Mount Ellinor — Tuesday, Mar. 16, 2021

I've done Ellinor probably 8 times now (3 times up/down the winter chute), and this was probably the most difficult day I've climbed Ellinor. Tried to get up with kidzwonthike early (~07:30) to avoid snow softening issues as the chute is an avalanche funnel that gets sun soaked by mid-afternoon and the day was scheduled to be warm.

The Road

The day started humorously by me getting my car stuck in some deeper than expected snow off to the side of the road (high centered a bit). I got out my shovel and dug around my tires and left the rest of getting out for future me to have to deal with (which was a good call). Other cars might be able to push further up to the lower trailhead, but you need really high clearance (Jeep, 4Runner) as it's really easy to high-center otherwise.

The Road Walk

The boot up was good as long as we stuck to the old tire wells. It was variable depth once we got out of them.

The Lower Trail

The climb up to the second upper trail junction was ok without traction, but it got dicier without traction when going up the ridge to the junction. I put my crampons on here since I opted to not bring microspikes, but kidzwonthike put on microspikes earlier.

To the Bottom of the Chute!

The path to the winter chute in the open was good, but postholey in areas.

The last few trip reports have recommended/mentioned they got up in snowshoes, but given how hard the snow was and the fact that the flat section above the chute was short, I recommended we ditch the snowshoes at the bottom of the chute (which was a good call).

Doing a quick handshear at the bottom identified semi-consolidated storm snow with a hard base, so it seemed safe enough for us to go as long as we didn't trigger the top-layer or get stuck under wet-loose avalanches of significant size.

Up The Chute!

The way up was relatively easy at the bottom, but got progressively more difficult once we got to the second section of the chute. I tried sticking climber's right (the more shaded areas) as it was starting to really warm up and pebble sized rollerballs were falling down the chute. At the second section  I yelled down to kidzwonthike to stay climber's left because I saw some potential cornice overhangs on the left side of the chute (turns out there were several; I'll get to that later).

The third section of the chute was a royal PITA. I felt like I was kicking a concrete wall with my Grivel crampons, while poking through the snow with my trekking pole/ice axe to find the snow covered holes/weak areas that I could place my feet/hands into, gain stability, and repeat. I was sweating bullets since it was around noon and the trees were really starting to shed their snow as small rollerballs down the chute. I knew that we needed to get up soon to get past the risky sun-soaked section.

After the Chute; Summit Ho!

Once we got up to the top of the chute, I pushed up to the flat section, parked my ass on the snow and laid down on my back in exhaustion. kidzwonthike caught up and sat down for a bit too. After about 10 minutes, we continued on the next section, sticking to the post holes provided by the climber that went before us (he travelled light; lucky).

On the next saddle (false summit) before the true summit, we had a short chat with the climber who stopped at the false summit; he noted cornicing to the right of the summit, we thanked him, and pressed on towards the true summit.

We stuck to the center of the ridge: climber's right is a steep drop-off down a gully, whereas climber's left is a less steep drop-off over the avalanche field (the summer talus field). The last section required some lowdaggering and bucket steps, but apart from the steepness wasn't too bad.

The Summit

The view from the top was absolutely gorgeous, like last year. A bit hazy/cloudy off in the distance, but beautiful nonetheless. The best parts of the view were Mt. Washington, the Brothers, Lena, Bretherton, Olympus, and of course Koma Kulshan, Dakobed, Tahoma, Pahto, and Loowit (sadly no views of Wy'east; it was a bit too hazy/cloudy). We even got some peekaboo views of Sloan, Queest-alb, Stuart, and other portions of the Western Cascades.

Getting Down..

The way down we down climbed from the summit for stability reasons along the steeper sections above the chute; the consequence was bad above as noted before and I was worried about going skier's right of the false summit and getting caught under a D2 wet loose avalanche, so we stuck to our down track.

Once we got to the top of the chute we considered glissading down. Another party of 3 was on their way up--with microspikes using our bucket steps--and they informed us that the previous climber hadn't used the glissade chute, so we decided to down climb the first section in our bucket steps, then heel plunge down the third and second section of the chute.

The day had warmed up significantly since we got out of the chute and the trees had basically shed their winter coats, so the path was littered with rollerballs.

Once we got down to the first section of the chute, we were playing a game of minesweeper, watching out for "hidden treasures" (covered heel plunged steps from past climbers). We made it back down to our snowshoes finally, but we had some close calls with some ankle twisters.

The Walk Out

The rest of the walk out was relatively straightforward, but it was extremely difficult without traction, since a lot of the snow below treeline had turned into slush thanks to tree bombs and the like falling off the trees.

I almost fell a few times and kidzwonthike did one accidental glissade down the ridge a short ways. Once we got down to the upper upper trailhead junction, it was a lot more easy going down to the lower trailhead since the trail levels out a bit.

The walk out on the road wasn't too bad sticking to the wheel wells.

I'm Free!

Once I got back to my car, the snow had softened up significantly. I goosed it, did some slushy drifting, got myself free of the slush, and back on to the [mostly] dry forestry road.

We tapped trekking poles, congratulating (and commiserating) the strenuous climb up the Ellinor winter chute :).

Gear Recommendations

• Crampons
• Helmet (in case of falls or fun glissades ;)..).
• Ice Axe
• Microspikes (optional, but helpful for lower sections).

Skills Recommendations

• AIARE/avalanche awareness.
• Self-arrest skills.

More Information on this Trip Report

• https://nwac.us/public-obs/20210316_mount-ellinor-winter-chute/