[TR] Mt St Helens - Swift Creek 4/27/2008

[Greg R]

Trip: Mt St Helens - Swift Creek

 

Date: 4/27/2008

 

Trip Report:

A friend and I picked last weekend for a two day climb of Mt St Helens. Road 83 is currently closed 1.1 miles up from the junction with 90. There was about a million snowmobile rigs and trailers parks on this stretch. The first 1/4 mile is pretty ugly, mostly bare pavement and chewed up trees. Once we reached good snow we put on AT skis and skins.

After three hours of skinning we reached Marble Mtn. snow park.

 

There is a marked trail up to timberline. It is 1.5 hrs from Marble Mtn. to timberline. We camped at 3500' out of the wind. We started out at 6AM on Sunday. The route starts out on the small ridge to climbers left of the swift creek gully. Posts mark the lower part here.

 

 

 

 

At this point my climbing partner bailed. My bad for underestimating the demand of this trip. Anyhow, I met up with Carlos and John from Tri Cities, WA. I want to credit Carlos for the rest of the trip as he led the way from prior experience.

We ascended directly up the Swift Glacier. At 7700' we put skis on packs and footed the rest of the way. Slope angle measured at 31 degrees. Snow still fairly firm with cloud cover.

Summit reached at 10:45

Now for the fun part! The skiing was better than I expected. We skied the fall line down Swift Glacier. Snow did become fair to poor below 7000'. We went to skiers L of Swift Creek which was a good line.

 

Gear Notes:

AT Skis and skins, tent, stove, Avalanche transceivers, probes, shovel.