Mount Adams South Climb — Saturday, Sep. 24, 2011

South Cascades

Tried this climb the weekend before and got turned around by bad weather...when I saw the forecast for this weekend I knew I had to get after it. With the fall upon us there wouldn't be many more chances. We slept in the parking lot and took off early for an alpine start (3am). The weekend before we had brought everything and the kitchen sink up to lunch counter and stayed the night; this time around with light packs, we were much faster and hit the snowfields before first light. The sun rise was amazing and we made it to the false summit by 10am, taking plenty of breaks along the way. Looking down from Piker's Peak (before continuing on to the miners shack and true summit) I counted some 35 little black dots scattered throughout the snowfields. When the sun is shining this Mountain gets very crowded. We reached the summit around 11:30am and hung out for almost an hour. The views were outta control (Rainier and Helens). We took off our crampons and headed back to Piker's Peak-now for the fun part. Glacading some 3,000 ft was worth the trip all by itself. At one point my arm got tired just holding my axe in the snow; it's a long fun slide down. A good long break after that to take off layers and change into shorts. We were back and had camp broken down by 4pm. A thirteen hour trip everyone should make at least once. It is truly the most fun you can have for 15$ (volcano pass price)