A view of the ascent route from our bivvy site.
I've been kind of down on Rainier climbs lately, more interested in rock climbing than glacier slogs. Alex and I had discussed cclimbing Triumph Peak this weekend, but he had a previous commitment with Oleg, and so we ended up on this route.
The damage from the storms was pretty impressive. The Kautz creek streambed (an interesting coincidence!) is moved about a hundred feet to the east, and the Sunshine Point picnic area is... gone. Nothing there but a broad expanse of rocks and streambed, and a couple of picnic tables still sitting forlornly at the edge of what used to be the picnic area.
We registered and paid at the visitor's center, and headed up. There were a remarkable number of people there; dozens clustered around the base and the slope going up to Panorama Point, and streams of them above there, heading up to Camp Muir like strings of ants. There was a group of (I think) Mountaineers down on the Nisqually glacier practicing crevasse rescue, and at least half a dozen people heading up Fuhrer Finger.
There was also clouds. The summit was pretty well socked in, and they'd warned us at the visitor's center of a chance of thunderstorms. And, in fact, we did hear some thunder coming from clouds to the east.
The route starts at Paradise, heads up to approximately Glacier Visa or a bit further, then you descend onto the Nisqually (which, despite its name and the breathtaking icefall above is safely crevasse-free) and up the other side, under Fuhrer Finger, and up to Camp Hazard with is perched "safely" at the base of the Kautz Icefall. On the way up to Camp Hazard, we ran into a couple of guys who'd just climbed the route and were descending, and told us that there was a rope to rapel down from the rock cleaver that Camp Hazard is on, down to the Kautz, which is much faster and safer than wandering around on foot.
So we got to Camp Hazard, which is at the very top of this long outcropping, and identified by several USGS survey brass plaques, and two big shiny bolts which used to hold the outhouse. And, no people. I was a bit surprised that, with such a busy weekend, we had the route to ourselves. Unfortunately, the rope was not actually at camp Hazard, but a couple hundred feet below it, which makes sense since that's where you get around the mess of the icefall to the Kautz Glacier route itself. But I was tired and cranky, and not feeling very well, and I was kind of pissy about this lack of perfect organization. What -- no escalators? No trams?
The other imperfection is that while there were a dozen nice bivvy spots at the actual Camp Hazard site, there wasn't much down by where the rapel rope was. We had to enlarge two of them, one for Alex and the other which Oleg and I shared.
So we were tired, and chilly, and hunkered down for some dinner and rehydration. I found out later that in Seattle it was brutally hot, but up here we climbed right into our down parkas once the sun went behind Success Cleaver.
I don't sleep well in sleeping bags, and tonight was no exception, but my new REI Sahara 30 degree down bag was pretty comfortable. Thank you, Jennifer!
We were going to get up at 1:00 AM, but I didn't hear my watch alarm go off, so we didn't get up until about 1:30. And, as usual, I lay there struggling with the temptation not to rouse Oleg and Alex, and just lay there snug in my down. But, hell. Times like this I remember reading an article by some climber about a really dire route he was doing up in Alaska, how he thought 'if I just drop one of my crampons we can quit -- I don't have to do this.' It makes me feel a bit better about my own frequent lack of enthusiasm while staring adventure in the face.
So we packed up and headed out, in about half an hour. It had been a trip of minor equipment malfunctions; yesterday the bite valve came off my platypus and peed down my back all the way into my boots, and now this morning, my headlamp wasn't working. It went on okay, but then it kept going out. I figured the batteries were going bad, and I'd brought another set for just such an eventuality, but after changing the batteries, it was just the same. There was some sort of loose connection where the wire connects to the battery compartment in the back. Sheesh! (Additionally, my nice old Thermarest air mattress sprung a leak. Oddly, it wasn't as uncomfortable as it sounds.)
Oleg has a very nice lightweight glacier rope, about 6mm, and we rapelled off that rather than trusting the rope that was there. Then, crampons on, and up the route -- after I dropped a picket that fell about 30 feet, and I had to go down and retrieve it.
The first part of the route was pretty routine, but made a bit more challenging by my damned headlamp, which went on and off approximately randomly. The slope is about 30-40 degrees. Then you get to the interesting climbing, an ice step that's about 60 degrees, and maybe a hundred feet long. I was in the middle of the rope, so I didn't have to lead any of it, which is fine since I'm not very experienced in leading ice. It was fun, and I was pleased and gratified by how much better my ice tool works when the point is sharp.
The basic problem with a Rainier climb is that no matter how interesting the interesting routes are, there's a 3000' foot slog up to the summit, not terribly steep, not interesting, meandering around following wands, up, eventually, to the crater rim. What made this climb more challenging was that there was a lenticular cloud up there, and the last thousand feet or more were climbed in a near-whiteout. Alex had his GPS along, with the coordinates of Columbia Crest in is, so we were able to walk right over there, almost spookily easily.
There was a fairly large steam cave up there, and so we went down into it just to see what it was like. It wasn't steamy like the one Hazard and Stevens spent the night in, but it was out of the wind and pretty comfy. There's a pretty big network of tunnels down there, according to Dee Moulenaur, which lead down to a lake, and which I've been tempted to explore, but this one, though its mouth was big, wasn't more than three feet high as you went down further. Still, it's pretty cool. It would certainly be a comfortable place to bivvy, once you cleared out a bivvy platform.
The biggest problem was going to be getting down. We'd carried over with the intention of descending the DC route, but finding it, despite looking at the desceptively plainly drawn map the Ranger had, was going to be a problem. We circled around the crater rim, and then I found a boot-track, so we started heading down. Soon enough, the boot track disappeared, and there was no clue where it might have gone. No wands (which, amusingly, Russians pronounce with a broad 'a', like 'hands'.) So we started navigating east, circling the mountain counter-clockwise with the faith that we'd run into the route pretty soon. But, we didn't.
Finally, we headed back up to the summit to look for the boot track from there. Where we came upon a clump of RMI climbers just inside the crater rim, preparing to descend. So we just followed them. Had we arrived 30 feet or more one way or the other, we probably wouldn't have seen them, and God only knows how much of an epic this trip report would have turned out.
The descent wasn't as arduous as it often is. I don't like descents much, I guess no one does, but it's a bit frustrating that I climb faster than most of the people I climb with, but get left behind on the descent unless they make a point of slowing down for me. I don't like the slipping down the steep snow when your crampons are all balled up, and the interminable back and forth, and after a couple of hours realizing you're still above the summit of Little Tahoma.
There was an interesting obstacle on the descent while we were still in the fog, a fixed line hanging down over a crevasse lip, which was slow negotiating -- especially for me. And, the same dramatic enormous crevasse formations and house-sized serracs that the boot track wanders around. If you had to climb this mountain like a pioneer, it's be a struggle!
The route still went down the Ingraham Direct, rather than up Disappointment Cleaver. Which is nice, I hate slogging on that rock. Then, down to Ingraham Flats, where we stopped and took off the extraneous clothing, and down Cathedral Gap, which was about half-snow. On the way across the Cowlitz Glacier, which is always broader than I remember.
For ages, I've wanted to descend Cadaver Gap, for the novelty as much as anything, plus that it cuts off maybe a quarter mile of circling around Cathedral Rocks. But it was out of the question, with a gigantic bergschrund at the base.
The trip down from Camp Muir was an extended period of wishing I skied, watching these guys on their AT skis just cruising down on the corn snow, reminding you why skiing is sometimes called "schushing" and wondering if it'd be worth hauling a few extra pounds of skis and bindings all that way to turn the drudgery of that last 5000' feet into pure pleasure. I suppose you could ski the Cowlitz as well, and ingraham flats as well.
Equipment notes: I really like my Marmot Eiger 36 pack. I got it a couple of years ago, and now that I've got a nice compact sleeping bag, I can actually use a small pack like this for lightweight overnight climbs. Though I wish it had better side pockets.
That 6mm rope is great for glacier travel. It's a bit tough to rapel off; even doubled it's not a lot to hold onto. I bet you'd have a hell of a time using prussiks on it. But it's lightweight and compact.
Here's a copy of the map that the park hands out.
more photos to follow.
