Mt. Shuksan - Fisher Chimneys 7/22/2008
Trip: Mt. Shuksan - Fisher Chimneys
Date: 7/22/2008
Trip Report:On Thursday, July 17, my friend from Boulder, CO, Jim and I hiked from the Austin Pass picnic area up to Lake Ann with the intention of climbing Mt. Shuksan the next day. The trail was still mostly covered with snow and rather than try to follow it and have to cross Swift Creek twice, we stayed on the East side of the valley and eventually came to the only stretch of bare trail which we followed for about a mile before heading up to the Lake.
We left camp at about 5:00 the next morning under mostly cloudy skies with hopes that it would clear up and we would get some views. Here is Jim at the beginning of the lower part of the route.
The chimneys were mostly snow free except for one section just be fore the lower bivy sites. The rock is reasonably solid in the steep sections.
Eventually we exited the chimneys to the edge of the White Salmon Glacier where we roped up and proceeded to climb to the top of Winnie's slide. Jim was curious about whether Winnie really did slide down this section. I couldn't answer that one.
After crossing over to the Curtis Glacier and dealing with a couple of snow bridges we climbed up Hell's Highway. It was quite easy going with no visible crevasses near where we walked.
Another hour of slogging took us to the base of the summit pyramid which was now out of the clouds, briefly. We ate lunch and then scrambled to the top via the central gully which was a poor choice with its loose, drippy rock. We were thinking that we would have been happier on one of the ridges.
Eventually we topped out on the summit ridge and were greeted by a fairly recent fecal smear. Brilliant!
After carefully downclimbing the loose wet summit rocks and backing down a hanging snow patch, we put on our glacier gear for the long, uneventful, though foggy slog back down. The slogging was broken up by some excellent glissades down Hell's Highway and Winnie's Slides. Both of these slopes were quite crevasse free and they were a nice change from all of the plunge stepping that we had been doing.
Another couple of hours of downclimbing in the Fisher Chimneys brought us back to our camp at Lake Ann.
While the climbing is all fairly straightforward, the length and the variety make this moderate climb an all day workout in the mountains.
The next morning we hiked out and got in some more good glissades including this one right down to the parking lot.
After changing and enjoying our post trip beers, we headed up the newly plowed road to Artist Point. There is an incredible amount of snow still up there and the highway department must have spent an awful lot of $ to get it open. There are still 30 foot vertical and overhanging snow walls at the parking lot with lots of tourists climbing all over them, seemingly unaware that if they slipped they would go splat on the asphalt 30 feet down.
Gear Notes:rope, glacier gear, ice ax and crampons. We did the rock portions unroped but they are well equipped for rappels
Approach Notes:Most of the trail is still snow covered. No snow free camping yet at the lake.
