Trying to get any sleep the night before a big summit day is always a challenge. Am I ready for this? Did I bring the right boots? Should I have brought that jacket instead of this one? It turns out to be a long restless night of going through all the “what ifs” since a lot of decisions are made at home, anticipating the conditions, long before you arrive at the trailhead.
DAY 4 – Summit Day
We started shortly after 2am with a mixture of stars and headlamps of those on the trail ahead of us.
The first half-mile from Camp Muir crosses the Cowlitz Glacier to Cathedral Gap. Here we removed our crampons to climb up and over Cathedral Clever. Maybe we shouldn’t have wasted that time taking them off because, as soon as we got to the other side of this gap, the crampons were back for the crossing of Ingraham Glacier. High camp sits here on Ingraham Flats. Unfortunately, we really couldn’t see anything at this time of the morning.
Kick Up This Adventure
At 4am, we were only a mile in when we came upon our first crevasse! It was a pretty short span, and not much depth could be seen in the dark, but it definitely kicked up this adventure.
It wasn’t more that a half hour later, less than a half-mile away, where we reached the bergschrund at Disappointment Cleaver. No one thought to snap a pic here as we had to climb down into this void a little in order to claw our way over the chunks of ice and up the loose rocks on the other side. Since it was more dicey than walking across the ladders, I didn’t even think about getting a pic of it on the way back later that afternoon.
After crossing the schrund, we couldn’t have been in a better spot to watch the sunrise from this vantage point!
The first light on Ingraham Glacier was equally impressive. If you look close enough, you can see the tents at High Camp on Ingraham Flats. Also notice Mt. Adams off in the distance.
These views were spectacular all morning. This is looking over the Emmons Glacier and Little Tahoma.
The climb is about 1,000 feet per mile, along a nicely groomed path thanks to all the guided groups that come up here. There really wasn’t any route finding to do. That would certainly be a different story in less than ideal weather conditions.
Walking the Planks
At 2 miles in, we found another ladder over the second crevasse. Walking the planks was very solid and secure. You just have to be careful to not trip over your crampons catching the wood.
The depths of these cracks is amazing. Standing there knowing this mountain is constantly on the move is just mindboggling.
Here’s lookin back at this second crossing.
At 13,000 feet, the route took a slight detour to the north as a result of some massive separation here just a few weeks ago.
Looking back again toward Emmons Glacier and the miles of mountains making up these Cascades.
A third ladder was set across the end of that ice wall, where the route turns west again towards the summit. This was only a third of a mile beyond the last ladder.
Finally, the last plank we had to walk.
I’d love to know how thick this ice is and what the ground looks like underneath it all.
The last 500 feet of elevation zig zags up the western slope to the crater rim.
It’s really hard to capture the magnitude of this mountainside.
At 10am, we reached the crater rim. Travel time to this point was almost 8 hours. That felt way long to have gone only 4,000 feet in 3.34 miles.
A short distance from one side of the crater to the true summit on the other side took another 30 minutes. Standing on the top of the Washington State highpoint put me at #24 of 50… almost half-way there!
If you are into signing the summit register you will find it just below the summit. It looked just like the one on Mt. Baker with the word “Mazamas” on the lid.
The walk down was pretty straight-forward.
Best pic of the day. Look at that glacial blue!
Here’s that separation again from a different angle. This is what blocked the standard way up, causing us to detour around it.
Another view of the Ingram Glacier in the afternoon sun as we descended back to basecamp.
Now seeing what we crossed in the dark earlier that morning.
Some people were practicing their crevasse rescue skills, which is critical to know how to do on mountains like this.
We were back to Camp Muir by 4pm. Our hope was to unload, eat and hit the hay! Unfortunately, that is not what happened! More to come…