Trip Report
Alpine Scramble - Goat Island Mountain (Mount Rainier)
Mixed weather with intermittent views of Emmons Glacier, Mount Ruth, and Sunrise. We even had a brief but intense period of sunshine just below the summit providing a short (but enjoyable) temperature excursion from sub-freezing to the 70s!
Dave Morgan
- Sat, Jun 10, 2017
- Alpine Scramble - Goat Island Mountain
- Goat Island Mountain
- Scrambling
- Successful
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- Road suitable for all vehicles
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Encountered continuous snow on east ridge of Goat Island Mount at ~5,300'. The ridge crest trending south westerly (SW) from the summit that is normally used to achieve a loop route using the Wonderland Trail just below Summerland is heavily corniced such that we opted to shorten this trip to just an out and back (as well as the slight change of an afternoon thunder storm with no fast way down from this ridge, and the unknown state of the Fryingpan Creek bridge). A few inches of fresh snow above ~6000' with well consolidated snow below (did not use snowshoes or microspikes).
Mixed weather with intermittent views of Emmons Glacier, Mount Ruth, and Sunrise. We even had a brief but intense period of sunshine just below the summit providing a short (but enjoyable) temperature excursion from sub-freezing to the 70s! We traversed from the east ridge at ~5900' to the final steep snow slope allowing access to the upper mountain. We darted across the low spot below this steep slope (one at a time) with careful attention to cornices on the ridge crest WSW of us. On descent we enjoyed a brief glissade in his area (after a brief verification of correct glissade/arrest positioning for our students in a level spot that was A+ with no comments needed). As a navigation exercise we practiced following a compass bearing on our east ridge descent to achieve the trail at our point of departure. Total trip time of 8 hours with 4 hours up, an hour on the summit, and 3 hours down. Photos can be seen here.