Swanny

Nice work! You had much better weather than we did! Was up there this weekend with our summit attempt on Saturday. We got to the summit block, attempted the 5th class variation and decided to bail due to wet rock from the rain and high winds we got pounded with. The Crystal Pass bridge is still in tact, but I can't imagine it will last much longer. Not sure where the route will go once it's gone.

Hey Sorry for the late reply. Doesn't look like I'll be able to turn this upcoming weekend in to a 3 day to do the climb. Hope you find a partner!

Hey neighbor to the north! I could possibly interested. Have you decided on when yet? How many days do you plan to take for it?

Looks like a great trip! Care to share route details, my boss would be super interested in this

Trip: Mt Baker - Coleman Deming Date: 6/14/2014 Trip Report: The weather last weekend was iffy at best, but our team of three made the best of it. We hiked up to some already established and dug out sites Saturday afternoon, with plans to summit Sunday morning. With zero view of the mountain early in the morning, we decided to give it a go after packing up everything but the tent Sunday morning as the weather briefly cleared around 6:30. It was a quick decision, but a good one. We followed a well established boot path and partially wanded route all the way to the summit, arriving at noon, being the 2nd party (that we know of) summiting for the day. We quickly returned to camp where we were greeted with winds and snow, tore down the tent, packed up and headed home. Approach Notes: Heliotrope Ridge trail is mostly melted out and there is a well established boot path up the mountain, with several different camp areas dug out up on the Coleman glacier

Super cool! Sunday was awesome over there.

Packs with minimal pockets provide fewer places to stash small items that add weight and bulk. My favorite pack that gets used 95% of my trips whether one night or multiple nights is the MHW Diritessima 46. It packs and carries a variety of loads really well and doubles equally as well for daypack use since it can be stripped down.

Like many, I've got a large list too. A lot of it stems around who is available to do what. Biking - mountain and road, most my road riding is commuting though Running Hiking/Backpacking Fishing Hunting Snowboarding Wakeboarding

Great looking trip! Can't wait for my trip down there next month

As a long time lurker and extremely rare poster, I love coming to read the TR's here. I'm not a very good climber, and tend to hike/backpack more than climb (along with a laundry list of other activities), but enjoy the very few climbs I do a few times a year, which is more due to lack of partners. (guess i should find new partners) I personally enjoy seeing pictures and reports of any kind. I don't mind if there is a blog link, but a short post with a few pictures needs to be here for me to want to go to your link usually. I certainly hope reports continue to be posted, and when I do get out on a climb I'll try and contribute what I can. I think for most people (me included) we figure the easier or less exciting climbs aren't worth posting about here as they don't measure up to some of the amazing trips and expeditions some people go on.

Here is a great site for beacon reviews. I just purchased the Tracker2 as my first beacon, seems like all the reviews favor it for ease of use and performance. http://beaconreviews.com/transceivers/Specifications.asp

This was my first trad lead a couple weeks ago. Good 5.6 to start on, with only one move towards the top that might freak you out a little. Just have to get there early or wait in line

Road is gated still, at least Friday it was. No snow until Eightmile TH

Baker and Shuksan are two for sure trips that are planned this year. Besides that I plan to learn some trad skills and am taking a road trip to Yosemite, which most likely will be more seeing the sights and hiking than climbing

I'd take the helmet. Be safe and like ajpederson said, it's not that much weight. For the Emmons I would plan on 3 days, especially since it doesn't sound like you and your partner have tons of mountain time. It's a long trip to get up to the summit and back down to the car in the same day. Not saying it isn't doable, it just is a very long day and if you get good weather, its gets very hot.

30 minutes max. Living in Des Moines, I hardly ever visit one. Wish the Kent valley had a good indoor gym.

Saw the new "parking area" last night...it disgusts me! Wasn't there last year when this pass wasn't required, glad decided it was necessary this year since they can charge us.

Looks like an awesome climb!

Beef jerky is great, those small cheese packets you can buy at the grocery store are nice for some real food too. Bagels and those peanut butter squeeze packets, and as others mentioned real candy bars. They give you just as many calories as the others do. Just make sure you take stuff you already like to eat since your appetite does go away.

Looks like a great trip, and awesome photos! I'm always impressed by those willing to take a larger camera climbing.

Trip: Mt Rainier - Emmons-Winthrop Date: 6/24/2011 Trip Report: Mt Rainier, Emmons-Winthrop 6/24-6/26, 2011 Long time lurker and a first time poster. Friday morning saw us leaving the house at 7am on or way to the White River ranger station. A quick stop for coffee and breakfast burrito’s at Memo’s finally put us on the road. Picking up two other partners along the way in the BL and Claw we finally made it to the trailhead around 9:30. A quick repack of bags and booting up, all 5 of us were on the way up the Glacier Basin trail. Snow started quickly once on the trail nearly on our own except for a climbing ranger heading down and an the IMG Jansport climb team, all of which warned us of the last 600ft being very steep. We made it up to Glacier Basin quickly and decided to head to the base of the Inter glacier where we would set up camp for the first night. No reason to push it too hard with 5 people on the team, Erin who has climbed numerous peaks around the world including Rainier, Marcus, Brandon, and I who have all tried to summit once only to be turned back, and my wife Cassie who after my attempt last year said she was coming next time. javascript:void(0) Camp was set up quickly and the stove was going to get water collected for dinner and the next days push up to Camp Schurman. A few more climbers followed us up the trail and passed through camp, some heading to Liberty Ridge and others pushing up to Camp Curtis that day. Weather came in and out over St Elmo pass all afternoon and would finally force us into the tents around 7pm, as we started to get hammered with winds and pelting snow. Saturday morning came to blue bird skies and warm temps, forcing us to pack up quick so we wouldn’t fry to bad heading up the Inter glacier. The trip up the Inter Glacier was uneventful, just long, hot, and steep all while carrying heavy packs as we trekked toward Camp Schurman. We finally made it around 1pm after a leisurely pace and set up camp. With camp set up, and the stove melting water again, we discussed the next day’s plan as we all anticipated our ascent up the Emmons-Winthrop route. 12am came way to fast and we were moving up the Emmons glacier by 1:30 under completely clear skies. Our pace was steady and we made good time up the corridor under perfect conditions and absolutely amazing views off in the distance. Seattle, Yakima, Baker, Glacier Peak, and the Olympics, if it was North, West, or East of us we saw it Sunday morning. As we pushed on the crevasse crossings started appearing more frequently, but all were passed with no trouble except for one that required a jump up in order to cross with little room for error on the steep slope across from it. The whole team safely across and the climb steepened greatly. We were told it was only 600ft of vertical, but I’m pretty damn sure it was a lot more. The climbing continued slowly at this point. Finally one last break with everyone feeling pretty beat up, some skiers next to us said they thought there was only about 500ft left of the climb, we decided to trust them. Thank god they were right, because as soon as we started up again and gained the next up hill battle, the summit was in our faces, we made it to the crater rim, 9 ½ hours later. After an hour of pictures, food, water, and signing the register, we roped back up and began the long slog of a descent back down the mountain. It was hot, very hot and it seemed like Camp cShurman was never getting any closer. Finally, as we stepped onto the corridor, we saw another team of two ahead of us making glissade track after glissade track back down to camp. The decision was easily made by all and we sat our butts down and started sliding as a team back to camp. This made the descent fly by, and by 3:30 we rolled into camp exhausted and not looking forward to the hike out. We leisurely packed our bags and took off about 6pm. We made our way to the top of the Inter glacier and glissaded all the way down to the bottom in nearly one long endless glissade and continued on to to the car. Arrived there about 9 and finally got back home after dropping some of the team off. 12 midnight was back, and my wife and I finally were crawling into bed, 24 hours from the time we woke Gear Notes: Lots of sunscreen Approach Notes: Glacier Basin trail is snow after about the first mile