Middle Sister Conditions?

[pjarms75]

Anyone been up recently? Planning on doing this in a couple days and wondering how the conditions are, if crampons / axe are still needed. Thanks.

[psistrom]

This may be too late for you, but I climbed the Middle Sister from Camp Lake last Tuesday, July 12, from Camp Lake. Trail from Pole Creek to Camp Lake almost entirely snow-free, but lots of snowfields above Camp Lake. Most of the Southeast Ridge crest and the dreary boulder field to the west of it, however, are snow-free. We had and used ice axes and crampons--snow fields were very icy in the early morning, but snow softened quickly. By staying on the snowfield just west of the Diller Glacier, we were able to avoid a lot of the loose boulder field on the way up.

[pjarms75]

That helps a lot. Taking my 2 teens up and trying to decide between middle and south, sounds like south it is. Thank you!

[plurpimpin]

Anybody been up or around the Hayden Glacier lately? Looking to take some friends out to practice some crevasse rescue and glacier travel next weekend. Also gonna try to tag the summit. Any recent Beta?

[plurpimpin]

Anybody been up there lately? Heading up this weekend, any recent beta would be appreciated. Mostly curious how open the glacier is.

Edited September 19, 2016 by plurpimpin

[Ptown_Climber1]

I was up there about one month ago...sorry...not too recent. But at the time, it was a walk up. Walked over a few cracks...took my 12 year old son and sister-in-law....roped up. Crevasses were opening, but the big ones were off to the sides. Can't say what it's like now, but my guess is it's still relatively ok. Good luck...post a pic if you go. It's beautiful up there.

[plurpimpin]

Awesome! Thank you for the reply! The only recentish beta I've been able to find was someone on summitpost that said it was impassable due to crevasses in July... I was alittle skeptical of that so it's good to hear from someone else.

 

We're definitely gonna head up and give it a shot this weekend. Worst case if it's too open we'll skirt around the glacier up to the saddle but I think we'll be able to find a way. From what I've seen in pics it looks like the toe of the glacier gets pretty nasty late season but the ridge that the climbing route follows stays pretty decent (at least in some videos I found from last september which was a lower snow year). I figure getting onto the glacier might be the crux of the whole climb.

[Ptown_Climber1]

Well, I was there on August 15this thereabouts, and it was a pretty obvious ridge of consolidated snow the whole way.....and even getting onto the glacier was really easy. Don't get on at the bottom of it.....take the rocky trail as far up as you can get, then drop down to your left onto the glacier.

 

And yeah, if it is awful, you could skirt around it up to the saddle, but that looked a lot longer, and really nasty.