This trip was one of those trips that started off with a lot of anxiety for me. Skiing Rainier is a big objective! It started with a lot of "Shoot, I forgot my gloves, I don't think we can even do the trip" and then, "...Oh wait, no I found them" and another major low and then a major high, and then another reason why we should bail, and then more reasons why conditions were lining up. Yet finally, with our permits all filled out and bags packed, we found ourselves touring quietly up towards Glacier Vista from Paradise. Once we clipped into our skis and started moving our bodies, everything felt right. This trip had many purposes for us. For one, we just wanted to ski the thing - it had been on our list for forever! I also had a couple pieces of new gear that I wanted to become familiar with before my upcoming guiding season, and also I needed to get used to travelling with more weight in my pack.

The weather was looking great on most accounts, however the biggest question we had was the wind. Different weather models were showing different estimations, and even the night before we set out, it seemed 50/50 as to weather or not it would be a-go. We decided to try our luck and see what came of it.

We traveled up the Nisqually and Wilson glaciers and had a lot of fun navigating through the little amount of crevasses that were on the route this time of year. We went up the Nisqually and stayed pretty far West when we got to the Wilson glacier (see Strava for reference). This time of year, there looked like a lot of viable options for travel, but this route made the most sense to us. By the time we made it to our camp, a little below Camp Hazard at about 9,400ft on the ridge, the wind had picked up a bit, and we realized that we needed to start getting our tent battened down for the night.

The true test of our weather prediction skills was going to happen that night, and with the amount of wind that we had while setting up camp, we weren't feeling very optimistic. We ate our dinner in our tent, and snuggled in our Spoonbill bag (such a cool sleep system! I've never been cold in that bag, and it only weighs 2lb 8oz... That's 1lb 4oz per person for a winter bag. Crazy!) and slowly started to "fall asleep" for the night. But that sleep didn't last long, as throughout the night, the winds grew and grew and grew. Throughout the following hours, we would roll over, look at each other with a pathetic "get me out of here" look as the winds howled around outside. All night, it sounded like a freight train was barreling into our tent, and we didn't sleep at all.

Whelp, that was that - we had received the weather forecast we didn't want. After the climb, we looked at the recorded winds at Muir for that night, and found that at it's worst it was sustained at 71mph with gusts of 86mph. Yikes. Once winds hit 70mph it is very difficult to even stand, and generally when winds hit sustained 30mph-ish is when I start to take them seriously. We bailed on a summit attempt, and in the morning went out to see if the Finger itself might ski well, but found that the winds had made for nasty skiing conditions up high, and it did not look like the sun was going to be able to soften the snow. Oh well. We went back to our camp, packed up our gear, and skied down to the watermelon waiting in the car for us - the best post-volcano snack!

Overall, a trip where we learned a ton, gained a new experience, and ultimately we had a fantastic time on beautiful WA glaciers. What more could you ask for?!