patrick_mauro

Trip: Mt Hood - South Side Date: 7/21/2016 Trip Report: My buddy Cory and I just got back from a trip up the South side/Hogsback on Mt Hood. We split this into two days since Cory is new to mountaineering, using the first day as a seminar day to teach crevasse rescue, self arrest, etc. We spent our night at Illumination Saddle. Some relevant notes: - From the Saddle, we observed a large wet loose avalanche coming down Leuthold's Couloir around sunset on the 21st. The runout continued to dribble out of the couloir for 15-30 seconds. - The bergschrund at the base of the Reid Glacier headwall looks quite open and nasty. It looks like it might require a bit of route finding skill to get around. - We went up the left couloir of the Pearly Gates. The crux was the 100' above the Coalman Glacier bergschrund, though that part was still quite easy. Were the snow conditions not preemo - we had styrofoam snow - we would have put in a running belay at this point. The left side of the Gates was a WI2- climb. Ice axes were sufficient for the one or two balancey step ups.