Our attempt to summit Mount Baker began Friday evening at a clearing to the northwest of the trailhead. Our group consisted of members from all over the State (Myself, Leilani, Jordan, Coleen, Ryan, Cort and Dan). We assembled late in the evening intent to get an early start via the Heliotrope Ridge trail. The weather was expected to be light rain thru the weekend with snow probable at the higher elevations.
We started off sometime after sunrise and parked the vehicles a few hundred meters short of the trailhead. The road is covered in snow and ice so you will have to park along the side of the road. There were a half dozen or so vehicles along the side of the road at the time. Anyhow, the trail’s beginning at around 3500’ is clear of snow but really muddy. As we continued along, the trail became more snow and ice than terra firma. Some spots were very narrow boot paths in the ice and melting quickly. At two points along the trail we had to climb over or under large trees that fell across the path. There were two to three creeks with snow bridge crossings along the lower trail. They are melting quickly so we took caution and each of our members crossed them individually. When we reached what appeared as an “S” curve on the trail map, the team surveyed the option of crossing the final snow bridge and found that the crossing is too precarious and beating a path in the deep snow would be a waste of energy. So we back tracked to where the trail split off and continued our hike up.
At just under 4500’ the ground is now completely covered in snow. After the 5000’ elevation the trees began to clear out and breaks in the fog allowed us peek a boo views of the Heliotrope Ridge. An hour or so later we have cleared the trees and took an extend break where Ryan reviewed our rope and arrest procedures. The weather was clearing so we got some incredible views of the Chromatic Moraine and the Coleman Glacier.
After our break we continued on our way directly south along a steep spur to reach our base camp. At this time the weather was clear most of the time and there was no wind. Along the way, we approached another camp that was set up on a rocky clearing at about 6500’. There we stopped to top off our water containers from the running water on the edge of the rocks and Cort gave a quick class on boot axe belay procedures. Once complete we roped up into our two groups and continued. We reached the 7000’ elevation and scouted for a camp site. The group decided that we should continue further to shelter against the rocky ridge line. So we set up camp at 7200’ against the ridge line approximately at UTM grid 10U EV 058360 540370. After digging in and setting up camp we all topped off our water and finished off our evening meal. At around 9pm everybody got settled in for the night.
At 2am, everybody got up to prepare for the summit. The air was cold and the ground was firm so it was looking like a good start for a summit attempt. For the safety of the team I decided to bow out of the summit attempt due to a knee injury that was irritated the previous day. Two others on the team also remained behind due to injuries or for safety reasons. The remainder of the team roped up into a four man team and set off for the summit. The weather was very cloudy and there was a light wind at this point. Later that morning snow began to fall and the wind picked up.
The summit team reported the following…
Route finding thru the initial crevasse field was fairly straight forward with some delays due to other teams. When the team reached the saddle near Colfax Peak and began up the Roman Wall, the weather turned bad and heavy winds were hitting them from the south across the Deming Glacier. Visibility in the dark and snowy conditions was near zero. The rope team reached 9500’ when they decided to abandon the summit and return to base camp. While returning they literally had to probe every step and rely on the GPS because visibility was nonexistent. The summit team arrived back at camp late that morning exhausted.
Once we were all together again we rested at base camp for a couple of hours eating and packing. We decided that we were glissading down any portion of the mountain steep enough. So we hike down to just under 7000’ and began our glissade. The temperature was just above freezing so the snow quickly melted and soaked into our packs and clothing. The glissade was fun with only one redirect due to a crevasse that was opening up on our route at about 6000’. When we reached the tree line the snow was now full on rain and it made for a very tiring slog back to the vehicles. I was moving very slow at this point and I am thankful to my team mates who checked on my condition several times and waited at the snow bridges to insure I was safely across.
Once back at the vehicles, Ryan had the BBQ going and cooked up the most delicious hamburgers ever! We loaded our vehicles and enjoyed some small talk over the burgers and parted ways. Although Mount Baker was a strenuous hike and the weather did not agree with us I am confident this team will return to summit Mount Baker.
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