Home > Trip Reports > May 22-25 laps on Tahoma Gl/Traverse from Paradise

May 22-25 laps on Tahoma Gl/Traverse from Paradise

5/15/09
WA Cascades West Slopes South (Mt Rainier)
7850
13
Posted by Monika on 5/26/09 12:54pm
Ryan and I had various ideas for possible trips over on the west side of Rainier~ Sunset ridge, Tahoma gl...
Choices and consequences--I didn't want my knees to feel beat up doing the long hike down to 2300' on the west side road  carrying skis, tools and fuel for three nights so the idea of a partial circumnavigation with a great forecast and great views sounded like way more fun.  And it was  :)   

So Friday afternoon we headed up from Paradise, traversed to the west side between 8200-8600 all at a pretty leisurely pace and set up camp less than 6 hours later on the tahoma cleaver between Tahoma Gl. and the S. Tahoma G.  That south side was no longer in the sun as we traversed, making for easier and safer travel conditions as things started to firm up a bit.

Saturday we headed up to do the Tahoma gl.  It was a lighter freeze Friday night, no track in, so we skinned, cramponed with a fair amount of postholing a route up to about 13K.  Acute mountain sickness AMS was having it's mean way with Ryan so we decided we had to turn around.  The turns down were delicious.  A huge serac thundered down well off to skiers' left after we started skiing. 

Saturday night was much colder and windy.  Sunday we decided to go after the Tahoma again since it would be easier than the Sunset ridge.  Plus I didn't feel up for the needed mental toughness of traversing the Mowitch face at the top of Sunset.  Much easier travel conditions, again enormous killer views.  We made good time but again AMS was after Ryan, even worse.  He was such a trooper to put himself up there again (!) But we decided we had to turn around. 

Back at camp oxygen Ryan didn't need much convincing to do some more skiing.  So we climbed up the cleaver and skied a 2400' run to approx. 6700'.  It was hot but the hard freeze from the previous night kept the spring skiing awesome. 

Monday morning we left without additional tahoma laps knowing the forecast was calling for more high freezing levels and that we'd be skiing east facing slopes to reach Paradise.  Had thought to do a run down the Van Trump  but turned out to be a wise choice to just return given the conditions of bottomless near-slurpee conditions getting down to the Nisqually.  Did have a crazy perfect corn run down the Pyramid gl. on our way through the traverse.

If you are avoiding the west side road because of the approach/de-proach, I would definitely recommend this traverse.  We had to carry our skis 3 very short sections ~10- 15m.  My knees still thank me  ;)  It was great fun to see that part of the mountain up close.  thanks for a great trip ryano !

It would still be doable to do Sunset Ridge from this traverse, you'd want to camp further along at least on the Puyallup Cleaver but as Sky pointed out, it'd be a closer traverse from Mowitch lake.

Way to go guys! Sweet camp photo. Love it.

Nice. Sounds like a really fun trip.

Just to give an idea of how poorly I felt, I actually sunburned my tongue. The next time I suffer I'll remember to do so with my mouth closed  :)

Thanks Mo-money for the great time...







BTW, West-side Road is still closed.  It was plowed to the parking lot long ago, but avy debris still dominates the parking lot so the park is not going to open it until "the snow melts"--the slides were well over 10 feet deep when I was up there last.  So that's 3.x miles walk out from the lot (ca 2700 ft) to 706 (ca 2100 ft).

Sounds like an amazing trip! Great photos, too :)

Great write-up and shots, Monika.  Creative route, looks like a bunch of fun.

Ryan, sorry to hear about the 'abnormal' amount of suffering--perhaps you could try painting your tongue w/ zinc oxide...

Great trip you two!  I guess the tongue burning happens, a friend of mine did the same last weekend...hmmm.  Hope to catch up with you guys at GG when the time comes.  

Hi from the party you skiied past on Sat., high on the Tahoma Gl. 

>>. . . cramponed with a fair amount of postholing a route up to about 13K.  Acute mountain sickness AMS was having it's mean way with Ryan so we decided we had to turn around.<<

Ha, and here I thought you were a couple of mountain spirits with a sixth sense about snow conditons.  The slope backed off considerably just 200 ft above your turn-around point.  The summit plateau atop Tahoma Gl. was large strasurgi - here, ice mixed w/ packed powder.  You definately had the best skiing on the parts of the mountain we saw on our carry-over (up Tahoma, down Ingram).

Pic upload attempt 3:

Cool trip guys!  I was wondering if it would be a better idea to traverse from Paradise than take the West Side Road to access the Tahoma Glacier.  Thanks for providing the answer.

author=jhamaker link=topic=13455.msg56082#msg56082 date=1243463907]
Hi from the party you skiied past on Sat., high on the Tahoma Gl. 

... on our carry-over (up Tahoma, down Ingram).



Hey, nice to hear from you and see your pics ~

  It certainly looked like the slope angle was just ready to back off--Nice work up there!
Sure became windy down at our camp that early evening--How was your carry over??  I was thinking your party must have been freezing up there with even more wind?

Cool idea on the traverse, always nice to get new slants on things.

>>How was your carry over??  I was thinking your party must have been freezing up there with
even more wind?<<

Other than hauling everything to the top in one day (10k ft), the carryover went well.  The Ingram Gl actualy had many more crevass proplems than did the Tahoma.  Lots of new spin-drift filled crevasses.  Also everything below Pebble Cr. on the Muir Snowfield was chopped up pretty badly by the post-holing hords.

No wind to speak of on the summit plateau.  Perhaps you were experienceing down-glacier winds, though when we were at the toe of Tahoma Gl on Fri night we did not experience any.

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may-22-25-laps-on-tahoma-gl-traverse-from-paradise
Monika
2009-05-26 19:54:32