Sunset Ampitheater Headwall Couloir - 5/24/09

An overview of our route from first camp to second camp (yellow dot), then left up to the headwall couloir, and right down the Tahoma glacier back to camp.



This Memorial Day my good buddy Chris and I took a trip to climb a seldom done route on the northwest face of Mount Rainier. The Sunset Ampitheater is the mountain's highest cirque, although geologically it is a feature that was likely formed by landslides and avalanches, rather than being scoured out by glaciers like the other cirques on the mountain. Our goal was to climb a couloir that splits the ampitheater's 1500' rock face that was first climbed just 9 years ago. We departed from the trailhead after noon on Friday and began the longest approach I've ever made on a climb. The trailhead was at a measly 2100', just barely within the park boundary. That meant we had around 12000' of elevation to gain and a lot of horizontal miles just to get to our high camp from where we'd attempt the route.


Looking way to happy and optimistic!


Three miles into the hike we ran into snow


We ended up traversing miles of steep snow on Emerald Ridge. Eck.

After an exhausting day of post-holing in steep snow while traversing a much "nastier than expected" ridge we made our first camp, still below treeline. We were both exhausted and surprised by how much effort we had put to just get up to 6000'. The next morning we woke up early and were soon wandering our way between the icefalls on the Tahoma glacier. It got hot quickly, and I paid the price for forgetting to put sunscreen on the front of my neck (which had blisters on it today).


The first nice look at the expanse of the Tahoma glacier, and our planned route to the summit


Regular


Crispy


Extra Crispy (doesn't it just look hot!?)


This is a picture Chris snapped of a rather massive Serac avalanche we saw while on our approach to high camp


A picture of our high camp. I was probably already asleep when Chris took this.


Tent life when it's too hot to be outside.


After another day of hard work we made it too our high camp around 10,000 feet on the Tahoma glacier. I was pretty spent, but we managed a good dinner and were asleep well before it got dark out. The alarm went off depressingly early, and we fumbled into our gear and were on our way before first light.


Downclimbing a steepish section of the glacier below some ice cliffs to get to easier ground.


Switching from glacier gear to climbing gear above St. Andrew's rock around 12K. Summit shadow in the background was pretty cool.


Chris leading the way up to the base of the couloir


After climbing above the bergschrund we traversed into the couloir itself


Me climbing up to our first fixed belay point


Here I took the lead up the couloir and around a corner to the right


Looking down at Chris climbing up to my belay point


After swapping leads, Chris headed around a corner, and when I caught up I saw him scrambling over this rock face. From where I was it looked pretty intimidating, but it wasn't too bad when I actually got on it.


Me leading out again up our last pitch to the summit ridge


Looking back on Chris' belay above the rock step


Summit of Liberty cap!


Beginning the descent of the upper Tahoma glacier.


Well, that's basically the end of the excitement. We descended the Tahoma in crappy snow conditions and heat that was almost unbearable. As we got closer to our camp we were frequently post-holing up to our thighs in the soft snow. Chris punched into a small crevasse (small being relative... he coudn't see the bottom) at one point, and although we were roped up I was glad he didn't go all the way in simply because of the additional effort that would have required of both of us. Again we passed out in the tent with the intent of waking up early and making the 8K foot descent back to our car via a different route than Emerald ridge.


Pictures don't do justice to how awesome of a morning we had descending the glacier. It was simply beautiful.


We hiked out the Tahoma creek trail, which had been mostly obliterated by a massive flood a couple of years ago. Still easier than Emerald ridge though.