Mount Harvey North Ramp (Winter)

January 19, 2024

Mount Harvey’s North Ramp is a North Shore mountaineering classic. 500m of sustained steep snow climbing overlooking the Howe Sound make it a unique outing. With the widespread melt freeze crust and green brick avalanche conditions on the south coast it was a far better time for pointy bits rather than skis, so we set our sights on this local romp.

The approach is straightforward. Start following the regular hiking trail from Lions Bay to Mount Harvey. At about 660m there is a fork, here you go left following an old logging road. Keep straight following bits of flagging tape until you end up in the open talus field beneath the north face.

We donned our crampons and started up. The lower section was quite firm and I felt the sustained front pointing in my calves. The firm snow held the picks well and it felt quite secure bear-crawling up the ramp. Higher up the snow softened and there was good steps from a previous party. There was two short sections of alpine ice but these were both easily bypassed via snow on the side.

Getting to the top of the ramp you traverse left through a fairly steep section of snow. Here we had a very nice sidewalk kicked in by a previous party. It felt easy and secure to traverse on this. It felt almost like cheating, I’m sure it would have felt much more real without the tracks.

After this you have a short sections where you can choose your own route up through some steep trees to the summit.

At the summit we sat down for a bit and enjoyed the spectacular views of the Lions and the Howe Sound. All before heading down the hiking route that follows the SW ridge. After the steep hike down we were back to the car in about 5.5 hours for the total round trip.

Gear Notes:

I brought two axes (camp corsa nanotech+petzl gully), and semi-auto aluminum petzl leopard crampons. This was completely adequate for the conditions we faced. Although it’s probably advisable to take steel crampons instead if you have them. We also packed microspikes which were nice to have for the hard-packed hiking trail on the descent.

A more conservative party could definitely do running belays or pitches through the cruxes. There wasn’t much ice for screws but the wall adjacent to the ramp had cracks that could take rock pro. Between that and a snow picket I think you could reasonably protect the route.