troy_moss

Sweet TR Alex. On 6/18 the N Ridge worked me over good! Managed to get up the nose to the left of your attempt though. Excellent photos!

Slap my ass and call me Sally! What a photo! Sign me up I'm going. Does anyone know how late the route stays in shape?

On June 18th Airmoss and I successfully climbed the North Ridge of Mt Baker. We originally planned to climb Liberty Ridge on rainier, but due to the recent events our wives laid down the law and insisted that we climb something “safer”. I have climbed Liberty Ridge before and found it to be a very safe route provided you don’t fall. The North Ridge of Baker seemed like a good alternative so after a favorable weather forecast we set out from Puyallup on Wednesday the 16th in Airmoss’ Motor Home. We bivied in great style at the trail head and set out a 1:00 am the next morning for high camp. We easily cruised to our 7000’ high camp next to Black Buttes in less than 3 hrs. Our plan was to scope out the glacier crossing and have a restful day in the tent so that we could leave for the summit at 2:00 am. By scrambling up on of the rubble peaks behind our tent we did find a couple of options for crossing the Coleman Glacier. One high (no tracks but looked ok) and one low (good boot path). We got lots of sleep but still overslept and didn’t leave camp until 2:45 am. We opted for the low route because though it was cold, the snow was unconsolidated, so we thought we would take advantage of the boot path instead of post holing. Well let me tell you we post holed our asses off. The boot path was false hope, every step was calf deep. As the sun rose the North Cascades turned blood red and hazy looking like Mordor in the Lord of the Rings. We were convinced that after our stellar performance on the approach to camp that we would cruise the North Ridge in 6 hrs round trip. Wrong!! It took us 5 hrs just to get to the base of the first pitch at about 8500’+. That is also where the tracks we were following stopped. We heard someone had climbed the North Ridge the day before so were surprised to see that they had turned around right at the crux. The ice on the first pitch was very hard so we set up a picket belay in the snow just below the ice. I launched into the first pitch glad to leave the snow but soon got gripped from the dinner plates my axe and hammer fractured loose. Also, my mountain axe (70 cm Black Diamond Raven) would barley penetrate the ice requiring 3 or 4 swings. My X-15 hammer worked excellent after clearing the first swing dinner plate. I placed 2 ice screws low on the pitch then running out aprox. 150’ of our single 60 meter Ice Floss rope to a belay on our last 2 ice screws. We brought 4 but should have brought 6 as our 3 pickets proved useless. Airmoss seconded the pitch and we discussed the route ahead. To the right or straight up looked vertical but doable, to the left looked like an easy traverse to “gentle slopes”, so Airmoss let through that way placing 2 screws on the way leaving him with only pickets for the belay. Let me tell you it sounded like Gimli the Dwarf had set up a blacksmith shop and was shoeing horses and makin’ swords and all kinds of shit by all the clangin’ and bangin’ going on around the corner. I could picture the pickets looking like bent over mushrooms so I followed very carefully. Sure enough that was on sorry belay Bro! 2 pickets driven about a quarter of the way in, at least he clipped them in low, equalized them and tied into a screamer. The Third pitch proved the best (though off route) pitch. It started with about 20’ of vertical ice where I placed 2 screws followed by 180’ run out of 65 degree ice to the crest of the ridge where I found good picket snow and found we had been off route to the left, and should have gone right at the second pitch making it much shorted and easier. Looking down on Airmoss as I belayed him up the third pitch was truly awesome. The view down to the jumbled Roosevelt Glacier was very exposed! The remaining slog to the summit was straight forward but back to the brutal post holing. 9 hrs after leaving camp we reached the summit. So much for 6 hrs round trip! As we were coming up to the summit the weather which had been changing got down right ugly. We were ringed on 3 sides by growing thunder clouds. The wind began to blow and it began to snow. Time to descend the standard route pronto! Boom, Flash, lightning lit up the black clouds. I don’t thing Airmoss felt danger like I did because he stopped, took off his back and began grumbling about his misplaced liner gloves threatening to “empty this damn rucksack” unless he found it. All the while I was about to piss myself from fright. As we stood and continued down the ridge, our pickets, ice axes, and biners began to hum and buzz!! While it was tempting to throw ourselves on the snow and wail like squaws, we did the brave thing and ran like hell, glissading where possible. We soon discovered the downside to roped simul glissading. I went first very quickly hoping to hurry Airmoss, who was going slow, digging in his heels. My 210 lbs of Alabama pork loin snapped up the remaining slack and launched Airmoss over my head as if from a medieval siege engine, down the slope. As he flew past he said “well, be seeing you”. Luckily he is highly skilled in the arts of the tumbling self arrest. We got back to camp 12 hrs after leaving. The hike back to the RV was sped by thought of ice cold Heinekins waiting in the fridge. The RV didn’t do too well on the way out though. Going down the steep dirt road back to Glacier, the brakes over heated so bad they smoked as if on fire. But enough of such adventure, it was a sleepy ride back to Hobbiton and the Gaffer. Climb: Mt Baker-North Ridge Date of Climb: 6/18/2004 Trip Report: Gear Notes: 1 - 8mm 60m Ice Floss Rope 3 - Pickets 4 - Screws (should have taken 6) Second Tool 3 - Screamers Glacier Rescue gear Approach Notes: Two feet of snow fell the week before and was still unconsolidated.

Does anyone know if the road to climbers bivouac is drivable yet ?

Nice job y,all! I'll have you know Terry is using classic British climbing understatement, Nisqually Icefall in a day? What a machine!

Great pics,Great day! I sure enjoyed B.S.ing with all you cascade climbers.What a fun ski down!

Thanks Dwayner ! Your obviously A Tatoosh veteran. I just climbed Lovers Lane 2 weeks ago(melting out early this year)with my man Mfro, sporting(read greasy)rock step at a chock stone 2/3 up.The traverse into the Zipper is pretty cool, lots of tree anchors,kicked off a dusey of an avalanche there many winters ago when I was young and dumb ! I'm off for the zipper in 4hrs, Old and dumb !

I have climbed Lanes Peak many times by many routes and have noticed that almost all climbers call the 3 north couloirs by different names.Looking at the North Face from Paradise (facing south ) I call the routes,starting from the left,THE ZIPPER,the middle route THE FLY ,and the route on the far right LOVERS LANE.I certainly dont think I have it right, please help.

whats up w/all the climbers roped but proless in the chute and on the hogsback ? One fatal " flossing " has already occured.Say NO to needless roping !

I climbed the Reid Glacier Head wall on 5/11 with Air Moss, and would like to add my .02 cents. If you have ever climbed the leuthold couloir and not been challenged, the R. G. H. W. is for you!! This is one of my favorite climbs, second only to Liberty Ridge. On the five star rating system I give it four stars. We left Tacoma at 12 midnight and got to Timberline at 3:30. We were amazed to see the amount of cars and more amazed to see a stream of head lamps going from the parking lot to the summit. We finally left the parking lot at 4:30, which we found to be quite treacherous with ice!!! We skinned up the climbers path and cached our skies at the top of the palmer @ 6:30 am. Traversed to illumnation saddle, where we saw an amazing 17 playas in da Leuthold. Glad we were going for the R.G.H.W.! As Air Moss said it was post hole city to begin with. But by 10 thousand ft. it was down to a poorly bonded 10 inch scary snow layer over ice. The gullies however were hard "water ice" and the upper 500ft. before joining summit ridge was typical hood rime ice. We got in the back of the line behind the Leuthold playas and summited at around noon. Back to the skies, had an enjoyable ski back to the parking lot, (sure beats slogging)@2pm. Got back home to Tacoma 18 hours after we left. This is an absolutely fantastic route!! But I think it is done for the year.

So that is you! When I read Fairweathers report about climbing with Terry Mcclain I was wondering if that was you! Great weekend on Hood huh? WE should get together and climb that Sandy headwall soon.

quote: Originally posted by Fairweather: Climbed Leuthold today with Terry Mclane and friend. Route was in bad shape. Strong winds were blowing rime ice feathers into the entire couloir. Without helmets (and goggles) the climb would have drawn blood. A steady rain of ice pellets the entire legnth of the couloir averaging the size of a quarter, but some as big as golf balls. No rockfall. Some ice on route. We set two pickets for running pro. Left Timberline at 3:30am, reached summit at 10:50. 7 hrs,20min. One other party of two on this route, and one successful party on Reid Headwall too. [ 03-02-2002: Message edited by: Fairweather ]

I climbed the leuthold Sunday with airmoss. We left Tacoma at midnight and got to the parking lot at 4:30 am. We got to illumniation saddle at about 7 or so. We could see nine climbers ahead of us, two going up yocum ridge and two going up the reid head wall. We had a great trip up the couloir, but we of course experienced the obligatory falling ice. I recieved one baseball square on the knee!! One on the Helmet!! Ran into Heiny, just before the traverse (thanks for the beta on the gear). Overall perfect conditions, perfect weather. Great Trip!!

I absolutely love my wild things ice sac for any load @ or below 30 lbs.When this one wears out i'll buy another!!!