This route wasn’t on my radar until Adam sent a note early this spring, looking to get a group together to climb and ski the line. Reading up on the route, we’d heard of the rock bands melting out early in the season and so we looked for the first opportunity with consistent good weather to fire it up. When the recent high-pressure system gave us July in April for an entire week, it was obviously time to roll.
Adam, Colin, and I met up at Longmire at 9am on Saturday morning to register and then drove to Comet Falls, packing up and leaving the car around 10am. It was a bit tedious ascending along the summer trail with some side hilling on slushy snow, but we eventually made it to the Van Trump meadows with views of the mountain and our excitement grew. We could see ski tracks from a group that had recently been up in the Van Trump area and it looked like they’d had a great time!
The approach was pretty straightforward, heading more or less straight up before bending to the West at around 8,000 feet. 5.5 hours from the car under a hot sun and cloudless sky got us to a nice, nearly flat campsite on the East margin of the Kautz Glacier, mostly protected from ice and rock fall. That meant we were at camp by 3:30pm, enabling my most favorite thing—an afternoon nap before dinner. The sun was beating down on us in our tents, but the 9,000-foot elevation helped keep things cool enough to go down for the count after some ramen. We scouted out the Kautz crossing that evening before dinner, including a highly-awkward roped ski, then tucked ourselves in just after sunset for a 2:45am wakeup.
I slept really well, having opted to bring a warmer bag than I’d tried to get away with on Rainier before and the early morning wasn’t that painful. We took a bit longer to pack up than planned and were moving around 3:45am. With skis on our backs and short-roped together with crampons, axes, and whippets, we descended and crossed the Kautz, then ascended the Kautz Cleaver’s 50-degree snow slopes to 10,150 feet where we were able to easily traverse into the East Success Couloir. The angle eased slightly here and we swung our rope team around, getting up to 11,.000 feet before our next break at 6:15am.
The snow was odd. Small sun cups and penitentes had formed with a light coating of pumice dust everywhere. Every so often, there would be an old wind layer that was more pristine, but harder packed. We hoped it would all soften up later under another cloudless sky. We took another break at 12,000 feet, roughly an hour later. At 12,600 feet, we encountered a steep step that was mostly exposed rock. It took a bit of finesse to work through the sugar snow here. Above this, we started traversing rightwards onto more and more exposed terrain.
At 13,300 feet or so, we encountered what normally must be a rock band. For us, it was a much steeper step of snow, easily 60+ degrees. The snow up here was warming fast at this point, with a more Eastern aspect. As Adam gingerly kicked in steps and Colin and I plunged our axes to be ready for a worst-case tumble, we had a group chat. The terrain below us was steep enough and exposed enough that an unmitigated fall would not end well. None of us expected to ski down this section, so it would require booting to the top and back, easily taking 1.5-2 hours. If the snow started to wet slide, that would also be a problem. So we called it, having all been on top before and being more interested in skiing the couloir than pushing our luck.
We down-climbed to a ridge at 13,125 feet, took a break, and clicked into our skis at 11:15am. The first turn was a doozy with firm snow, steep terrain, and a lot of exposure. We scraped our way back to the rock step at 12,600 feet, popped our skis off to down climb, and then clicked back in just below. The snow had softened a bit, but was not great. All of the sun cups, wind features, and mini penitentes made for choppy skiing requiring a lot of attention. We slowly made our way down the couloir, searching for anywhere the smoother old wind layer bridged sections together.
Finally, near the bottom of couloir, we got delicious corn. The objective hazard was mostly behind us and we could go for it as much as our quads would allow. At 8,900 feet, we decided to traverse to the Kautz Cleaver to see if we could get across here. Boy were we glad we looked! The Kautz Glacier below us had a dirty, nasty icefall that we’d have to climb through if we went farther down. We were able to traverse from here, then skin back up to camp by 2pm. We packed up quickly, knowing the lower slopes. would be getting wet.
Skiing from camp to 6,500 feet or so was lovely corn which we enjoyed as much as we could in spite of our overnight packs. Below this elevation, we encountered isothermal slop. With matchstick skis and an overnight pack, I struggled my way down, reaching the car at about 4pm.
We made a good decision to turn around when we did. I can see how the couloir can be a phenomenal ski line. Unfortunately the conditions for us didn’t live up to the promise, but we did it and came out unscathed. Not sure I’ll be back on this route. I like a bit more technical (and protectable) terrain punctuated by some amount of moderate terrain. In this case, it was a consistent, long day of ~45-degree snow slopes—a bit of a slog while staying on edge the whole time.