Liberty Ridge Mt. Rainier

Monday was about as normal as most Mondays get, working at the Ranger Station helping people plan trips all over Washington when unexpectedly my own plans for the three days I had free needed some planning of their own. I jumped on Cascade Climbers and saw that Michael Rowley was looking for somebody to climb Liberty Ridge with so I called him up and we made it happen. 

I arrived at the Rowley residence around 11am Tuesday (July24th) where we munched on some cinnamon rolls and I watched Michael madly cram his gear, including an over-kill drop 20 degree sleeping bag into his pack. From there we headed off to the mountain drooling in anticipation. 

Our first day climbing to St. Elmo's pass and traversing the Winthrop Glacier to Camp on Curtis ridge was uneventful. Some minor route finding challenges and a bit of on-off-on-off with the crampons. That night we settled in and soaked in the madness of the famously treacherous Willis Wall adjacent to our objective. 

Winthrop Glacier

Total Gnar fest

Looking back across the Winthrop Glacier

Michael doing his thing in the soft light of the sunset

From left to right-Curtis Ridge, Willis Wall, Liberty Ridge Liberty Wall and Ptarmigan Ridge

Is the water boiling yet?!

Carbon Glacier is a mess! We have to go through that! 

Our second day we dropped down from Curtis ridge onto the Carbon Glacier and weaved our way through the huge cracks until we gained access onto the ridge and continued up to our high camp

Dropping down to the Carbon

Route finding

Huge Cracks!

Oh yea....we had fun!

Willis Wall growing ever closer

Finally onto the ridge

Back on snow!

Cruising to Thumb Rock

A very lofty high camp. 

We woke up the next morning around 1am and left camp around 2am. We cruised up through rock steps successfully staying on snow all the way through to the base of black pyramid. Before we knew it we were at the base of the ice step! It wasn't really a big deal so we just soloed up it and found ourselves on top of Liberty Cap without a problem. 

Soloing up onto the cap

Liberty Cap

Michael

From the cap we made the easy rising traverse to the summit of Mt. Rainier! 

Looking across to the Summit from the Cap

Summit! 6am

We hung out near the top for about 20 minutes signed the register and headed off down Emmons glacier to Camp Shurman. Reaching Shurman around 9am we realized we could easily complete the trip in 48 hours. 

Emmons in all its late July glory

Cool Seracs

Finally at Camp Shurman! 

Liberty Ridge was quite an awesome trip! For both of us this was our 8th summit and definitely one of the best climbs of our summers!

5 ice screws

2 pickets

60m 8.2mm rope

Ice tools 

Stubbornness