South Spur on Mount Adams 2015

May 25, 2015

*Dale on the summit with a view of Mount Hood*

Dale, Kate, and I found the best weather in the state on Memorial Day to skin up and ski down Mount Adams. We drove up to the trailhead on Sunday night and got started at about 5:45am on Monday. The snow was a bit icy, but soft enough to skin most of and we headed up the summer route via the ridge. We were able to skin up most of the headwall and then finished to the false summit and then true summit with boots.

We were on the summit by about 11:30am and then enjoyed some phenomenal corn skiing on the way down. It was a bit icy up top, but the main headwall was perfect and we couldn't help but let out some whoops. After waiting a bit for Kate and having Dale do a lap on the face, we cruised out to the car by 2:15pm or so. Great day.

Approaching Colfax Peak. Photo by Dale Apgar.

Ford's Theatre on Colfax Peak

May 9, 2015

This new route on Colfax Peak went up on April 20th by locals Andrew Fabian and Dana Bellows. Their trip report made it look like another fun ice route on what is now a very familiar NW face and it was an easy decision for Dale and I to head back up there after great success on the Polish Route the weekend before.

Dale's primary desire was to ski Baker while mine was to climb ice, so we compromised. Our plan was to climb Ford's Theatre with skis on our backs, descend to the Colfax-Baker saddle and then skin up the Roman Wall to the Baker summit before skiing all the way down.

We left Seattle at 4:30am on Saturday morning and were hiking up the trail by around 7:30am. As we were skinning up to the route, we saw a party of three low on the Polish Route and a pair of two guys bailing from the Cosley-Houston, mentioning that the ice was pretty rotten. Nevertheless, we finished up the approach to see what was in store for us up there. Skis were quite handy as a bunch of new snow had fallen since last weekend.

Dale headed up on our 70m lead line at about noon and found the ice in better condition than it looked from afar. Things had thinned up since the FA and there was a bit of 'spring cleaning' to be done near the crux to enable safe passage to the upper steps, but it went smoothly for a full rope length to the couloir above. I had to move the belay pretty far away from the route to get out of the line of fire of some big chunks. Once I met him at the belay, Dale suggested that I move quickly as the three screws he'd placed were fully in the sun. I'd been thoroughly showered by running water on my way up and didn't need any more motivation, knowing it was only getting warmer.

After a bit of low-angle ice, the couloir turned to steep snow with secure steps, but little in the way of protection. After making it over a knife-edge ridge, I traversed to the Cosley-Houston exit and we finished simul-climbing to the summit at about 2pm.

Finishing the ice pitch with Lincoln in the background

Dale, traversing to the Cosley-Houston finish

After downing lunch on the summit, we descended to the saddle, left our technical gear, and skinned to the summit of Baker at around 4:30pm. It was incredibly warm with no breeze and felt like being on a beach. Dale enjoyed himself thoroughly on the ski down while I successfully survival skied through the sloppy snow. Good times and a great linkup for those inclined.

Skinning up the Roman Wall after climbing Colfax with our descent tracks visible

NW Ice Couloir on Eldorado Peak

May 1, 2015

Skinning up with J-burg in the background

The weekend forecast was shaping up nicely and both Dale and I wanted to get out there to enjoy what I like to refer to as "prime time" in the Cascades for icy routes. We'd bailed on the North Face of Graybeard the weekend before and were looking for something a bit less avalanche prone and committing. The NW Ice Couloir on Eldorado was a good choice, especially since Dale likes those silly plank contraptions under his feet.

We left Seattle at 3:30am and departed from the car just shy of 6am. The snow line had moved up a ways since my trip in late February and we boulder hopped a good ways up, perhaps around 6,000 feet and around 2 hours from the car, before putting the skis on and weaving our way through the trees.

Thankfully it was smooth sailing from there and we were up between the rock outcrops on the East Ridge by 10:30 or so. Wrapping around the North side of the mountain was easy on skis despite the deeper, windblown snow. We easily found the rappel station and did a single rap with our 60m line to reach steep snow below. As we traversed to the route, what had started as a beautiful day was quickly turning into a socked-in mess. Full whiteout conditions followed.

Dale headed up the couloir and quickly out of view. We ended up simul-climbing the whole thing and didn't find much gear, but the climbing was secure, with good steps in steep snow, solid sticks in neve, and a few ice bulges in which Dale placed three screws along the way. For much of the route, there was a deep runnel with good neve, but it was also the firing line for anything coming down the route, so we stayed out of it. We topped out the route in what Dale called a "milk bottle" whiteout just shy of 2pm. With our GPS (the Gaia app is a true life saver), I got a feel for how close we were to the knife edge and headed to what we believe was the summit, without getting too close to the cornice edge.

The descent was painstaking and we weaved back and forth down the East Ridge, checking our position often to avoid going over the cliffs to the South or into the crevasses to the North. Once we were down to the rock outcrop, we put skis on and experienced serious nausea as we slid down the slope with no visibility and flat light. After one errant circle on the soccer field when we ran across our tracks from the morning and followed them the wrong way, we navigated back to the glacier descent just as visibility lifted a little.

It was wet slide prime time below the final ridge and we were careful on our way back to the boulder field and our approach shoes. The last bit went smoothly.