[TR] Mt. Shuksan- Price Glacier 6/11/2006

[Otto]

Climb: Mt. Shuksan-Price Glacier

 

Date of Climb: 6/11/2006

 

Trip Report:

I’d wanted to go to the Price Glacier on Mt. Shuksan for several years now, so when Jake Larson suggested it I knew this was the time for it. Our partner Jim Daubert was also highly motivated and had done the descent route recently, so we had a fully prepared and charged group.

 

The weather the weekend of June 10-11 was predicted to be unpredictable, and we got to fully appreciate the variety implied by “on shore flow”. With a forecast of 20% chance of precipitation, we got rain, hard hail, snow, thunder and lightning, around 20% of the time. Fortunately, it held off for the technical portions of the climb, like climbing out of the bags and packing up in the morning.

 

First came the creek crossing at the trailhead:

 

And the infamous log crossing:

 

Price Lake starting to melt out:

 

Bill and Jake ascending the moraine in the rain:

 

Peekaboo views of the route:

 

There’s Nooksack Tower on the left. Jake and I had approached it last month and sussed out the trail, but the weather was much worse:

 

We carved out an 8 foot square platform for a tarp, with the weather clearing off:

 

The route goes up and right, to the snow saddle above the large rock hump in the foreground, then up and across the glacier to the big schrund:

 

A good evening:

 

An alpine start:

 

From up on the snow saddle, dawn light:

 

Crossing the glacier, Jake sensing victory:

 

Features of the glacier. Probably the best shot of the worrisome schrund problem coming up; it is at the left end of the rock prow in the center:

 

The schrund which we passed on the rock on the right:

 

Surface snow kept shooting out of this tube, every few minutes, as we crouched off to the side waiting to step across a slot onto the rock:

 

Otto starting up the rock pitch:

 

A rather dicey step across here with a bulge forcing one’s pack out:

 

Rambling up the summit pyramid:

 

From the summit, there’s Mt. Baker:

 

Thunderhead:

 

What a good glacier climb. It seemed reasonable at all times, although the roar of the surface snow pouring out the chute at the top was disconcerting. About the possibility of ice fall on the glacier, Jake says, “While deserving of respect, I didn't think the route was an objective danger "horror show" as it is sometimes portrayed, at least in the conditions we did it in. Personally, I found the objective danger on the summit pyramid far outstripped those encountered on the Price...” Thanks Jim and Jake, for another grand adventure.

 

[Billygoat]

Nice pics

[Weekend_Climberz]

 

Great pictures. The sunset shots are awesome!!

[zoroastr]

Awesome T.R.--thanx for the gr8 pix--more eloquent than prose...

[Maestro]

Personally, I found the objective danger on the summit pyramid far outstripped those encountered on the Price...

Which route did you take on the summit pyramid and what conditions did you find?

[ivan]

boooooo!!!! hardy-har-har - actually b/c layton ridiculed me into fear-hobbling my thc-addled reptilian forebrain across that log i now find it my sad duty to shit on all others in sound agreement w/ my original coward-logic - "shit runs downhill" my old football coach said, shortly before losing his job for dui's n' sleeping w/ the clientele.

 

[Madcap]

Haw! Jibe well-taken and deserved. I had Layton's words ringing in my ears as I had read his great trip report before we went to take shot at Nooksack. I chuckled in shame the whole way across...

My cap's off to your bold and visionary crossing....

[Madcap]

We did not ascend the standard gully (which was easy snow the whole way we took it in descent). Went up what I believe is the SE Corner route (far edge of the pyramid towards Hell's highway. On that ascent I was lucky enough to get tagged with some icefall, and narrowly missed having my head taken off by a random cannonball rock wizzing down from above (no other parties above). Thus the somewhat tongue-in-cheek quip attributed to me. Central gully no problem.

[Otto]

Trying for the standard, central, gully we went too far to the left. About as far to the West as you can go before it cliffs out. The climbing wasn't difficult, but a soccerball sized rock came down and just missed my partner.

[jimd]

Thanks Bill and Jake for another great climb! Bill, nice lead on the rock pitch. Doing laybacks with a full pack and mountain boots made for interesting climbing. Jake, good call on the weather. The minor threat posed by "onshore flow" was more than offset by the solid clear breaks and spectacular scenery for most of the climb. Jake's lead up the Price Glacier included routefinding around a snow chute that had been carved so deep and wide that direct crossing was impossible. On the summit pyramid, indeed, the central gully was in good condition, and we would have much preferred it over the SE ridge. At the summit, we encoutered a rarity which mightily hastened our descent: static electricity was felt both by me (tingling hands and arms) and Jake (ringing / buzzing ears). That bit of weather followed us down the mountain with hail on the Sulphide Glacier and a whiteout for our crossing of the Upper Curtis Glacier. From the Fisher Chimneys out, weather broke again into clear evening sunshine. There was little sign of the trail, still buried in snow, from the creek crossing below Lake Anne to Artist Point, so some navigation was required to get into the exit valley as dusk approached. Glad the pics turned out!