Rainy Memorial Day...

A rainy Memorial Day here in Ashford brought snow and inclement weather to the mountain.

The guides tell me that the route on the upper mountain is great and direct - it's the weather that's keeping them from the summit. This morning, the 4-day climb was forced to turn around at the Ingraham Flats. Stay tuned - We'll have a full trip report from the climb in the next few days! Keep your fingers crossed for some better weather in the near future!

RMI 5-day Climb: May 26 - 30

Another summit for RMI today! The climb reached the top around 6:45 this morning...

The group headed up the Muir Snowfield on Friday, May 28th - RMI guide, Lindsay Mann said they ascended the Snowfield in low visibility, moderate winds and snow falling. Once they arrived at Muir, the weather began to improve. She said it was a beautiful night at Muir - with an almost full moon! The group began their ascent to the summit this morning around 2am with good visibility and decent weather. 2 guides went ahead of the group to punch in a good route - they found a lot of wind deposited snow on the upper mountain. Around 12,800' they were in the cloud cap and no longer had great visibility. After a successful summit the team made its way back to Camp Muir. Lindsay spotted a fox hanging out at Muir! Upon leaving Muir, visibility was good until about 8,500' on the Snowfield. From there the climbers made their way back to Paradise in spotty visibility and new, wet snow.

Nick's Ski Descent of Mount Rainier

Whittaker Mountaineering's Rental Manager, Nick climbed Rainier the second week of May - here is his trip report and some photos from his climb...

Walking downhill has always been my least favorite part of mountaineering. You’re usually tired after a long ascent, all the motivation of reaching the summit has fizzled out, and snow conditions are often beginning to deteriorate. And while it may seem like it would be easier on the body to walk downhill, after a couple thousand feet of descent your legs can turn to jello. Then in the back of your mind you know that most accidents happen on the way down. Rocks that were frozen on the ascent are now starting to melt out and fall onto the glaciers. Seracs weaken and threaten to spill tons of ice down the mountain. A slip or fall can be more difficult to arrest when facing downhill. Okay, you get the picture...

My dislike of walking down mountains combined with my affinity for skiing led me to a logical conclusion: a ski descent. Ever since I began skiing in the backcountry, a ski descent of Rainier had been a personal goal. In even the worst snow conditions, I have always felt more confident on skis than on my own two feet. Plus, skis allow for more efficient travel both uphill (with skins to grip the snow) and downhill, reducing the jello factor. For me, skis are a no-brainier.

My good friend and climbing partner, Matt, recently started backcountry skiing and shared similar goals. We had climbed Rainier together before a couple of times, which ironically were the two longest, most painful descents I’ve ever experienced on the mountain. So armed with that valuable experience, we hatched plans for Matt to fly up from Salt Lake City in May and spend a week in Ashford, hoping a for a weather window to make things happen.

With a close eye on the forecast, we finally saw our window appear and headed up the mountain. We left Paradise in low visibility, but we knew the cloud deck was well below Muir and sunshine wasn’t far away. By the time we reached Panorama Point, we broke free of the clouds and enjoyed the clear skies that would continue for the remainder of our trip. The storm from the days prior had dumped a fair bit of new snow, about 4” at Paradise to more than a foot at Muir.

After a leisurely skin, we arrived at Muir around 3:00 pm and enjoyed the calm breeze and warm sun. There were a couple other groups that also had plans to summit the next day, and we ran into Amar, who I had skied with before and was also planning on ascending the Ingraham Glacier Direct. Although he had two partners for the descent, they were planning on climbing a different route. Since Amar would be going solo, we offered him a place on our rope the next day. Rather than climbing as a team of three, we decided that he would join us if we ran into one another on route the following day. So we relaxed, melted snow, and prepared dinner, in no hurry to crawl into our sleeping bags because an “alpine start” was nowhere in our agenda.

We awoke around 5:15 am to another beautiful day, cloud level still hovering around 7500’ but very little wind and clear skies up high. Sleeping in was another great benefit of skiing. Rather than beginning our ascent hours before daylight, which I am never a fan of, our plan was to allow the sun to soften the firm snow high on the mountain for improved ski conditions. Matt and I departed Muir just after 6:00 am, opting to boot using crampons rather than skin because we were concerned about potential icy sections around Cathedral Gap. One set of snowshoe tracks from another party who had left several hours prior helped to consolidate sections of the route below Ingraham Flats, but the occasional posthole had us wishing we were on skis. In the interest of time, we decided to continue booting until the Flats, where we would transition to skinning.

*Arriving at the Ingraham Flats

After a quick break and now enjoying the extra flotation of our skis, we roped up and continued ascending the Ingraham Glacier, which appeared as smooth and continuous as I had ever seen it. Our pace slowed a bit when we began to encounter breakable crust over unconsolidated powder just above the Flats. Breaking trail in these conditions was rather difficult, but offered a secure grip for our skins and greatly reduced the chance of an uncontrolled slide should one of us fall. We soon reached the party on snowshoes, who had been making very slow progress given the snow conditions and wisely decided to turn around just after we passed them, around 12,000’. At about 12,500’ and just after the only real crevasse crossing of the day, Amar caught up with us. Now a rope team of three, we began a series of long switchbacks on the upper mountain. Snow conditions were much better at this point and we continued skinning up the firm, wind-affected glacier. A few icy sections on the last 1000’ vertical were fairly easy to avoid, never requiring the use of crampons.

*Matt, skinning around 13,500'

*Amar, just below the crater rim

Just below the crater rim we ran into Amar’s other two partners, who had ascended the Nisqually Cleaver. Our group of five skinned up to 14410’ Columbia Crest, the true summit, where conditions were breezy but not too cold. The ascent had taken about 6.5 hours, not bad given the trail breaking but a bit longer than what we had estimated. However, Matt and I were both feeling great, agreeing that it had been the easiest climb we’d ever had on the mountain. At this point, the original plan was for Matt and I to descend the Fuhrer Finger. However, it was without much debate that we decided to descend the Ingraham Direct instead. Our concern was possible wind-loading of the Finger, which could create high avalanche danger in the steep chute. Coupled with the breakable crust conditions below 12,500’, it seemed like an unwise choice to ski a route we had never climbed before in what were potentially dangerous conditions. We stripped our skins and skied off the summit and back down to the lowest point of the crater rim, were we took a longer break before our descent.

*Nick (left) and Matt on the summit!

Now it was time to actually enjoy the trip back down the mountain. Thrilled to not have to walk down, we left the crater rim at about 2:00 pm. Despite the heavily wind-affected snow, the upper 2000’ of the mountain proved to be quite good for skiing. I had never been that high on Rainier without being roped up, and the feeling of exposure while staring down at thousands of feet of glacier was incredible. Not a feeling of intimidation or fear, but rather a complete sense of freedom. Even though nobody else was there to stop me in the case of a fall, it was the first time I had zero concern of sliding uncontrollably or plummeting into a crevasse. I had a huge smile across my face as we made our way down the upper Ingraham Glacier.

*Still high on the mountain, Matt skiing down

*Just before the snow turned bad ...

Unfortunately the good turns ended all too soon. By the time we reached about 12,000’, the breakable crust made skiing much more difficult, even downright scary. Not scary in the sense that you could tumble down the mountain, but in the sense that your knees will be destroyed should your ski tips suddenly dive under the icy surface crust and submarine into the deep unconsolidated snow below. Careful turns (which were more often than not of the downhill-facing kick variety) brought us back to Cathedral Gap where conditions improved a bit. A quick traverse across the Cowlitz Glacier found us back at Camp Muir a little less than 2 hours after we left the summit, a majority of that time spent dealing with the breakable crust.

Our stop at Muir was very brief. Unlike the day prior, there were many hikers and climbers up at the camp enjoying the warm weather. Matt and I took off a few layers, packed up some climbing gear, and quickly departed to enjoy sections of nice corn snow down the Muir Snowfield. Just above Panorama Point, we descended back into the dense layer of clouds that we had experienced the day before at similar elevations. Our world suddenly shrunk to less than 10 feet in any direction. We had one last glimpse of Rainier, said our goodbyes to the mountain we just skied down, and carefully found our way back to Paradise. We were back at my truck 2.5 hours after we left the summit. All and all it was a very successful trip, certainly breaking the streak of long and miserable descents that Matt and I have on record. I don’t think either of us will ever walk down the mountain again.

*Their last view of Rainier on the descent, Panorama Point.

Is it still winter?

Well, it's almost the end of May but lately the mountain has been looking more like winter! Unseasonable storms have created winter conditions on Rainier - the RMI climb did not leave Camp Muir for a summit bid this morning. Yesterday, two RMI guides ascended part of the route to scout out the conditons. They encountered a lot of windloading of snow, creating high avalanche hazard. Windloading is when the wind picks up snow from the windward side of ridges and deposits that snow on the downwind or leeward side of the terrain - this rapid addition of weight on the snowpack quickly creates high avalanche potential. They made the decision not to climb this morning based on their assessments.

RMI guide, Eric Frank, tells me that on their descent from Camp Muir this morning, visibility on the Muir Snowfield was poor - ranging from a few hundred yards to about 20 feet. Even though the route to Muir is very well wanded right now, the climb was navigating by GPS in the whiteout conditions. Eric says the climbers were post holing in the knee-deep snow on the snowfield.

Here are a few pictures from Paradise today! RMI guide, Win Whittaker is leading a snow school right now and he sent in a few photos of the winter day in Paradise!

Look how deep the snow is!


...and it's still snowing...

May 21-24th Climb Report

The climb just returned to Ashford and I had a chance to catch up with RMI guide, Chris Bamer to get some route beta. After a failed attempt at making pancakes, the climb departed Camp Muir around 2:20am and ascended the Ingraham Direct. With a nice, direct route in place, it took the team about 5 and a half hours to reach the crater rim. Once on top, they found the summit register frozen together from the recent stormy weather! Chris said they had awesome weather today - clear skies, little wind and lots of sun! Although it warmed up throughout the day, Chris said that when they were descending, the weather started to deteriorate a little - it got really cold and the wind picked up creating spin drifts. It looks like our break it the weather is just about over - the forecast for the next few days doesn't look as good as today!

Be sure to check out RMI guide, Win Whittaker's photos from today in the previous post!

Another successful summit of Rainier!

The RMI May 21-24th, 4-day summit climb reached the top of Mount Rainier this morning around 7:45! They had perfect weather for their summit day! The team reported blue skies, warm weather and no wind on the mountain! That's a huge change from the past few days...

RMI guide, Win Whittaker sent us some photos along the way:

7PM - May 23 - Camp Muir


Camp Muir - Looking south to Mount Adams


The sunrise en route to the summit this morning - May 24th


RMI climbers at a rest break high on the mountain...almost there!


The summit of Rainier! What a perfect day!!

Congratulations everyone! And thanks for the photos, Win!

A Week of Summits!

It's been a big week for RMI climbers around the world! Yesterday, RMI's first McKinley climb of the 2010 season reached the summit! The team, led by guide, Mike Walters is currently on their way down the mountain. Read all of the climbs' dispatches here.

This morning, RMI guide Melissa Arnot stood on the summit of Mount Everest for her third time! Waiting for the weather to improve, Dave Hahn and Leif Whittaker are holding at Camp 4 on Everest. Follow their progress, as well as Melissa's descent here.

RMI is 3 for 3 this year on Rainier summits - with the 3rd summit of the summer season this morning around 10AM!

Congratulations everyone!

May 22nd Climbing School

Today's climbing school just arrived back in Ashford. RMI guide, Win Whittaker said it was snowing most of the day at Paradise! Although visibility wasn't the greatest, he said it was great that they didn't get rained on. He estimated 6 inches of new snow on top of a consolidated crust - and his group of climbers were post-holing a little bit. Stay tuned for route conditions on the mountain!

May 21st Snow School

Today's snow school just back back from the mountain! RMI Guides Katy Laveck and Solveig Garhart taught school about 20 minutes outside of Paradise in Edith Creek Basin. They encountered a "spring mix" of rain and snow throughout the day. With low freezing levels over the past few days, Paradise had a fresh blanket of soft, unconsolidated snow creating a bit of a Winter Wonderland. Solveig said it was perfect for practicing plunge stepping! Let's hope for some sunshine in the forecast!

Camp Muir Expedition Skills Seminar May 16-21

We just got word that the RMI Expedition Skills Seminar has reached the summit! They radioed down around 8:15 this morning to let Basecamp know they were at the crater rim! Congratulations everyone! Later this week we'll have a full trip report, including route conditions, from one of the guides on the climb.

May 12-16 Summit Climb Overview

The climb that summited Rainier yesterday morning has arrived back at Basecamp just in time for the sunny, warm weather to turn into rain. I had a chance to chat with RMI guide Andy Bond about their climb and the conditions on the mountain.

The route to Muir is already kicked in pretty well. Above Muir, the team was able to climb the Ingraham Direct route - heading up the Ingraham headwall with no long traverse over to the Disappointment Cleaver. Andy said they had good snow conditions with no post-holing or icy sections. Since it's early season, most of the crevasses on the upper mountain are still filled in, but he said there were still a few crevasse step-overs along the route. "As it storms, the mountain continues to heal itself...hopefully we can stay on this route for a while," says Andy. It took the team 6 hours to ascend to the summit, taking breaks at the Ingraham Flats, above the Cleaver and at 13,500 feet. At about 12,000 feet and the rest of the way to the summit, the wind picked up a bit but Andy says it was a great day to be on the top! 3 hours after departing the summit they were back at Muir. Today, the team was able to give their knees a break on the way down the Muir Snowfield by glissading on the snow! Congratulaions everyone!

Tomorrow morning an RMI Expedition Skills Seminar heads up to Muir to spend the week training and ultimately climbing the mountain! We'll keep you posted on their trip!

The first climb of the season summits!

We just got word that the first RMI climb of the season has reached the summit! Congratulations! At 10:38am the team, led by senior, veteran guide Brent Okita, left the summit and is en route to Camp Muir. We'll keep you updated on their expected arrival back to Rainier Basecamp!

RMI's First Climbing School of the Season!

The summer climbing season is officially underway! The first program of the season is a 5-day summit climb. Today was climbing school! The nice thing about an early season climb is that the group doesn't need to travel very far to get to a training area. RMI guide Kel Rossiter said they only had to walk about 15 minutes out of the Paradise parking lot to get to their training spot for the day. They were lucky to enjoy the day training in the sun! Although the warm weather was perfect, the snow conditions could have been a little better. Kel said the team was post holing in the soft snow that has yet to completely settle from last weeks' storm and in the afternoon they saw a few point releases and some sloughing of snow.

Stay tuned for the climbs' update on the route in a few days!

New First Ascent gear!

Although the weather has made it feel more like winter, we're getting all geared up for the summer climbing season here in Ashford! The mountain has seen a lot of snow over the past week so be cautious out there in avalanche terrain. With low freezing levels, even Ashford has seen a bit of snow! That's good for the Mount Tahoma Trails - keeping the hut system accessible for a little longer this spring.

We're ready for the climbing season here in the shop! Check out the NEW First Ascent gear that we just got in! First Ascent has updated and modified a lot of gear for 2010. One must-have piece of gear for this year is the BC-200! Peter Whittaker swears by his BC-200, "A hardshell jacket is like an attorney...you rarely need one, but when you do, it should be a really really good one. I carry the BC-200 in the bottom of my pack 90% of the time, but for that other 10% of the time when the weather is hellish, it gives me full protection from the elements."



Raininer Mountaineering's first climb of the season is May 12th! Stay tuned for more updates, Rainier route conditions, trip reports and both Rainier and McKinley dispatches!

April Expedition Skills Seminar

RMI Guide, Andy Bond gave us a trip report from the April Expedition Skills Seminar. Here's a look at their week spent on the mountain:

After a day of orientation which included knot tying, transceiver practice, Leave No Trace Training and getting ready for our 4500' climb up to Camp Muir, our group was ready to head up the mountain for a week of training. Camp Muir is located at 10,040' on the south side of Mt. Rainier at the top of Muir Snowfield. Climbing Rainier in the winter, you never know what to expect in terms of weather. This trip provided us with a little bit of everything! We left Paradise on a pleasant day with good snowshoeing conditions but with a 1000' left to Camp Muir we found ourselves in a whiteout, but thankfully with no precipitation.

After moving into our hut which we called home for the week, it was time to start training. Camp Muir sits on a ridge separating the Muir Snowfield from the Cowlitz Glacier providing a perfect area to get in some avalanche as well as glacier travel training. Climbing to the Ingraham Flats gave us spectacular views of the Ingraham Headwall and the upper mountain as well as an opportunity to travel on glaciers and experience massive crevasses which would serve as the focus for training the next day.

The next days training focused on crevasse rescue and anchor building where everyone learned about different haul systems to pull people out of crevasses. One of the nice parts about being at 10,000' is that a lot of times we are above the clouds enjoying sunshine. Our group was able to enjoy the nice weather for training but also were able to see some beautiful sunsets.

Summit day was upon us which meant an early waking or alpine start. We put our harnesses, helmets, and crampons on and headed out up the Disappointment Cleaver route (Standard Route) with ice axes in hand at the early hour of four in the morning. After walking for an hour and arriving at our first break at the Ingraham Flats we found ourselves in a whiteout with snow falling and the wind blowing. Today was not going to be our day so we headed back to Camp Muir to get out of the storm. Thankfully the storm abated later that day and we set up some fixed lines practice for bigger mountains like Denali and Everest as well as nice 100 foot repel off of Muir Peak.

All in all it was a great week with lots of laughs and skills learned.

McKinley Season

McKinley season is just around the corner with RMI's first trip heading out on May 4th! While we're gearing up and outfitting the climbers as they prepare for their expedition, RMI owner and McKinley Expert, Joe and RMI Logistics Manager, Shawn are up to their ears in food! Check out these photos of the two of them packing for all of the McKinley climbs - that's a lot of food! They are meticulously counting and sorting out 22 days worth of breakfast and dinner for 12 climbers - for all 9 Alaskan expeditions! The only thing they aren't counting is calories!

Ed Viesturs Autographed Books!

Autographed copies of Ed Viesturs' books have arrived! We have Viesturs' newest book, K2: Life and Death on the World's Most Dangerous Mountain - an unforgettable account of triumph and tragedy on the world's second tallest mountain. We also have No Shortcuts to the Top - a memoir of Viesturs' quest to stand on the summits of the world's fourteen 8,000-meter peaks! Don't miss the opportunity to own autographed copies of these books!

*Click the images of the books to purchase online

Winter Expedition Skills Seminar - March 14-19

RMI Guide, Tyler Jones gave us a recap of the March 14-19 Winter Expedition Skills Seminar. Here's what Tyler had to say:


The week on Mt. Rainier was a blast! Our guides Billy, Andy, Pete any myself had a great group of folks from all over the world. The week started in Ashford with a day of packing, prepping, knots, and rescue skills. The next morning we had a perfect winter day, climbing to Camp Muir with blue skies and a light winds.
That night and through the next day a wild storm pounced on Camp Muir with the wind gusting to 80+ mph. Team endured the poor conditions in full attire while we constructed a grand snow cave to sit 15, along with building expedition quality camp walls for blocking wind and gained key foul weather self care skills. At the end of the day conditions were intense and we were all thankful to retire back in the bunkhouse.
The following morning was cold, blustery, and yet gorgeous blue bird day at 10,000ft on the Cowlitz Glacier. We practiced our ice axe and crampon skills, then broke the ropes out for a glacier walk. Our rope teams went to look for crevasses, to have a hands on live experience with crevasse rescue. I had my personal favorite crevasse rescue training session on Rainier and the group vibe was strong. That evening the guides had another lecture on mountain medicine, tour planning, and avalanches.
The last usable day we made an attempt for the Summit and achieved 11,500ft on the Gibraltar ledges route. We had a great time with spectacular exposure and an exciting rappel but the mountain’s avalanche hazard and cold wind from the north made conditions too unstable for the teams to continue. “There is always next time!” Overall, the day was outstanding! It was great to see everyone learning and having a great time, climbing up or down the snowy faces of Mt. Rainier.
The final morning broke to blue sky and we had beacon search training for breakfast. The team then packed equipment, closed up the bunkhouse and descended from Muir. The teams made it back to the parking lot easily in two hours!
Back in Ashford we had lunch together and said farewell to our new climbing friends having had a fun and safe experience in the mountains. I feel the guides all spilled their passions and knowledge of the mountains and gave one of the best skills seminars possible! I look forward to my next RMI skills seminar in Alaska for nine-day trip on the lower glaciers and peaks of Denali. It should be another one of a kind experience. Hope to see you in the mountains!

Great video of snow shoeing the South District of the MTTA huts.

A few weeks ago a young lady by the name of Anna came into our shop stating that she was making a video blog about snow shoeing in the Mount Rainier area. She had already finished her trip but wanted to film a segment where she would come into our shop and ask for directions to get the the south district of the Mount Tahoma Trails Association. Here is a link to the video.

ENJOY!
http://matadortv.com/winter-adventures-snowshoeing-mt-rainier/

Video produced for Under Solen (http://undersolenmedia.com) and MatdorTV (http://matadortv.com/) by Daniel Fox (http://thewildimageproject.com/)

First Winter Seminar of the season summits!

RMI had a great start to the New Year with a successful summit on a Rainier Winter Seminar. The trip lasted from Jan 3rd-8th. RMI guide Andy Bond was kind enough to give us a trip report.

"Heading up to climb a mountain in the dead of winter in rain is never a fun proposition, which is exactly what we were faced with on this January seminar. Leaving the Paradise parking lot in the rain for the 4500’ climb up to Camp Muir the group managed to push through white out conditions and rain all the way up to 9200’. The nice part about some storms in the Pacific Northwest is their low cloud ceiling or a marine layer, which meant Camp Muir was above the clouds and in the sun. The warm temps and nice weather up at Muir gave us a great chance to do some training for our summit climb push the next day. Practicing self-arrest, cramponing and rope travel before moving onto building anchors and crevasse rescue the group was able to work on and build skills needed to climb Mount Rainier and similar mountains.

We awoke the next morning to warm temps and not a breath of wind. Leaving Muir at 6 am we climbed the Gibralter Ledges route, which used to be the standard route on Rainier offering a more direct route to the summit. Climbing on the upper Cowlitz Glacier we saw the sun rise from the East painting an amazing array of colors across an incredibly clear sky where Mount Adams, Hood, Jefferson and Saint Helens were all visible. After enjoying these magical couple of minutes it was time to enjoy the steep climbing and sense of exposure the Ledges route gives a climber. You start by traversing along snowy ledges at the base of Gibralter Rock until you reach Gibralter Chute offering some 50 – 55 degree climbing with the Nisqually Ice Cliff to the left. Once out of the chute we were able to walk a pretty direct line to the summit switching backing over the filled in crevasses to the summit crater. After a safe descent back to Muir where the weather turned to near white out conditions we all enjoyed the comfort the shelter of the bunkhouse gave us from the storm. A long and hard, but very rewarding day left us with a sense of great accomplishment." Andy Bond

Thanks Andy for the great trip report. Check back this winter for more Mountaineering, Skiing and Snow shoeing trip reports.

WM