended up pulling out the rope halfway up for some awkward moves of bush wrangling and airy steps.
Labour Day Horn - ~2120m
Once we hit the ridgeline, the sun fully peaked over the horizon, warming us with welcome rays. Ahead lay Labour Day, which looked as scramble-able as it did worthy of pulling out the rope. So, we pressed on until we encountered a steep wall to surmount, forcing us to pull the ropes outs again. We simul-climbed the rest of the way to the summit, and were rewarded with a spectacular view of our objective ahead. It was 7:30am, 4 hours after leaving our bivy at the propeller cairn. Undoubtedly the faffery to reach the ridgeline had set us a back, but we still had plenty of daylight remaining.
Station D Peak - 2126m
Getting off Labour Day proved to be fairly straightforward, some down-scrambling, and finally a short 20m rappel. We rambled over to the base of Station D Peak, featuring a truly intimidating-looking ridge to the summit. After surveying possible options as we drew closer, it seemed that the only option was to venture onto the East aspect to avoid the steep and blocky ridge-crest. Mike led the way, finding an awesome anchor atop Pitch 1. From there, we looked at some options and concluded that we had to take a short step-down to regain the East aspect, as the blocky ridge-crest once again looked more difficult than necessary. Mike led Pitch 2, which included a short-but-spicy 5.9 handcrack to bring us just below the summit. I led Pitch 3 up to the summit, which featured some awkward backpack shenanigans to squeeze between tight pillars of rock. We reached the summit of Station D just before 10:30 am, 3 hours after leaving Labour Day.
Point 2187 - 2187m (?assumably 2187m?)
We walked off Station D with ease, no raps needed. After an hour of slogging up heather and scree, we did about 10m of scrambling a steeper step to the summit, arriving at 11:20 am! Intimidating views of the far-more-complex summits of North Star and South Peak lay ahead.
"North Star" Peak - ~2200m?
We did a rappel off 2187 with both 40m ropes, but realized at the bottom that we could have done it with only one of them. Twin gullies led the way to the West aspect, where we traversed towards North Star lower down, bypassing some unnecessary towers. A short step caused us to lasso a horn and rap about 15ft before retrieving our sling by flicking the rope - perfect! Barring the way to the upper heather field lay a vertical wall, but thankfully there was a weakness on the right (east) side to climb up. We ended up doing one pitch, but it was definitely on the verge of scramble-able. Now I know! A short grunt of a climb let to the base of the summit-block where we took a peek around the corner to the precipice between us and South Peak. I led a spiralling pitch up to the summit of North Star, which was very much like a crown.
In all honesty, there was a higher finger to the right, but I didn't have enough rope to establish at the base of it (where I spotted some rap tat). I settled on belaying Mike up, and we started to assess our situation.
It was nearly 3 pm, and we had a lot of climbing and rappels between us and Slesse Peak. This led us to ignore the (barely) higher finger and build a rap anchor where we were to begin our descent to the col between us and South Peak. I can still happily call this a summit, and a wise decision based on the following events...
The increasingly probable outcome was that we would have to bivy a second time before getting to the car, the only question was where. Ideally, we would make it to Slesse, familiar terrain for me, before sleeping.
TCA Flight 810 "North Star" - the Origin of the Summit Name.
It wouldn't be a complete blog post if I didn't discuss the 1956 disaster, after which the "Slesse Memorial" was built. A plane with 62 passengers and crew was flying over the Fraser Valley through a winter storm on December 9th, 1956. Engine troubles caused them to reroute back to Vancouver after passing Hope, requesting lower and lower altitude clearance from air traffic control. "Clearance for 19,000 ft... 14,000ft... 10,000ft..." the engines simply couldn't generate enough lift... "Clearance for 10,000ft..."
"Roger, range, cross 8,000 or above, will remain... further... "
This excerpt is from Rien van Tilborg, author of "TCA 810 - Anatomy of a Disaster," a book which I was informed of through a client who knows Rien. He sent me a signed copy, which I have enjoyed reading through. It includes a very in-depth re-telling about the events leading up to the plane crash, search efforts following, and a remarkable analysis for what likely caused the engine failure and subsequent crash.
After getting lost in dense clouds on the way to Slesse, a trio of climbers heading up Slesse in Spring of '57 discovered some shrapnel from the wreck that flew onto the West side of the mountain. Elfrida Pigou, Geoff Walker, and Dave Cathcart discovered parts of the wreck on May 12th, 1957, specifically a fuel gauge with the TCA number on it, identifying the aircraft. This evolved into a full-blown search effort and the crash site was discovered by helicopter, as Elfrida and a party of 3 others climbed to it after landing nearby. Rien has some historic photos from the original discovery included in his book, ones that I had never seen in my prior research. Suffice to say it is a great book!
Today, all that remains are small pieces scattered and strewn in every direction, carried downward each year by melting snow. But, nearly 70 years later, sunlight glinting off metal attract the eyes towards a hollow in the mountain, cradling the remnants of "TCA 810 - North Star". I'd eyed the wreckage from Slesse during my very first time up in 2022, and each subsequent visit piqued my interest. I was (oddly) elated to be so close to the crash site. It felt like I could reach out and touch history; indeed, I could. It is one thing to touch the propeller at the Cairn atop the Slesse Memorial Trail, but it was a strangely special experience to behold the crash site with my own eyes, not 50 feet away from it. Not to mention having stood on the summit not 30 feet above it an hour prior! It is astonishing how CLOSE the plane was to clearing the summit. However, it they cleared Third Peak, they would almost certainly have crashed into the neighbouring American Border Peak to the West.
South Slesse Peak - 2354m
We did 4 rappels off of North Star, each between 20-40m, landing us in a gully just below the col. After we filled up some water from a melting snow-patch, Mike led the charge from the col, questing up the chossy gully into the unknown above. Soon, I followed, and we referred to the Alpine Select for likely the most key beta of the whole trip:
Don't get sucked into no-man's land on the Western aspect of South peak, climb towards the East of the col and into the half-pipe.
Or at least the beta went something like that. Mike led another steeper pitch traversing East, and I followed, swapping leads for a traverse that spat us below some black and red rock. Here is where we had some of the best views of the plan wreckage across a chasm (see above). Mike took over the lead and pressed on for Pitch 4 into the steeper wall ahead. The wind picked up and I put on another layer, teeth chattering as I belayed. Finally, I rejoined Mike, taking extra gear as I prepared to lead what ended up being a 100m+ simul-climbing pitch to just below the summit! Refer to the photo below for our route up South Peak. We paused at the top-belay to assess our situation, eyeing up a possible rappel station, and unsure what lay below us. Scrambling the remaining 50m to the summit, we tapped the overhanging summit block's tippity top. After peeking over the edge, we quickly decided to return to the notch to rappel.
It was 8pm when we reached the top of the last pitch, and 8:40pm by the time we had tagged the summit, built the anchor, and Mike had begun the first the rappel. Wind howling and clouds billowing, Mike stepped back to the edge. Tension was high, light was fading, and the bitter cold was growing. We needed to get off the jagged summit of South Peak quickly and find a bivy spot, but Mike wasn't sure our rappel would land us where we needed to go. "We might need to re-establish the rappel and go directly off the summit." I pressed Mike to make a decision, and he stood on the edge, contemplating. As Mike leaned back, a strand of cloud blocked the golden sun on Slesse's neck and I captured one of the craziest photos I've ever taken. We ended up doing a J-hook rappel to reach a grassy ledge below.
On a narrow, grassy ledge, I prayed harder then ever before in my life: that the rope would come down easily, and that we could find a bivy spot and get out of the cold wind. Praise be to God! The rope passed down many possible snags and we were able to build another rappel anchor to reach the col between Slesse and South Peak.
At long last, we reached a suitable location to bivy, and spent a good while shuffling rocks and creating a nook to put our sleeping pads down on for the windy night.
We left out camp at the Propeller Cairn at 3:30 am, and we reached our current bivy after 9:30 pm - an 18 hour day of hiking, climbing, rappelling, and route-finding. My longest single-day effort in the mountains!
I was glad to have my sleeping bag, and Mike made do with the puffy pants and emergency bivy atop his sleeping pad. Around 2 am, after fitfully tossing and turning to get comfortable and getting short spurts of exhaustion-driven sleep, I lay awake for a moment staring at the stars. I heard Mike inquire:
Greg, are you awake? I'm pretty cold.
I pulled out the "Hot-hand" packet that I'd brought and gave it to Mike. Fortunately, things didn't get so drastic that we were required to spoon to stay warm. Unfortunately, the hot pack didn't do a whole lot, but Mike did end up getting a bit more sleep until we roused ourselves around 4 am. We ate some morsels of our remaining food and sipped our precious, diminishing supply of water and pulled on our harnesses for what could likely be several pitches to get back onto the "Voie Normale" route of Slesse.
Slesse Peak - 2439m
The dawn began to light up the sky, and we were on the move, shivering in the wind and clouds. Our confidence was a low as we peered at the steep and consequential traverse trending Westward. I figured we could probably scramble it. But after some discussion about a possible misstep and fall into the gully below, we decided to play it safe and rope up. It ended up being one short step, which was hardly protectable, and lots of choss scrambling. I would probably opt to just scramble this in the future (foreshadowing...). We ended up pitching out 4 pitches on some scree and heather slopes to get to a final steeper gully leading to the Standard Route. Looking back, I don't blame us for playing it safe, as we were venturing into the unknown. A rope provides literal if not mere mental security, which can be all the difference.
Some 2.5 hours after leaving our bivy spot, we were standing below the final pitch of our adventure. I racked some gear on my harness and climbed up in my approach shoes, which I had been wearing since leaving our bivy. At the rappel anchor, we ditched our ropes and scrambled the rest of the way to the summit! It felt incredible to finally reach the highest point of the traverse, and to be in familiar terrain.
After a quick stop on the summit to take pictures, we began our final descent, carefuly picking our way across the traversing ledges to the stashed ropes. A 40m rappel brought us back to our packs, where we at a breakfast of our remaining sausage and cheese. The series of gullies and ramps back to the climber's trail is certainly not a cake-walk, so we took our time and rappelled once or twice on the way across to the diving board. Down at the cave, we started packing away our gear for the descent... a quad thrashing 1900m of downhill to the car. We took a much needed break at the stream to refill water and wash our bedraggled hands and feet before the final 5km of overgrown FSR to the car.
In total, we were "on the move" for 31 hours out of 44 hours (not 13 hours of Strava's "Moving time"), ascending ~2,700m and descending ~3,000m over 36km (give or take due to GPS inaccuracy amidst the towers!).
Overall, this was a full range of emotions from excited and stoked, to timid and fearful, to relieved and relaxed, to satisfied and pleased. We set off into completely new terrain and suffered through a cold and unplanned bivy at the top of a mountain. We climbed 6 summits and did many pitches of climbing and rappels. Most importantly, we made it out safe and sound!
Gear Used:
I used my 38L Firecrest pack from Blue Ice, and Mike borrowed my 28L Firecrest. Inside and attached we had:
Clothing: pants, sun hoodie, hat, helmet, sunglasses.
2x40m 7.7mm Sterling Dyad ropes (bought specifically for trips like this)
Rack: cams singles 0.1-0.2, doubles 0.3 to 0.75, singles 1-3, couple ball-nuts, rack of nuts, 5 alpine draws, 240cm sling, 180cm sling, 2x120cm sling (one sacrificed as a rap anchor). Probably could have used another size-1 cam but did okay without, and shoulda left behind the 0.1... who are we kidding about using that dinky thing. We brought a bunch of rap tatter to leave behind 5 or 6 x 5-metre bundles, with 1 bundle remaining.
We both brought crack gloves and rock shoes (TC Pros for me, Skwamas for Mike... he's funky like that), which I climbed in up Station D, and South Peak. Everything else was in my TX4 approach shoes.
Sleep system: half z-pad and -1˚C sleeping bag. Mike had puffy pants/jacket, other half pad, and emergency bivy. I also had a puffy and windbreaker in addition to my pants and sun hoodie.
Food and water: I can't remember exactly, but a mix of granola and fruit bars, trail mix, sausage and cheese. I use LMNT as my electrolyte drink mix, and I had a 3L bladder + 500mL flask + a 1.5L flexy-filter bottle.
Emergency kit: bivy, c-cplint, inReach, radios, light First-Aid kit with pain-killers, gauze and tape.
Awesome ~ And, I had a really hard time watching the video from around 9-11 minutes. Not for this faint-hearted mumsie 😅
Epic adventure, photos and video!! So fun reading about your adventures, Greg!