"Haffner Senior"

“Haffner Senior”, Unnamed at GR658655 – May 10, 2008

Mountain height:         2714 m
Elevation gain:            1300 m
Ascent time:                6:00
Descent time:              2:30

Snowshoeing with Mark and Ferenc.

I really didn’t have my head on right when I chose this objective (good grammar, hey!). We knew the weather wouldn’t be great and therefore should have picked something in familiar surroundings, where the view or scenery would not have been so important; or at least something in the Front Ranges where the cloud ceiling may have been higher. I also mistakenly thought that the area would still be blanketed in deep snow and so a snowshoe ascent would have been appropriate.

“Haffner Senior” is an unnamed peak, immediately southeast and connected to Mount Haffner. Since it is higher than Haffner, it earns the title of “Senior” (unofficially, of course). After seeing ascents of Mount Haffner by Bob, Dinah, Sonny and Raff, earlier in the year, I decided an attempt of the higher summit might be interesting. Therefore, our objective was to gain the ridge between Haffner and Haffner Senior and then choose to attempt one or both summits from there.

The lower slopes of the mountain were a little frustrating to ascend, as several times we had to put snowshoes on only to take them off several minutes later. The aforementioned individuals picked the right time of the year to complete the trip, when snowshoes or skis could be worn from bottom to top. It took us 3 hours to finally clear the tree-line and another 30 minutes to gain the ridge.

At this point, we were 500 horizontal metres from the summit of Mount Haffner and 2 kilometres from Haffner Senior. We opted to go for Haffner Senior and traverse back to Haffner if time permitted. Travel on the ridge was very enjoyable, but would have also been extremely scenic had the skies been clear. Unfortunately, the weather conditions continued to deteriorate throughout the ridgewalk.

Except for a short section of steeper terrain just before the summit, the ascent of Haffner Senior was straightforward. Mark and I traded snowshoes for crampons for this steep section. Ferenc didn’t have crampons, but managed to negotiate the steep slabs nonetheless. Needless to say, the summit view was practically non-existent.

While Ferenc had plenty of energy to complete the traverse back along the ridge and up to the summit of Mount Haffner, Mark and I did not. We chose to head home at this point, taking a direct route to the road. This was a pretty good route and granted us a decent glissade above treeline and relatively easy travel down snow slopes. Overall, a good day of exercise, but definitely a trip we’ll be inclined to repeat with better weather.