Highpoint #45: Washington

View Across the Crater from Columbia Crest, the Highest Point in Washington!

My cross-country road trip was in full swing at this point.  Having left Virginia, I already managed to climb the highest mountains in Colorado and Utah, and now I was on my way to Seattle.  That being said, my climb of Mt. Rainier, the highest point in Washington, was scheduled as a guided climb.  Since the dates for the climb were fixed nearly a year in advance, running ahead of schedule, as I now was, meant that I would simply have to wait until the appointed date.  This was not too problematic though since I was in one of the most scenic parts of the country to have some downtime. 

I managed to camp out in Glacier National Park and see what few glaciers still remain there.  I then continued on to Mt. Rainier to have an advance look at the mountain and the climbing route.  After taking in the views of one of the most beautiful stratovolcanoes in the world on one of the fairest days, I spent the night at Whittaker’s Bunkhouse just down the road from Paradise.  Whittaker’s was of course RMI territory (the original and most well-known guiding service for Mt. Rainier), so I could not resist experiencing a part of mountaineering history by visiting there and having a Rainier beer served by none other than Peter Whittaker himself.  The day was an inspiring one! 

The Objective:  Mt. Rainier!

Driving into Seattle the next morning meant that I managed to drive my car all the way across the country – yay!  First order of business was visiting Alpine Ascents (my guiding company for the trip) and doing a required gear check.  This was a straightforward affair and went pretty easily, since we all had previous mountaineering experience.  It was a good chance to meet the other climbers though. 

Our chosen route up Mt. Rainier for this expedition was the Kautz route.  It is a more involved, intermediate level route that involves a little bit of ice climbing as part of the summit bid.  It is definitely not a route for the uninitiated.  Indeed, all the beginners typically go up the comparatively easier Disappointment Cleaver route (also located on the south side) or sometimes the Emmons route, which is on the north side of the mountain.  Being a more demanding climb, everyone at the gear check was already pretty experienced.  Some had summited Rainier before by one of these other routes, some climbed Mt. Baker and had completed mountaineering school, and others had varied climbing experience in the Cascades and beyond.  One had even climbed Denali (the highest point in Alaska)!  My experience was an 8-day mountaineering school that I did with Alpine Ascents two years ago on Mt. Rainier over on the Winthrop glacier.  Additionally, I soloed Mt. Hood and had done a few other mountaineering climbs, so this was the next logical step in my climbing career. 

After the gear check, I went over to my AirBnB apartment along the waterfront to check in for the night, a new first for me.  My host was absent, but I was able to still get into the apartment eventually.  I deposited my bag, went out for some sightseeing and dinner, and came back later in the evening.  Later back in the apartment I met up with the host, talked a bit, and called it an early night since I had to be up first thing in the morning. 

I “checked out” of my AirBnB apartment at 5:30am and began walking over to the Alpine Ascents office located about a mile away.  I had plenty of time to make the 6am rendezvous, so I enjoyed a pleasant walk in the cool morning air.  When I arrived, I saw several of the other climbers in line in front of the door.  Apparently, no one with keys to the building had yet arrived.  After about 10 minutes, one of the Alpine Ascents staff arrived and let everyone in.  We quickly claimed our bags and brought them out to the mobile trailer, making sure to separate out all of the sharps (ice axes, crampons, etc.).  We loaded up rather quickly and made our way out of Seattle. 

The ride to Ashford was quiet and scenic.  We had a view of Mt. Rainier for most of the trip in, which afforded us ever more striking views of the volcano as our distance to it narrowed.  Our progress was zippy and contrasted rather well with the standing traffic trying to make its way into Seattle.  Once we pulled into Ashford, we stopped at Whittaker’s.  Hey, I know this place!  I had no idea that Alpine Ascents got on well with RMI; it was good to see this camaraderie between competing guiding companies.  Better yet, I was in for a decent breakfast before starting the climb.  Red-eye coffee and an egg, ham, and cheese bagel?  Yes, please. 

After breakfast, we assembled again and made our way into the national park.  We were all issued our individual climbing passes (good for the entire calendar year), and we proceeded up to the visitors' center in Paradise.

Good for the Entire Year!  Wish I Lived Here!  

Now it was time to get down to business!  I changed out of my street clothes and into my climbing clothes and set aside some fresh clothes in the van to change into for the return trip back.  I gathered my share of group gear (food, fuel, and pickets) and half of a tent, and repacked my backpack.  Waiting around for everyone to finish and get started, I took some pictures. 

Alpine Ascents Van and Trailer and Two Guys with Icy Stares Blocking the Shot

Some visitors to the park stopped by and talked to us about the climb.  One lady asked if she could lift my backpack to get a sense of what we had to carry.  With the pack weighing in at more than 60 pounds, she was unable to lift it off the ground.  She took in a clear view of the summit and then turned back towards us, laughed, and dismissed us as “crazy”.  That was a seemingly fair assessment of what we were about to do.    

Van Parked and Getting Ready to Rock

Now it was go time!  For the next 4 days we would be on the mountain.  We were 12 in all which broke down to 8 climbers and 4 guides.  We proceeded up the steps, emblazoned with John Muir’s words, more or less in line-file and followed the paved path up and away. 

John Muir Endorses this Climb

Soon the tourists thinned out and then all but disappeared.  We made our way over to Glacier Vista where we searched for the best place to descend onto the Nisqually glacier.  We worked our way down a rocky cliff keeping to a largely class 2 route.  

Off the Paved Trails, Approaching the Nisqually Glacier

Once we were down to the glacier proper, we took out our climbing harnesses and roped up in teams of three.  Of the four guides, I, by chance, wound up with the most famous one:  Lakpa Sherpa.  Seriously, he has -- summited -- Mt. Everest 17 times and has his own clothing line.  He is the mountaineering equivalent of a rock star.  I clearly was in very capable hands tied into his rope.  Of course, the initial terrain hardly merited someone of such stature to guide me through it, being relatively straightforward and all, but it was an honor nonetheless to have that experience.  

Roping up with Lakpa Sherpa

The glacier was thinner at this lower elevation and was interrupted by moraines as we crossed it.  As we started to gain altitude along the glacier, we could see crevasses and began crossing snow bridges. 

Typical Terrain Along the Way

We made our way over to the Wilson glacier and made our way up one snowy hill after another.  

One of Our Breaks Along the Way

A few hours later, we walked into camp.  It was a relatively nondescript place and one could easily miss it, but had the advantages of a large flat area to set up tents and a cleaver like formation that served as a windbreak.  

First Campsite; Mt. Adams in the Distance

We established camp, and the guides made us dinner and hot drinks and served us Oreos for dessert.  The guides were always good about getting snow and melting it down for water and refilling our water bottles.  As climbers, we got to sit out these activities and just enjoy the views – definitely easier going than the mountaineering school where we were expected to be entirely self-sufficient!  It was a solid first day, and we were all good for the wear.

Set Up Camp with View of Mt. Adams in the Distance

The next morning we woke early to hot drinks and breakfast.  We packed up camp with the objective of proceeding towards the icefall visible off in the distance at around 11,000 feet in elevation.  The icefall always seemed relatively close, but we still had to make our way up one long hill after another, zigzagging our way up, kicking steps, and taking rest steps.  With heavy packs, it was a slow-going affair.  Again I was tied in with Lakpa Sherpa, and we were the lead team heading up.  Our moderate, purposeful pace was uniformly kept across all of the teams. 

The improving views informed us of our progress.  Along the way we stopped to allow a team to descend by way of our path.  Apparently, the IMG team had summited just the day before and was heading down.  Our guides conferred with their lead guide for beta on the route.  We were in for 4 pitches of easy to moderate ice climbing and large ‘penitentes’ (suncups) along the upper route.  While the Kautz route is never quite the same route twice, the scouting report indicated that everything was going to be straightforward and within expectation. 

We continued up more hills and finally arrived at our second camp, a bit below the icefall.  Evidently there was a party already camped at the higher spot, so we settled for a lower camp.  This was fine by me really, as there is no need to carry a heavy pack any higher than is necessary. 

The downside to the lower campsite was the narrow shelf within which we had to pitch all of our not-so-narrow tents.  My climbing partner and I got dibs on the worst spot, so we were in for quite a bit of work trying to remove rocks and widen the area enough for a tent platform.  Fortunately some of the groups of three finished early and helped our group of two towards that end.  We made up camp for the night and had a group review with two of the guides.  We made slings with our accessory cord that we would clip into anchors along the ice route the next morning.  We discussed rope management and reviewed expectations for the upcoming summit bid.  

Afterwards, we broke up and waited for dinner.  Bangers and Mash!  This hearty fare really hit the spot and was calorically dense enough to fuel our summit bid which was only hours away now.  Indeed, we were told to go to sleep early.  Our lead guide would come around to the tents and wake us up at around 1am for an alpine start. 

I checked in with my tent-mate who was not feeling so well by this point.  In fact, he felt quite awful.  His best efforts to treat his symptoms were to no avail.  He decided to sit out the summit climb.  I encouraged him to get some rest and see how he felt at the appointed hour to leave.  He obliged, but in the end though, he did opt to stay behind. 

It was 1am in seemingly no time at all.  Up and at it!  We had our hot drinks and breakfast and dressed for the climb.  Our packs were considerably lighter, in the 20-30 pound range, and they felt even lighter than that given the excitement for the summit bid.  Since my tent-mate stayed behind, Lakpa Sherpa stayed behind with him to mind him during our absence.  Given that, this time I roped in with our official lead guide for the trip, Brent Langlinais, who led the first team out.  (Technically all 4 of the guides were of lead guide status, but he was designated the lead guide for this trip on paper). 

We made our way up to the icefall and over to a narrow edge with a down climb.  There was an emplaced fixed line, which seemed superfluous since the down climb was, while awkward due to a jutting rock formation to work around, pretty easy going otherwise.  We had to wait for a team ahead of us to descend.  Once we descended, we made our way over to the Kautz ice route and anchored in.  We were in for a traffic jam.  There were at least three other teams already on the route.  This is the busiest the guides had ever seen the route.  Indeed, this route sees very little traffic in general and is known for being a much quieter way to summit.  Go figure. 

The Easier Ice Climbing After the Sun Came Up

We waited for the teams to advance, which took a while since they were not so swift in their movement.  Worse, they kicked the occasional ice down the route.  Brent was annoyed, not being a man who likes to wait.  We did get our turn to go up though.  We made our own line up the right-hand side of the route.  The first pitch proved to be the crux with jutting, bulbous ice to work up and over.  We made pretty good time and anchored in for the second pitch.  It was fairly dark out, but we could see the Milky Way in the night sky amidst a brilliant star field.  Even the nighttime views are incredible here!  The second pitch petered out about half way through, and we found ourselves on a flat section thereafter.  

Making Good Progress!

Crossing this football field of sorts, we anchored in for the third pitch.  At this point, the sun began to rise.  We could see the mighty shadow that all of Mt. Rainier was casting well off into the distance.  The scale was grand!  

Mt. Rainier's Shadow

The fourth pitch was more a formality than anything.  There was less ice and more suncups.  They were very large and always provided a good footing amid the gaps between them.  

Suncups Eventually Dominated

All in all, the climbing through these pitches was engaging and never particularly difficult.  I did manage to take a whack of ice to the helmet though that someone climbing above had kicked down, so it is smart to wear a helmet and anchor in between pitches. 

Ice Route Finished, Normal Climbing Now

Having completed the ice climbing, we were back to our routine glacier travel.  Again, it was a series of snowy hills connected by snow bridges, with the occasional gaping crevasse on display for full view.  

One of the Sections that We Crossed

After a while, we found ourselves approaching the crater rim.  

Almost at the Crater Now

At this point, we took a short cut that went straight up to the rim over a particularly narrow snow bridge rather than proceeding up and around.  The bridge held, and we had made it to the top!  All 11 of us!  Sort of. 

The Crater Rim!

Some people consider making it to the crater rim as a successful summit.  In fact, some guiding companies will only go as far as the crater rim, saying that there usually isn’t enough time to make it to the highest point.  (I chose Alpine Ascents specifically to avoid this problem).  Geographically, the entire crater rim is not at the same elevation.  Some parts of the rim are higher than others.  The highest point along the rim is called “Columbia Crest”, a point which lay diametrically opposite (and higher) from where we had “summited”.  Being a blog about climbing to the highest point in every state, where we had summited was insufficient.  No worries though.  Our guide was well aware of the distinction and fully intended to take us over to Columbia Crest, though he did allow that the trek across the crater was entirely optional. 

We did just that.  Unroped, we traipsed across the crater itself, which amounted to a fun walk in the snow, albeit in excess of 14,400 feet in altitude.  At the other side, there was a very slight hill to climb.  We made it to the top and officially were standing at the highest point in Washington state!  Yay!  My 45^th state highpoint!  

View from the Top!

We lingered for a bit and took some photos.  Brent asked if anyone was interested in signing the summit register located a little farther down, but no one was particularly in the mood; me included.  Alpine Ascents submits the names of all the successful climbers anyway to the National Park Service, so it is really just a formality. 

Vanity Shot from the True Summit (Liberty Cap in Background)

After everyone had their time at Columbia Crest, we crossed back over the crater rim and roped up again for the descent down.  This was fairly fast going for a bit.  We quickly dispensed with hills and crossed snow bridges in no time at all.  That is to say until we reached the ice field.  Those 4 pitches could not be descended in a hurry.  In fact, it took forever.  The approach agreed to by the guides was to lower us, team by team down each pitch.  This was a very time-consuming process, all the more apparent being the first team to descend and having to wait for everyone else to catch up.  Easily a couple of hours had passed to get through those 4 pitches.  During one of our pauses, an entire slab of ice from the adjacent, overhanging icefall had fallen causing a crashing boom.  Yikes!  This was not the safest place on the mountain to tarry, especially with the sun rising and the snow softening.  

Ice Cliff that We Paralleled in the Morning Would Prove Dangerous in the Afternoon

If Brent was annoyed having to wait for his chance to ascend, he was definitely annoyed wasting so much time descending.  He was noticeably agitated.  He even had to change up his plans by descending first rather than last so as to build a v-thread anchor for us in order to safely descend the final pitch.  Once we all descended, we proceeded over to the fixed line and made our way up.  This should have been straightforward.  Alas, Brent started yelling and swearing at me that I was stepping on the rope.  I continued forward as I could clearly see that my foot was not on the fixed rope.  Much to my chagrin, my foot was on the climbing rope though.  I failed to note which rope he was referring to during his yelling which resulted in more yelling.  Yes, a long day left our guide a wee bit agitated. 

At any rate, we were safe now only a few hundred yards from camp.  We made our way down, dropped our packs, and changed into more comfortable clothes.  Lakpa made everyone Ramen noodles which helped us rehydrate.  After lunch, we all turned in for an afternoon nap.  That hit the spot.  We woke up, prepared dinner, and retired again for the night.  Brent was considering moving our camp lower, but there was seemingly a lack of concurrence among the other guides for this option.  I am not sure what the point would be either.  Breaking camp and setting up camp again is a fairly time-consuming process, and heading entirely downhill on the last day means it would only save us an hour or so in net time expended. 

Breaking Camp on the Final Day

On the fourth and last day, we had our breakfast and hot drinks and broke up camp.  Descending was fast and easy.  We made our way down one slope after another with the surrounding terrain whizzing by.  Again I was tied in with Brent for this leg of the trip.  What I had chalked up to agitation the day before was more pronounced on this day.  I sensed that his remarks were more pointed and directed at me.  For example, when I remarked that the lower portion of the Wilson glacier looked a little bit different to me than it did on the way up, he went off in a monologue about having good mountain sense, the importance of always looking around, etc.  It was just an offhand remark, almost rhetorical.  Really, this merited a lecture?  When we had finally crossed the Nisqually and were getting ready to un-rope, Brent took the opportunity to yell at me in front of everyone that I was “again” standing on the rope.  Something was off with this guy.  So when we had the chance to continue down on our own accord, I quickly broke away from Brent and tried to catch up with some of the guys who started up the cliff.       

            

Under the rules of the concession, you still had to be within eyesight of a guide, even though we were off the glacier at this point and simply hiking.  So I followed another guide’s lead, Matthew Nightengale.  Rather than going straight up the cliff we had originally descended, we decided to follow along the cliff farther down into the valley.  We apparently were following a “new” route (later termed the 'Lakpa Direct') that Lakpa was taking his lead group along.  The route was very scenic, but there were two downsides.  One, Matthew did not know the route, so he was always attempting to infer the route which led us to backtracking a few times.  Two, the route had us crossing fields of wildflowers.  We trampled them one after the other, which was heartbreaking.  Indeed, one of the visitors to the park scolded our group about this reprehensible undertaking.  So much for leaving no trace.  Eventually we made it back up the paved trails.  We walked around throngs of tourists and made our way back to the visitors' center.  

Ah, civilization!  It felt really nice to change into clean clothes and grab some rehydrating drinks at the visitors’ center.  We left the park and went once again back to Whittaker’s for a post-summit beers and burgers gathering.  I grabbed my beer and started heading out to the main field where all of the picnic tables were.  Brent was coming in and told me to go ahead and grab a table.  I found a nice one, away and in the shade and waited for my lunch order to be brought out.  No one joined me; not noticing me, they all opted instead to sit at the main table by the kitchen.  Brent came over to my table and asked if I directed them to sit there?  Huh?  He explained that that table was the summit table reserved for RMI climbers returning from expeditions.  He got the okay from Peter Whittaker that it was okay for our group to sit there though since RMI did not have any climbers returning that day.  Really, he wanted to know if I orchestrated this?  I was clearly sitting more than 200 yards away from said table all by myself.  I declined his offer to join them opting to “celebrate” alone.  I could explain away some of his personality irregularities as part of the climbing experience, but this was ridiculous.  At this point, I had enough interaction with Brent to conclude that he was just an asshole who felt some need to focus his exasperation on me.  Eventually we all gathered together again and drove back to Seattle.  Whew, glad that was over! 

As soon as I arrived back, I turned in my rental items (avalanche transceiver and ice tool), and asked for the nearest emergency clinic.  My right ring finger was badly infected and was cherry red by this point!  There was a clinic a few blocks away, so I asked if I could leave my bags while I went over to get treated.  The gear manager obliged, and I went over for a long wait at the clinic.  The physician assistant performed surgery on my finger, drained it, and put me on an antibiotic.  Wow, of all the climbing injuries one could get, I would not have guessed this one!  

Infected Finger.  Really?

I hurried back to Alpine Ascents and gathered my bags.  Nick Mullan, the fourth guide, was kind enough to carry my backpack to the street.  What a nice guy!  The staff called a taxi for me, but the taxi never came.  The office had since closed, and my phone was dead.  Ugh.  I had to walk a mile with two backpacks to the parking garage.  Oh what fun that was!  Oh well, one of the hardest climbs was in the books.  Time to head to Idaho! 

Addendum:  I am generally fine with using Alpine Ascents, and I do recommend them.  In fact, I have since signed up for their Volcanoes of Ecuador trip.  Just be careful about who your guides are, and be prepared to adjust accordingly.  In any business, you are bound to encounter an asshole or at least someone who rubs you the wrong way.  So goes it; no need to take away from the bigger things that you are trying to accomplish in life.