April 11, 2004, Ingraham Direct
4/11/04
WA Cascades West Slopes South (Mt Rainier)
2033
1
After reading the t.r. by Michael from the weekend before, a buddy of mine and I decided to take a shot at Rainier too.
Not too many folks on the upper mountain, most parties were going up Gib Ledges, only saw one other group ascending Ingraham, though there is a good boot pack up the route.
Conditions above the Ingraham Headwall were very hard snow...wands would break instead of go into the snow, and our axes would only penetrate about the top half inch or less of the snow surface.
We left Muir at 5am and topped out about 11:30, neither of us had been training for a Rainier climb, so we were spent. Started heading down around noon, the skiing we did was more like side slipping until the legs got tired enough to turn and slip the other direction. We de-skied and put the crampons back on to negotiate the 400v.f. or so above the Ingraham headwall...folks had skied it just the day before, but our legs were shot and the slope was a mix of sastrugi and hard snow with an ice cliff and crevasses below...we just didn't feel like putting that much faith in our burned out quads.
After downclimbing past the headwall, the skis were back on and the snow was finally soft at about 12,500ft. Turns were excellent all the way down to Ingraham Flats. We chose to boot down the scree of Cathedral gap, Cadavar looks like its still skiable...again our minds were willing but our legs were toast.
It was a fun weekend, nice to play on Rainier before the summertime crowds arrive.
Not too many folks on the upper mountain, most parties were going up Gib Ledges, only saw one other group ascending Ingraham, though there is a good boot pack up the route.
Conditions above the Ingraham Headwall were very hard snow...wands would break instead of go into the snow, and our axes would only penetrate about the top half inch or less of the snow surface.
We left Muir at 5am and topped out about 11:30, neither of us had been training for a Rainier climb, so we were spent. Started heading down around noon, the skiing we did was more like side slipping until the legs got tired enough to turn and slip the other direction. We de-skied and put the crampons back on to negotiate the 400v.f. or so above the Ingraham headwall...folks had skied it just the day before, but our legs were shot and the slope was a mix of sastrugi and hard snow with an ice cliff and crevasses below...we just didn't feel like putting that much faith in our burned out quads.
After downclimbing past the headwall, the skis were back on and the snow was finally soft at about 12,500ft. Turns were excellent all the way down to Ingraham Flats. We chose to boot down the scree of Cathedral gap, Cadavar looks like its still skiable...again our minds were willing but our legs were toast.
It was a fun weekend, nice to play on Rainier before the summertime crowds arrive.
Good to see that you had a good trip up the Ingraham as well. Yeah, the skiing is definetely quite sketchyt in some of the sections.
The route that goes up on the left of the headwall and joins the Gib ledges route is not the "normal Ingraham route though, it is much steeper. Last week we saw tracks go up on the right side of the wall as you look towards the summit, which is not as steep acording to Mike Gauthier's book - don;t know how good it is for skiing though.
The route that goes up on the left of the headwall and joins the Gib ledges route is not the "normal Ingraham route though, it is much steeper. Last week we saw tracks go up on the right side of the wall as you look towards the summit, which is not as steep acording to Mike Gauthier's book - don;t know how good it is for skiing though.
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