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Early to bed, early to rise. At 5:30 a.m., I began arranging my gear for the day, prepared for the worst. Apparently, this is an uncommon practice, as several cottoneers without ice axes or poles in jeans are droving around below the snowfields on Eolus on my return. The morning was warmer than the previous day, and everything seemed to be going fine, except for a sore diaphragm - that feeling you get after running for too long as a kid underneath your ribs - whatever... I was still making a pace at least as good as the previous two summits, which was acceptable. I had watched the sun beam down on Eolus two days in a row now, and I was anxious to reach Twin Lakes to once again "novel" terrain to the West and follow the steps of Mr. Maki. Twin Lakes comes soon enough. The sunis coming up, and feels great.
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 | Once again, I am glad to have brought my ice axe as I eye the snowfields above. The trail seems to continue for a very long time, and the start of the West Ridge route on Windom's ridge proper looks about level with where I'm at, which has me encouraged about my chances of making the summit. The first snowfield is easy, and takes only a few minutes to ascend, upon which a small line of slab is available without black ice covering it. I want to say the granite is prime where dry; cliche. The next snowfield goes by almost as un-noticed as the first, following steps kicked in by previous parties. It is apparent that the ridge is above and it is also apparent where the ridge should be, but it is not in view now.
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| I remember Roach's description to head Northeast and then ascend the flat area to the Norhtern-most saddle North Eolus shares with Eolus. So, Northeast I go above the second snowfield and over slabs coated with black ice.
Eolus rears above, as shown in the photo on the right, and appears very close. The thought did cross my mind to skip the Catwalk and try my luck on 4th or lower 5th class ledges, but I'm not that divergent or skilled. I followed the cairns up higher and crossed more snowfields until arriving at the base of the easy 3rd class that was highly reminiscent of Lost Creek Wilderness style slabs. Atop the easy part, I could finally eye the Catwalk, with a good deal of exposure into New York Basin. I take a very short break, and pace myself slower, because I have at least 26 more hours to spend waiting for the train to return to Needleton.
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For whatever reason, the Catwalk appears to have been over-hyped; I never even use a hand while traversing it. After crossing, I think the worst is over. A steep patch of snow greets me at the base of the peak itself, though easily managed by gripping the rock to its right while ascending (left the axe at the base of the saddle between Eolus & N. Eolus). Now the fun begins...the route is not very discernable, and cairns are often misleading. The exposure here is much greater (subjectively at least) than the Catwalk since much more time is being spent climbing up 3rd class above the drop-off as opposed to moving over it laterally. A slip would not be good at all on this face. Stair-like progressions of rockbands are the only reasonable means of ascent, separated at fifteen to twenty foot intervals. Usually only one convenient mean of movement exists on these ledges; I spent a lot of time trying to make the route "work" the way I wanted it to, like many other peaks, but it just wasn't going that way today.
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Taking my time, I kept telling myself "All day...All day" to signify that when I was done with the peak, I had nothing better to do than read as many chapters of Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance as I could fit in before calling it a day and sleeping. The summit was a strange place, almost not fit for a "class 3" experience. Turret Peak is featured prominently from the summit of Mt. Eolus (photo on right). Perhaps it seemed strange to have been alone all morning and arrived there at 9:00 a.m. I took my time descending to the Catwalk, but still experienced a multitude of route-finding mishaps. I even started to descend the wrong snowfield after getting back below the trouble spots. Backtracking upward was no big deal, but annoying nonetheless. I bumped into some familiar and not-so-familiar faces on the descent from the snowfields. I moved my camp down to 8,500' in hopes of a better night's rest before the train the next day. It was in some way a good conclusion to be on the train again, heading back to Silverton. Sometimes it takes "wilderness" to comprehend wilderness.
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