Mike Gauthier - Mount Rainier: A Climbing Guide

MOUNT
RAINIER

A CLIMBING GUIDE

Author Mike Gauthier is a veteran climber and the lead climbing and mountain rescue ranger at Mount Rainier, so youre in good hands.

Pittsburgh Tribune-Review

If youre looking for an experienced author, it doesnt get much better than this: [Mike Gauthier is] the lead climbing ranger at the park.

Everett Herald

A great starting place for anybody wanting to challenge the Washington landmark... Literally discusses everything youd want to know about Rainier before you leave home.

Idaho Falls Post Register

A CLIMBING GUIDE

Second Edition

FOREWORD BY BRUCE BARCOTT

MIKE GAUTHIER

THE MOUNTAINEERS BOOKS
is the nonprofit publishing arm of The Mountaineers Club, an organization founded in 1906 and dedicated to the exploration, preservation, and enjoyment of outdoor and wilderness areas.

1001 SW Klickitat Way, Suite 201, Seattle, WA 98134

2005 by Mike Gauthier
All Rights Reserved

Second edition: first printing 2005, second printing 2007, third printing 2008, fourth printing 2009, fifth printing 2010

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form, or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, without permission in writing from the publisher.

Distributed in the United Kingdom by Cordee, www.cordee.co.uk
Manufactured in the United States of America

Project Editor: Mary Metz
Editor: Cynthia Newman Bohn
Maps and photo correction: Ani Rucki
Cover design: The Mountaineers Books
Book layout and design: Ani Rucki
All photographs by the author unless otherwise noted
Cover photograph: David Gottlieb, Winthrop Glacier
Frontispiece: Joe Puryear climbs the Emmons Glacier, 13,500 feet.
Dedication page: Mount Rainier, Winter Sunset

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Gauthier, Mike, 1969

Mount Rainier : a climbing guide / Mike Gauthier ; foreword by Bruce Barcott. 2nd ed.

p. cm.

Includes index.

ISBN 0-89886-956-0

1. MountaineeringWashington (State)Rainier, MountGuidebooks. 2. Rainier, Mount (Wash.) Guidebooks. I. Title.

GV199.42.W22R344 2005
796.52'2'09797782dc22

2004031024

Editors Note: The authors of sidebar texts are identified by their initials.

S.C. Skip Card

M.G. Mike Gauthier

P.K. Paul Kennard

E.S. Eric Simonson

Printed on recycled paper
ISBN (paperback): 978-0-89886-956-9
ISBN (ebook): 978-1-59485-208-4

In memory of JIM BROWN, PHIL OTIS, & SEAN RYAN

BY MARK MOORE AND MIKE GAUTHIER

BY MARK MOORE AND MIKE GAUTHIER

BY PAUL KENNARD

BY JIM LITCH, M.D.

BY ERIC SIMONSON

Rangers at Camp Schurman, discussing route conditions with climbers

The second edition builds upon the foundation I established in 1999. Now there are more images, stories, and information from Mount Rainiers experts and aficionados. In this edition, youll find

More photography. There are 63 new aerial and climbing images. The photo collection has been updated and expanded. Now its even easier to pick your climbing line, understand the objectives, and visualize the route.

More biographies and history. Climbers come home from Mount Rainier with stories to share. Here youll learn interesting tales of success and woestories that illuminate the routes and locations around the mountain through biographical accounts.

More on the glaciers. Mount Rainier is an arctic island in a temperate sea. Glaciers dominate the mountainous landscape and climbers must contend with them. Now youll learn more about the ice, glaciers, and geography on the lower 48s most glaciated peak.

More on training and guiding. Many climbers (and almost every Northwest climber) come to Mount Rainier to improve their skills and prepare for other mountains. A third of the climbers attempting the summit go with a guide service. Why is Mount Rainier such a training destination? Because it is North Americas mountaineering destination. Whether youre learning the ropes, practicing on the glacier, or leading a trip, this guidebook will help you train better and get the most from your Mount Rainier experience.

More routes. New route descriptions and photos of Little Tahoma, Washington States third highest peak. An airy summit with dramatically steep faces, Little Tahoma is the beautiful satellite peak of Mount Rainier.

Mike Gauthier
January 2005

We were just below Pebble Creek, about to slog up the vanilla plain of the Muir snowfield, when Mike greeted a bandanad hiker and his friend grubbing some cashews.

How you guys doing today? he asked.

Were doing great, man, said Bandana Boy, wiping the late July sweat from his cheek. How could we not? Were on Rainier!

He said it as if we had all rounded a corner and stumbled upon the spot where God had stashed Eden all these years. And in a way, we had. At our feet the heathers, all pinks and whites, were beginning to reclaim the Paradise Valley from the winters eight-month freeze. To our left the Nisqually Glaciers crevasses split open like creamy wounds in snow unsoiled by the summers rockfall. Behind us not a single cloud obscured the view of the Tatoosh and southern Cascades. And before us stood Rainier, big and fat and available, blocking out half the postcard sky. This is what makes this place so damn wonderful and so damn dangerous, makes people around here behold this mountain like a god and love it like a grandmother. Mike put it in technical terms: Ripper day.

Its a day like this that makes people take Rainier too lightly, makes them plan a two-day summit run, makes them turn tail and run in shock when a front moves in from the Pacific and spanks every living thing above 6,000 feet. Because the truth of the matter is, this is one hell of a deceptive mountain. On the right day a fit climber may zigzag up the cleaver with no hassle from the gods of wind, rain, and snow. Thing is, we dont get too many right days around here. Most are wrong ten ways from Tuesday. The altitude you may plan for, the endurance you can train for, the will you must summon, but the weather can only be gambled with. There are plenty of other fourteen-thousanders on the continent, but none that will give you the wild ride of Rainier.

One bit of advice: Take your rewards along the way. Take them on the White River trail in to Glacier Basin, at midnight under the stars at Camp Muir, at dawn on Disappointment Cleaver, at midmorning astride an Emmons Glacier crevasse. Emulate John Muir, who lounged in Rainiers mountain meadows on his way to the top, gazing at the mountain in silent admiration, buried in tall daisies and anemones by the side of a snowbank. The summit may hold some personal triumph, but it does not promise splendors for the eye. You may see nothing but the hazy outline of your climbing partners, or you may catch a glimpse of the tableau that struck Hazard Stevens, the first recorded climber to reach the summit, with awe. The wind, he wrote, was now a perfect tempest, and bitterly cold; smoke and mist were flying about the base of the mountain, half hiding, half revealing its gigantic outlines; and the whole scene was sublimely awful.