Mt. Hood – 4/18/2010

Mazama Climb of Mt. Hood (south side)
April 18, 2010
Leader: Glenn Widener
Asst. Leader: Robert Joy

Early Springtime is a fantastic time to do Hood. Success, however, often favors those with flexible schedules. Weather can be lousy and/or unpredictable for days or weeks at a time, while weather windows are often brief.

On Friday, I got a short-notice invitation from Glenn to go on a Sunday climb of Hood’s south side. A Sunday-only window of good weather had appeared on the forecast. So at 1:30 AM on Sunday, April 18, I found myself sitting on a bench in the climber’s registration hut at Timberline Lodge, lacing up boots, donning my headlamp, and making final adjustments to my gear and pack.

We were a group of 5: Glenn, Robert, Keegan, Ashley, and me. Other groups of climbers were gathering there as well. There’s always a sense of hushed excitement here during the wee hours of the morning, when climbers congregate to register and do their last preparations for their adventure.

Just past 2:00 AM, we set out across the road, scrambled up the snowbank on the other side, and began our long plod up the Palmer snowfield. Four hours later, as we approached Crater Rock, dawn began to break, and we got our first close-up views of the Mountain. It was breathtaking. The rocks and cliffs of the crater rim were caked with ice and snow, which the wind had chiseled into weird and fantastic textures and shapes, like an abstract relief sculpture. Behind us, the clear sky allowed us an unobstructed view of the land.

The trudge from underneath Crater Rock to the Hogsback was the most exhausting part of the climb for me. An unsettled stomach had made all food unappetizing, and although I’d choked down some energy food, it wasn’t enough, and I was running out of fuel. As I climbed the last 50 feet to the base of the Hogsback, lagging behind the rest of the party, I wondered whether I had the summit in me.

We took a half-hour break at the Hogsback. When I arrived, I sat down in the snow and spent five minutes just sitting there resting before I even took off my pack. After some water, food, and a little more rest, I felt ready to go back into action.

We headed up the Hogsback, and once at the top, traversed west and upward toward the steep chutes leading to the summit. Glenn chose the easternmost of these chutes, which tops out closest to the summit and has the benefit of avoiding the freakishly exposed knife-edge section of the summit ridge. We protected the ascent with a running belay. The sun was starting to hit the ice on the cliffs, and tiny shards of ice rained down on us. The occasional egg-sized chunk of ice came whizzing down as well, and a couple of us came away with bruises on legs from those.

Finally, just after 10:00 AM, we kicked our way up the last steep and icy section of the chute and came out on the summit ridge, with the summit just a gentle stroll of a few minutes to our east. Once there, we did the usual summit stuff: snapped pictures, had a snack, and took in the panoramic views. The clear skies meant that we could see all the Cascade volcanoes from Rainier to the Sisters.

Although the views were beautiful and it felt great to be on the summit, it was cold and breezy, and soon we were packing up and planning our descent. We got back to the top of the chute we had come up, and Glenn belayed us down the steepest and iciest section. We picked our way down carefully until the slope became more moderate and it was easy to plunge step.

We got back to the Hogsback at about 12:30. There we had time to relax, snack, and take off crampons. Then we began the long, hot slog down the soft snow back to Timberline. Glenn and Keegan glissaded as far as they could down Palmer, and covered some good distance, despite being slowed by mushy snow and low, non-glissadable slope angles between the steep sections.

A little after 3:30, thirteen-and-a-half hours after we left the climber’s register, we stepped off the snow and onto the parking lot, joining the crowds of skiers, snowboarders, and tourists. Looking up at the Mountain, it was hard for me to believe that we’d just been up there. After congratulating each other, we prepared for the hour-and-a-half drive back to Portland… perhaps the most dangerous part of our adventure that day.

It was another rocking day in the mountains.