2-9-10, Mt. Baker, Summit attempt
2/9/10
WA Cascades West Slopes North (Mt Baker)
3753
5
First day with a good forecast in a while, and for the first tour of the year, decided to take a shot at the summit of Mt. Baker with my housemate. Left Seattle around 0245, arrived at the parking lot for Heliotrope around 0530. As we were gearing up, we met two very helpful gentleman from Bellingham Mountain Rescue on their way out for a short morning tour. As this was our first winter attempt on the mountain, they offered to lead us on a cut-off through the woods and up a wash with access to Marmot Ridge, traversing from there to join with Heliotrope Ridge and proceed towards the summit. We parted ways with them prior to joining Heliotrope, having saved an hour over the standard route (thanks guys!). The climb up was under bluebird conditions, though temperatures were not particularly warm (forecast around -10C at the upper levels of the mountain) and the majority of approach was in the shade. Snow conditions were excellent, varying between four and eight inches of powder on top of the underlying layer.
Being a bit out of shape, our progress was slower than hoped (mostly my fault), and we made the saddle below the Roman Wall around noon. We started up on the final push, but became concerned enough with the cloud layer moving in below us to pull the plug on the summit bid at 9500 ft. While missing the tantalizingly-close summit was a disappointment, the quality of the descent was not... a pity the trip back to the car was so much shorter than the trip up. Saw a bunch more tracks on the slopes below Marmot Ridge on the return, looks like a bunch of people got in on the quality snow and beautiful day. Route and a couple pics below; will try to get the rest of them up on Flickr sometime soon.
Being a bit out of shape, our progress was slower than hoped (mostly my fault), and we made the saddle below the Roman Wall around noon. We started up on the final push, but became concerned enough with the cloud layer moving in below us to pull the plug on the summit bid at 9500 ft. While missing the tantalizingly-close summit was a disappointment, the quality of the descent was not... a pity the trip back to the car was so much shorter than the trip up. Saw a bunch more tracks on the slopes below Marmot Ridge on the return, looks like a bunch of people got in on the quality snow and beautiful day. Route and a couple pics below; will try to get the rest of them up on Flickr sometime soon.
It was a beautiful day up there yesterday! You must have had the brown car. We pulled in at 7:30 and left at 1:30. How was the crevasse action above the black buttes? Enough coverage? It looked like you made the right call on the clouds. By the time we drove out of the parking lot at 2 the visibility up high seemed like it was probably nil. We talked all day about how perfect the window was for the summit push! Good work
Sorry to hear you guys didn't make it, but the skiing was sure nice. Now you have the route down for next time.
For anybody else interested, directions for the shortcut (again, appreciation to the folks from Bellingham Mountain Rescue who were kind enough to lead):
Starting from the Heliotrope parking lot, skin up the road until you hit the outhouse on the left hand side. From there it's a relatively modest bushwhack about a 1/4 mile SSE to the creek/wash, which you follow south and up. Turn more uphill at the second gulley to the east (best seen in google earth shots), gain the ridge, and you're off to the races. I've uploaded a few pics to Flickr that will hopefully be illustrative of the proper routing... haven't got the actual trip photos up yet, but the google earth snaps are based on the track from spot. http://www.flickr.com/photos/35484892@N08/
Re: mick, crevasses were a non-issue. Perhaps a few large ones, but coverage was excellent, and didn't need to deviate from the direct route while maintaining plenty of clearance (100 ft +) from anything open.
Starting from the Heliotrope parking lot, skin up the road until you hit the outhouse on the left hand side. From there it's a relatively modest bushwhack about a 1/4 mile SSE to the creek/wash, which you follow south and up. Turn more uphill at the second gulley to the east (best seen in google earth shots), gain the ridge, and you're off to the races. I've uploaded a few pics to Flickr that will hopefully be illustrative of the proper routing... haven't got the actual trip photos up yet, but the google earth snaps are based on the track from spot. http://www.flickr.com/photos/35484892@N08/
Re: mick, crevasses were a non-issue. Perhaps a few large ones, but coverage was excellent, and didn't need to deviate from the direct route while maintaining plenty of clearance (100 ft +) from anything open.
Thanks for the link. I'm shooting for an ascent Sunday morning on splitboard. Welcome the company if anyone would like to join in.
Sunday is tempting if it weren't for the gold medal hockey game. Though there'll certainly be a lot more snow up there by then, wind too, watch that windslab, enjoy!
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