Dan Helmstadter is a hard guy to find if you aren’t in the mountains, so I went to the mountains. A day earlier we had exchanged vague assessments of our plans, our timing. Dan mused about a steep face he wanted to put turns down somewhere above Mt. Shuksan’s Hanging Glacier, and in my mind I recalled a view of the same face that I had contemplated from the north shoulder of that mountain some seasons earlier. He planned to camp in Glacier, but maybe at the gate. I planned to drive up the night before, or maybe the morning of. Specifics were lacking, but I knew we would meet somewhere en route if our fortunes so allowed.
2:00am and my alarm goes off. 2:30am and I’m on I-5 north, a full tank of gas, a thermos of tea and some music keeping my company. Ski touring is filled with motivational ups and downs, and mine started on the road as I wavered between wide-eyed excitement and fleeting desperation. Finally I arrived at the gate to the ski area to find Dan’s Sandtana camper. Sadie’s barking greeted my headlights, and I could see Dan rummaging around inside preparing for the day ahead.
The approach up White Salmon creek is different every time. This time most notable was the enormous pile of avalanche debris in the woods at the bottom of the clear cut below Chair 8. We skinned up and over it and into the majestic amphitheater below the NW face of Shuks looking more filled with snow than I’ve ever seen it in my brief three years in Washington. And a brief couple of hours later arrived at the top of our line having ascended the White Salmon glacier and crossed the Upper Curtis.
Looking across the Upper Curtis Glacier
- The face was absolutely gorgeous as it dropped away steeply below our feet on its way to the Hanging Glacier. From there the glacier’s convex slope rolled left, back under the upper face and toward the brink of the ice cliff below which, seen mistily through the boiling cloud deck were the tops of trees in the creek below. Things were feeling good so far, so we unpacked the rope and I belayed Dan as he climbed down into the slope with ice axe and shovel, investigating the snow conditions. As our preparations drew to a close and we were considering that it may be time to ski the route, the cloud deck rose slightly, obscuring our route.
Dan inspects the upper slope.
As we debated our options, another group arrived – our friends Eduardo Blanchard and Dylan Johnson. They were headed to attempt the NW Couloir, and Dan and I agreed that while the clouds were present we should ascend higher. So the four of us headed to the north shoulder, rising ever so slightly higher than the sea of clouds below. After a few shared minutes on this spectacular vantage, we dropped in and split back into our two original groups, each heading to their chosen path.
Our group on the north shoulder of Mt. Shuksan.
The summit pyramid of Mt. Shuksan and Mt. Baker.
Slopes above the Price Glacier.
In this Zach Clanton image taken from the summit of Mt. Baker the same day, you can see the two diverging ski tracks heading into the clouds from the north shoulder.
When Dan and I convened at the top of our line and the clouds were thicker than ever. So we got comfy, excavating small seats in the snow with skis and backpack, eating food, talking about adventures passed and future. I half-napped, in a state between waking and dreaming, on our cradle in the upper floor of the cotton ocean. I rose to collect water from a drip on a nearby icicle and the clouds began to lift. Dan and I both sprung into action and were packed and clicked into our bindings, buckling our boots in a few short minutes.
Dan skied first, making caution turns down the steep upper slope before crossing the runnel that guarded the main face to the right, dropping straight down below me as though on an elevator. Soon he reach a safe spot to wait and I joined in the fun, gaining the main slope and traversing far right, allowing me to then link thrilling turns back to the left away from my sluff that spilled down the fluted slope toward the bergschrund. We crossed onto the bench of the glacier, regrouped, and then continued down the rollover of the glacier toward the low point to the left of the ice cliff.
Dan drops in.
On the steep slope of the Hanging Glacier Headwall.
Dan looks back up at our tracks.
From here two options presented themselves. A steep ice gully to the left which would likely require technical downclimbing with crampons and axe and possibly the assistance of the rope, and to the right, the exit ramps below the seracs. This route was extraordinarily filled in thanks to the huge snowfall in the last half of the 2011 winter. It is extremely exposed to serac fall rom the ice cliff above during brief sections. We were lucky to find these constrictions filled with very good snow allowing us to ski quickly through – if they were in such a condition to hold up our passage the route would be unthinkable.
Skiing the (objective) crux of the route.
The clouds arrived again for the final section of the run.
Avalanche destruction.
The route as seen in May, 09.
Soon we had exited completely, skied down the end of the White Salmon and into the creek, and had begun our last climb back to the parking lot. Dan and I looked back at a cloud-shrouded Shuksan with our own thoughts of the possibilities that still, and will always, exist there. We cracked a celebratory beer with a spring-loaded Sadie dog back at the cars and parted ways.
Once again, you put words and pictures together to help us see what you do on a typical “Drew Day”. Thanks for sharing!
just visited the site as you commented on a TR of mine on TGR… that face is outrageous, wonderful trip.