Bushwhack
[boo sh-hwak, -wak]
Verb (used without object)
- To make one’s way through woods by cutting at undergrowth, branches, etc.
- To travel through woods.
- To fight as a bushwhacker or guerrilla in the bush.
In wanting to know the overall difficulty and commitment a given climb has, various difficulty and grading systems have been developed over the years. These are regional in nature and in many cases should be considered directional at best. Often times they are open to interpretation and indeed can be quite controversial as well. They do however serve as some sort of guidance or roadmap for a climber to ensure that they don’t get in over their head. However even the best ratings should be taken with a grain or two of salt.
Some of the more popular difficulty rating systems are represented here:
French: 1 to 9a (Rock climbing)
French: F to ABO (Alpine)
UK: M to E10 7c
Aussie: 8 to 35
North America: 2 to 5.15d
UIAA: I to XI
North America Bouldering: V0 to V16
However…
Regardless of the difficulty rating of a given climb or route, and before you can even attempt it, you need to actually get to it. When it’s at a roadside crag or an established area, or even an alpine ascent with nice approach trails it’s mostly all good. Heck, I know of some places where you can belay from your car seat. But there are some places in this world where it’s a wee bit more challenging to get to your climb of choice. So challenging in fact that you must partake of a quaint activity known in common circles as the ‘Bushwhack’. Those climbing readers who live in Washington State, and Southwestern British Columbia will most likely be intimately familiar with bushwhacking. Elevated to a perverse art by some, reviled by others. In fact in some locales, the compulsory bushwhack approach or descent may actually be the most arduous; if not the most dangerous part of the climb.
How difficult or dangerous? I’m glad you asked…. I have done some trivial amount of this bushwhacking business over the years and every so often I run across some form of bushwhack grading system. What follows is a combination of what I have remembered about reading from other sources, along with the distillation of my own limited experience.
First things first. Just how difficult is a bushwhack? For the most part, this address the major details of the actually bush you are trying to navigate through.
Difficulty Ratings:
B1:
Light, open bush with good visibility. Occasional use of hands may be needed. Minimal flora or fauna hazards. Travel is usually unhampered. A sublime stroll through open forest, moss underfoot, sunbeams and butterflies in the scented air. (Sorry I wax poetic…)
B2:
Moderate bush. Frequent use of hands may be required
B3:
Heavy bush and/or substantial blow-down. Terrain typically will be more awkward. Pace will be significantly slower. Most likely including some amount of particularly demanding vegetation such as slide alder.
B4:
Dense bush in steep or otherwise difficult terrain. Becomes problematic to navigate. Swear words may occur. Blood loss may possibly ensue.
B5:
An upgrade from B4, including a substantial and loathsome amount of noxious plants, and treacherous footing. Less than one kilometer per hour is covered. Foliage may be so thick that sunlight is blocked causing gloomy conditions. Much thrashing about and gnashing of teeth. Cussing becomes the standard mode of communication.
B6:
Extreme. Use your imagination here.
Modifiers:
Besides the basic difficulty ratings listed above there are certain factors that need to be taken into consideration when trying to fully define a proper bushwhack.
- Like climbs, besides a difficulty rating there is also a grade, which attempts to define the duration of the event. Grades are listed below.
- Snow has a major impact. Typically, a snow cover has the effect of lessening the difficulty of any given bushwhack. The exception being when the snow is covering hidden dangers and there is not enough of it to be supportive of your weight.
- Topography or terrain. Cliffs, steep ground, and boulders can all compound the difficulty of the bushwhack.
- Water. Swamps, bogs, creeks, streams, rivers, and the like can impose a particular sort of hazard and discomfort that can affect the overall difficulty. Separate water ratings are listed below.
- Type of bush being navigated has a significant impact as well. Blow-down, slide alder, devils club, manzanita, poison ivy, oak, and sumac each offer their own grim brand of punishment.
- Fauna. Bushwhacking may also involve the presence of pesky critters that add to the fun. Mosquitoes, blackfly, snakes, fire ants, killer bees, and grizzly bears are just some of a few that have been known to spice up an approach.
Grades:
Grades attempt to define the duration of the event along with the resultant commitment factor
- Several hours or less
- Several hours to half a day
- Could take the greater part of a day, except for skilled, seasoned, and tough parties.
- Will take a full day, and include significant difficulties well in excess of B3
- Upwards of 1+ day to complete. B3 and B4 should be expected.
- Extreme Bushwhacking. Likely to take 2 days or longer to complete. Will most certainly contain a section of B5 or long sections of B4 terrain as well as water up to W5. The term ‘despair’ comes to mind. Likely to be a life changing and transcendental experience. May require resorting to ‘aid-bushwhacking’
- A mostly hypothetical grade. 2 days or longer. Continuous B4 or significant sections of B5. Multiple water crossings up to W4 or greater. Copious amounts of at least one type of noxious flora, and at least one type of hazardous fauna. Mythical creatures may be encountered.
Water Ratings:
W1:
Water, moving or still. Rocks, boulders, and logs permit a dry crossing.
W2:
Similar to above although getting wet is likely, but with enough skill and agility a dry crossing may be possible.
W3:
Water, moving or still, but with no means of avoiding a wet crossing up to calf deep.
W4:
Water, moving or still, calf to knee deep. May also encounter deep mud and slime.
W5:
Moving water that is thigh to chest deep. Significant chance of getting swept downstream.
W6:
Moving water greater than chest deep. Prudent parties would rig some form of Rope Bridge or Tyrolean traverse. Really prudent parties would consider abandonment of objective. Significant chance of injury, drowning, and/or loss of equipment.
Desert Ratings.1
I know that some of you gentle readers partake in various adventures in the desert regions of the American Southwest. You know the score. For those that don’t, please do not be fooled into thinking that there is no bushwhacking in the desert. On the contrary. Desert bushwhacking can be some of the most insidious and bloodletting around. The nuances are such that it requires its own sub-system to rate it properly.
Many of the above factors from non-desert locations apply (with some obvious exceptions).
DB1:
Light open, flat desert. Good visibility. Occasional use of hands may be required. Mostly benign foliage such as creosote bushes and/or avoidable species of cacti. Lovely ocotillo blooms, warbling cactus wrens… (Dang, there I go again…)
DB2:
Moderate brush with the possibility of occasional heavy patches. Increasingly rugged terrain. Cacti and shin- daggers may be encountered.
DB3:
Heavy brush. Constant use of gloved hands is required. Multiple species of problematic cacti encountered. Profanity may occur.
DB4:
Dense thickets of thorny brush. Visibility impaired, resulting in possible navigation issues. Convoluted terrain. Unavoidable Teddy Bear Cholla cacti. Blood loss is to be expected. Profanity becomes the norm.
DB5:
Extreme. Forward travel may become impossible.
Cylindropuntia bigelovii
Special modifiers and notes:
While this is intended to be a light-hearted approach to wilderness travel it needs to be noted that none of this is a joke. The hazards and dangers are very real and in many cases life threatening. Travel at your own risk.
- Water hazards. Although lack of water is usually a concern in the desert there is a rare water related bushwhacking hazard, and that is the infamous flash flood.
- Fauna. The desert is home to an unusually wide variety of stinging and biting insects and reptiles. Including but not limited to rattlesnake varieties, coral snakes, Gila monsters, killer bees, scorpions, tarantulas, black widow spiders and more. These can certainly add to your bushwhacking adventure, as can Javalena and mountain lion encounters.
- Hostiles. The American southwest has become an increasingly lawless place. You may run across armed criminals in your travels.
So there you have it; some guidance in rating some forms of bushwhacking. The world is a big place and terrain and bush can vary immensely2. As you have probably gleaned, there are many variables that can come into play during a bushwhack. No single rating or grading can possibly provide complete information about an approach. You just need to steel yourself and take that plunge into the greenery.
*Notes:
1 The Desert Bushwhacking (DB) rating system has been reviewed and edited by one of the world’s leading experts in this type of terrain; none other than the Desert Mountaineer
2 Jungle Bushwhacking is out of scope for this article
Bushwhacker Gloves
“I am a bushwhacker, the thicket’s my home… And them that don’t like me can leave me alone. I’ll tune up my fiddle and rosin my bow… And I shall find welcome wherever I go. My kinfolks don’t like me, and that I well know.”
– Traditional folk ballad
Some selected bushwhacks….
Mt. Hozomeen, BC (via border swath in winter): B3 Grade II+
Lillooet Range, BC (Descent to Harrison Lake): B4 Grade III+
Mt. Redoubt W Flank BC (via Bear Lake): B3 Grade IV
Weaver Peak, AZ: DB3 Grade II+
PGH Bonus Feature…!
Mt. Sloan E. Ridge, BC (Descent): B2 Grade I
As we reach the bottom of the ridge, we know at some point we need to turn sharply right and head back down the steep slope of trees we ascended through. We were happily chatting about what, I don’t remember, but from time to time one of the guys would mention heading down to the right. I would keep saying “No, I think it’s just a bit further.” Why they listened to me, I have no idea. Perhaps Bill was being overly nice this being our first climb together. My only reasoning for not turning right just then, was simply, it was easier on the path we were on.
Finally, the emergency alarm in Bill’s internal GPS must have gone off because suddenly he decided we must turn down, immediately. At this point heading down is not so nice as before, and there is, what I perceive, to be an impenetrable wall of trees and bushes. Bill and Brian head towards the wall and I think “ah, personal break”. But no, they just walk through the wall like it’s nothing. I remember standing there for quite a few seconds before panic set in realizing I could lose them very quickly. I tried to move some branches aside and find a place to step, but in the end the only thing that worked was to try to crash through like a rhino.
It went like this for quite a while, I would see the two up ahead, disappearing through another wall, while I desperately tried to keep up and fight off the blanket of mosquitoes that had descended upon me. All of a sudden, we come out of the bush onto the end of a logging road. Although it is a long hike, we are able to take it all the way back to the car. Looking at the map later, if we had not turned down at the point that we did, we would have ended up in Downton Lake. Or eaten by a bear. Or worse, mosquitoes.
-courtesy of Renee
Peak 4740, Ajo Range, AZ: DB5 Grade IV
The NNW canyon which approaches this summit is a climber’s nightmare. It climbs over 1,800 vertical feet, and every inch of it is choked with vegetation. It starts off bad enough, a mix of brush and small trees. For the most part though, you are able to thrash your way forward. It’s still bad enough even at its start, though, that the DM found human remains there. As you work your way up, things quickly head south. The mix of cactus, spiny bushes and trees thickens. The slope steepens too. By the time you’ve climbed 500 vertical feet, your luck is running out, and fast. The trees are getting bigger and closer together. The canyon walls are closing in – the vegetation thickens, and you find yourself struggling to make any forward progress. Every damn thing seems to have thorns. Small waterfalls (dry, of course) block your path and need to be climbed. Vines have appeared by now, choking everything else. The canyon has now become devoid of all sunlight – I’m not shitting you, the sun never reaches the bottom of the canyon at this point. By now you’ve climbed 900 vertical feet, and you’re SOL. Any forward movement becomes Class 5, and the bushwhacking is the kind that makes you wake up at night in a cold sweat. The only conclusion you can come to is “fuck this shit!!”
You have two options at this point. Turn around and go home, nursing your many wounds, or side-hill up and across out of the canyon and gain an open ridge. The DM chose the latter, and almost regretted that choice too. That involved a steep, loose climb through horrific bush but nothing worse than Class 3. However, the bushwhacking was so thick and nasty that in places, your foot punched through into air along a steep cliff.
Suffice to say that to try to continue up the canyon instead of side-hilling out of it is madness, and has never been done. The DM considered himself lucky to have made the round trip to the summit in 9+ hours with nothing more serious than a loss of blood and some of his hide. Conclusion – this mother-fucker is to be avoided at all costs. DB5, because far enough into it, forward movement is impossible.
– Courtesy of the Desert Mountaineer
I’m sure that many of you readers out there have at least one tremendous bushwhacking tale of their own to tell. Please feel free to reach out to us about submitting your own exciting bushwhack stories here at PGH. We would love to hear from you.