April 4, 2009, Rainbow Mtn, BC

I don't know how you can ski at Whistler and not notice or want to climb and ride Rainbow Mtn which is NW of the resort past Mt Sproatt.  Until now I had been denied an early winter attempt by a blown out bridge, deep snow, and short day light hours, and by horrible bugs on a summer attempt.  I've done a couple other route scouting ventures when visiting Whistler.  The new road to the new Olympic Park Nordic Center and the weekend weather opened a window I had been waiting a long time for.  The weeks new snow was a moderate 18" and ave conditions much milder than the Cascades.  Most new trips have at least one or two obstacles that can be deal breakers; this one had at least 6 or 7, so we left the car at 5:20am with some nervousness regarding the outcome.  Not getting kicked out of the parking lot just before the locked gate at the Nordic Center was #1 and hoping to not encounter anyone while hiking the road past the gate was #2.  3/4 of the way up the road headlights approach from behind; damn!!  Told the guy we were just passing through and climbing Rainbow; very lucky, he let us go.  We quickly turned right just past the ski jumps and followed a groomed road up hill and made our way toward Hanging Lake Creek.  Staying south of the creek we actually stumbled upon some tree markings that continued up hill to a final clearing below the headwall and cliffs just before the lake.  We climbed up the clearing, looked left and there was an open bench right to the lake!  Started to feel like this day was meant to be and we crossed Hanging Lk in early sunshine and blue skies 8).  Stunning, but pretty uneventful climbing past Rainbow Lk and up the massive west face to the more MASSIVE upper bowls, summit and sub-summits.  Getting to the true summit looked doable, but troubling, with a possible cliff band if going left, a very steep chute up the middle, or rime ice on rocks to the right, but a little melower slope.  Having axes and crampons we  chose the right hoping again for the best and empowered by how well things had gone so far.  We really hadn't planned to circumnavigate the whole summit, but still hoped the North side might be more mellow.  After reaching the saddle we peared around to the north and found easy snow slopes all the way to a windless sunny summit at 12:30.  She's one beautiful mountain and views were spectacular.  We enjoyed about a half hour on top and started down the SW ridge into a very steep couloir, completing the circumnavigation back into the upper south bowl and worked our way down the West face and into Beverly Creek.  We followed this creek all the way back to the nordic trail system and back to the car, but that's a whole 'nother story ;D!  Had about 3500' of great turns and a full-meal-deal of adventure!