Tag: Cascades North

climbs in the North Cascades of Washington state

North Early Winter Spire, Early Winter Couloir

on By 1 Comment

A week beforehand, a bunch of mixed alpine route beta from WA Pass started spraying on Instagram, and we wanted to partake in the fun. We arrived to the iconic hairpin turn on the highway. The weather was colder than the warm forecast, and we were feeling good after a few glugs of Yerba Matte. It was fairly clear where we were going even in the pitch dark, and after about an hour of following some boot pack and crossing over some shitty tree wells, we found ourselves at what seemed to be at the bottom of the route. [..]

Eldorado Peak, North Ridge

on By 2 Comments

I mentioned to Will that Jess and I were looking at climbing the NE Face of Eldorado. His AMGA Alpine exam happened to take him pretty close to our objective, the relatively untouched North Ridge of Eldorado. Kind of a coincidence because I had just been looking at the N Ridge topo wondering if it would be a viable ascent. Turns out it was, and Will was ready to get back on it! [...]

Dorado Needle, East Ridge

on By 3 Comments

We had spent the previous day hauling up to the 7400’ camp of Eldorado. This camp is such a long way to go that it doesn’t particularly make sense to me for anything except mini-basecamping. Our primary objective of the trip was to climb the rarely touched North Ridge of Eldorado, with the NW Ridge of Dorado needle as a warmup. Being the slightly overlay ambitious people that we are, chatting over our rehydrated meals, the East Ridge came up. “Why not!” [...]

Mt. Baker, The North Ridge

on By

I had climbed this route back in 2016, and with Jessica just moving here, it was a great opportunity for her to nail a classic and for me to get on the sharp end of the rope. Our normal prep was pretty much tossed to the curb for this climb. We intended to have a rest weekend after hitting our workout routines pretty hard for the past few weeks.[...]

Forbidden Peak, West Ridge in smoke

on By

One of the considerations I have had for a long time has been spending a summer season climbing a bunch of alpine routes close to home. The irony of me leaving for peaks abroad during the core of the climbing season here has never been lost on me.  For that, I have never actually had the time to climb in the Boston Basin.[...]

Mt. Shuksan, The North Face + total solar eclipse

on By

Somewhere on the internet I read that people could climb Shuksan’s North Face in a long day.  I knew that would probably be a bit extreme, so I figured 2 days would be optimal.  I sent Chad a message with my timeline and he said he would really prefer to do it in 3.  In fact, he would truly prefer to do it in 4.  In hindsight, 4 would have been nice.[...]