rmiller

My buddy used a bivy on a ski attempt of the Emmons this past weekend. He dug a snow cave at camp Sherman. Blowing snow was such an issue that night, that he kept getting buried and we had to keep digging him out. His sleeping bag got so wet that another night out was out of the question. I don't really use bivys, but my guess is you will be fine if the weather is good. Otherwise, it could be fairly miserable. If you're just going up to camp Muir, my suggestion would be to lug the tent. Its not too bad of an approach.

Three of us made an attempt to ski the Emmons Glacier this past weekend. We started our approach on Thursday (27th) afternoon. The road to white river campground is now open. The glacier basin trail is a mix of snow, bare trail, and stream crossings right now. We didn't have much trouble with postholing on our way to the basin. Getting up the Inter-Glacier on Friday was fine with skis, but it looked like slow going for other parties without flotation. Visibility was terrible for us and we relied solely on a map and compass. We saw signs of wet sloughs on many of the steeper slopes, and although I was always concerned about how warm it was, nothing we were on ever gave any indication that it might slide. We experienced high winds at camp Sherman and had some major issues with wind loading. Our buddy was in a small bivy in a snow cave and each time we got up to shovel out our tent we'd realize that he was buried again and have to shovel him out as well. In the morning (Saturday), everything was wet, the winds had worsened, and visibility was only marginally better, so we decided to retreat. We caught glimpses of the upper route here and there and it looked like an incredible ski, if only you could see where the hell you were going to avoid crevasses. Our ski descent from the camp Sherman was great at first, but then we quickly ran into more whiteout conditions and vertigo set in pretty bad. We heard Sunday had a short weather window in the morning, but that the forecast had also worsened from it once sunny prediction. I'm curious to know if anybody had summited from the Emmons on Sunday?

If anybody heads out on the North side of Rainier in the next few days, it would be great to hear an update on avy conditions. Thanks!