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Posted (edited)

Trip: Mt St Helens, Washington - Climbed Monitor Ridge. Descent was based on snow

 

Date: 2/2/2007

 

Trip Report:

With no new snow and back-to-back-to-back sunny days in almost two weeks in the typically moist NW, most are (or were) talking about corn skiing rather than face shots.

 

With ugly weather expected for the weekend a buddy and I opted for a last minute Mt St Helens summit ski on Friday. Many happy skiers had been skiing St Helens in the past week so we figured it was worth a shot. It's not the best sequence of images, but here they are anyways.

 

With skins on at the car, it's just under 5500 ft of climbing to the rim, which of course means a great ski descent

summitclimb.jpg

 

High clouds kept the snow a little firm up top, but they didn't limit any of the views

mtadamsviewwithtitle.jpg

 

Looking south, Mt Hood was easily visible (not necessarily in this picture unfortunately), as were some of the more southern volcanoes...even the Sisters could be seen near Bend

aaronclimb_2.jpg

 

Crawling over the rim in great anticipation, the steaming crater is a sight to see

cratershot.jpg

 

As are the surrounding views

spiritlake.jpg

 

Another day at the office

brokencloudswithtitle.jpg

 

Ian

---

www.mackieimages.com

 

Gear Notes:

Skis: G3 Tickets mounted with Hammerhead telemark bindings

Boots: Garmont Synergies

Camera: Canon Rebel XT w/ Canon 17-85 IS

Edited by Spin Fast
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Posted (edited)
Sweet. May have to head up this weekend.

About how long does it take to get from the parking lot to the rim?

 

Chester - it took just under 4 hours to get from car to rim.

 

Ian

Edited by Spin Fast
Posted
Climbed Monitor Ridge, huh? Where'd you park?

 

 

I'm pretty sure it was the Monitor Ridge route; it was my first time skiing the mountain. Although, we didn't catch the ridge until about halfway up. Please correct me if I am wrong. Looking at that first picture I posted, you can see the ridge we would eventually ascend on climbers right.

 

As for parking, we started at the Marble Mountain Snow Park

 

Ian

---

www.mackieimages.com

Posted

If you parked at Marble Mountain snow park and took that packed out snowshoe/cross country ski trail then you probably climbed the Worm Flows route. That is the standard route in the winter because the road to the Climbers Bivouac is closed to snow. It actually joins Monitor Ridge for the last few hundred feet to the crater rim.

 

Climbing the Monitor Ridge route in the winter would be somewhat out of the ordinary - and that's why it piqued my curiousity. You'd have to work pretty hard (or make friends with the slednecks) in order to make it over to Monitor Ridge proper.

 

In any case, the turns down are sa-weet!

Posted (edited)

We only followed the snowshoe/cross country route to treeline, then went climbers right. About half way up we got onto the ridge.

 

We need new snow. NOW.

 

Ian

Edited by Spin Fast

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