Home > Trip Reports > June 1 and 2 2007, Rainier via Emmons

June 1 and 2 2007, Rainier via Emmons

6/15/07
WA Cascades West Slopes South (Mt Rainier)
7604
11
Posted by jdclimber on 6/5/07 7:40am
After suffering last summer while watching others ski down the
"making careful progress at a slow 1000ft per hour"

Justin,  1000 ft per hour is considered a healthy pace for a few of us in our 60's.  ;)

Glad to hear it was an enjoyable roundtrip.

Nice!

From the Prow, I watched two skiers come down Emmons around 3PM on the 3rd. Lower part looked nice. Cloud deck at 12K kept me from seeing the whole route. I recall thinking that the corridor did look pretty damn narrow, narrow enough that ski tracks are going to get pretty bunched up in there.

One thing I shoulda mentioned in my post on the other recent Prow thread: wading the Inter fork isn't really necessary, even thought that seemed to be the herd instinct. You can just follow the summer route to the Basin camps (switchback right at an obvious point where there's usually a sign or flag or something, gain about 100ft up a small drainage and then traverse).  After reaching the camps there's a decent snowbridged stream crossing of Inter fork 200yrds upstream, just at the start of the ugly moraine. Least there was last Sunday. That's what I did, no wet feet or garbagebag improv required.

Very nice Justin, thanks for sharing your adventure.

author=Zap link=topic=7339.msg29250#msg29250 date=1181091180]
"making careful progress at a slow 1000ft per hour"

Justin,  1000 ft per hour is considered a healthy pace for a few of us in our 60's.  ;)


Thanks for saying that Zap, I was thinking the same thing myself, remembering the days when the "geezers" thought 1,000ft per hour was a pretty good pace  ;).  My, how times have changed  ;D.

Nice job Justin!  We've got permits to climb over July 4th weekend -- sounds like the route might be a little *interesting* for skiing by then...

Your comment: "They have also not ventured in with skiers in mind, as there are a number of low hanging sections that made carrying skis more difficult than necessary."

Agreed, skis are like petrified tentacles snagging EVERYTHING above one's head.  Rangers need to slap on some skis onto a pack big enough to make it impossible to tent the skis.  Though, beggars can't be choosers - mother nature did her thing and our skis got to tangle with her work more than usual  ;)  Thanks to the rangers for their work on the "trail" thus far - its condition even improved from Saturday to Monday Memorial Day weekend.  Just a lot of damage to handle. 

Nice job on the solo ascent/descent, that's truly a great accomplishment!

way to go, j-man!  that's some pretty gutsy stuff, hucking crevasses and all...glad the weather cleared out enough for you to tag the summit.  8)

Good strong work Justin....very cool  8)...Jerry

nice work, Justin!

Ya, now go clip some bolts for relaxation 8)

Very nice, JD!   Me and a couple friends skied Mt. Ruth on Saturday... we were probably skinning up it as you were coming down the Inter Glacier.... "ships passing in the night", as it were...  if we'd gotten to the summit of Ruth an hour or two earlier we coulda watched you ski down the IG.  8)   


Nice work Justin, glad you got it in!  It looked pretty windy up there on Sunday with the lenticulars we saw while on L Tahoma.  Thanks for passing along the greetings from Kevin.  Glad to hear they made it.  Small world.

Paul

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2007-06-05 14:40:40