May 19, 2011, Mt. Hood Southside via Leuthold Col

Beautiful day on Mt. Hood. Left the lot at 1:45 am for a moon light skin reaching Illumination Saddle by twilight. Roped to cross the Ried Glacier and the bergschrund which is well bridged. Once across the schrund we unroped for the climb which was fine with an axe and a whippet. Two groups of two that had camped at the saddle were in front post-holing. I was glad to be following them even though a constant flow of small rime particles was filling in the steps with amazing speed. There were none of the falling  ice cube chunks featured in most Leuthold€™s climbing reports, more of a constant flow on the surface like a sand dune.  Below the hour glass there was a slight crust in places maybe 3-4 cm and pretty insignificant. Some ice and hard snow climbers left in the hourglass and good soft snow above that. It was very tempting to ski from the top of Leutholds, but we wanted to summit so we continued up maybe 800 vf on blocky rime to the summit ridge. The ridge walk to the summit was spectacular with crystal clear views to every major summit in the region. From the summit I down climbed one of the €œold chutes€ and then tried to enjoy an uneventful ski down on soft snow. I was tired. This was my first time up Mt. Hood, a beautiful mountain with a stunning summit and a luxury depproach-  After a long day those groomed beginner runs are a sure welcome change from the usual manky chowder, creek crossing, log humping, bush schwacking exits typical of the Cascades. I guess the drive back to Seattle kind of made up for that, but we down the mountain by 10 am so we managed to miss the really nasty traffic.