Steve Trent, Scott Bingen and I climbed this route on Friday, May 31, 2008.  We really got lucky on the conditions for this wonderful, challenging route.  The weather was beautiful!  It’s a route worth building up to in your North Cascades alpine climbing dream list.  The north face is long, steep, and committing; however the rest of the climbing and descending for the day is regular snow, glacier, and gully crossing stuff.  Lot’s of trip reports can be found on the internet and lots have been written up in climbing route books, so it’s not necessary to go into the route details

Wandering through the white-out; Starting the climb

Breaking out into the sun!

We left the car at 1:50 am and skied from the White Salmon (lower) ski lodge to the base of chair 8 and then put the skis on our packs for the traverse through the forest.  Three hours of hiking and skiing later and were at the base of the north face.  About half of this part of the ascent was done on skis.  There is a huge avalanche debris pile that is less than two weeks old that we skirted below on the way to the col below the north face.  The north face was mostly firm snow and there was no avalanche or slide activity the entire time we were on it.  The north face took us about 4 hours, but took Steve and Scott about 3.  After summiting we descended on skis from the base of the summit pyramid at 8600’ across the Sulphide Glacier, and then down the White Salmon Glacier and lower snow fields to 3600’ on excellent corn snow.

Scott and Wade on the middle face.

I was a little sketched-out and tired after about half the north face part of the climb.  Feeling less stable on crampon front points than them, I kicked deep, bomber foot buckets into their shallow marks all the way up the route.  This took much more time and energy for me.  I was physically spent and just thought about hanging in there, made sure I religiously kept 3 points of contact with terra-firma, and went at the pace I hoped I could keep up without cramping or collapsing.  For this route you need to expect to solo pretty much the whole thing to save time and energy as well as to stay safe (there may be snow/ice that releases far above you that can windshield-wiper you off the face quickly).  I cannot imagine spending more time than we did on the route to belay multiple pitches.  The north face is about 2500 feet of 40-60 degree snow/ice climbing, but the majority of the route is about 50 degrees.  There is no way to arrest your fall with your ice axe once on the face.  The name of the game is to hold on to your tools, keep your energy up, and be efficient!

Wade on skis on the Sulfide, Wade resting above the face.

The standard summit route on the south face of the upper pyramid (top 600’ of the peak) spooked me a bit also.  The snow was thin and rotten from recent rain and sun melt.  Steve belayed me a couple of pitches and on the descent I rappelled the top 400’.  We made the summit at 1:00 pm and had the mountain to ourselves with the exception of a team of two that had crossed the Sulfide Glacier and were about an hour behind us.

On the summit shoulder.

Skiing down 5000 vertical feet on the Sulfide Glacier, White Salmon Glacier, and lower snowfields after such a great climb was icing on the peak.  We skied corn snow and had no major problems all the way down to 3600 feet where the traverse back to the lower lodge begins.  Sure, we could have saved a few pounds and had better climbing boots for the route if we did not bring ski gear, but the small amount of extra effort was worth it ten-times-over to ski down.  We were back at the car drinking beer at 5:40 pm.

Skis are great!

Gear notes:  Day packs, skis, crampons, two ice tools (one standard axe would be ok); one 40 meter rope used on the summit pyramid for two pitches up and 3 raps down; brought 4 liters of water each and needed 5 for the day (we found a water drip on the summit pyramid); lots of easy to consume snacks like Gu and energy bars; one picket each, crevasse rescue gear, headlamps; emergency bivy gear

On the Sulfide Glacier with the summit;  White boys rule!

Recommendations: Choose good, capable, fun companions because you may need to depend on their good humor, ability to suffer, and desire to keep going up; brings skis and do it in a day or else go overnight with very light gear and camp at the col next to the north face; start the north face climbing at daybreak with at least 6 servings of food and two liters drink that you can access without removing your pack (we found a ledge about 1/3 the way up to take a break, but don’t expect this); be a comfortable and efficient steep-snow/ice climber before embarking on this adventure; take lots of photos; expect the trip to take longer than you think it should!