Intermediate Alpine Climb - Copper Mountain, Iron Mountain & Pyramid Peak

Trip Report

This was plan B for an Eldorado climb -- chasing the better window in MRNP was an excellent idea.

Party of 6 (all intermediate students or grads) decided to give this linkup a try in the winter (two of us did it years back but in the summer).

Saturday:

Start: 9:40 (after we got the permit)

Devils dream camp lunch stop: 1:30 PM

Arrive at camp site NE of Copper's base (~5600 ft) with perfect views of Rainier and Pyramid in front of us: 4:00 PM

Start of Copper summit push: 4:40 PM

Back to camp: 6:00 PM

Copper summit at sunset.

On our way back to camp (from Copper). 

Sunday:

Pyramid summit push : 7:00 AM

Back to camp: ~10:00 AM

Packed up camp and did a carryover  up Iron  after contouring around Copper (E then S and then headed W to the ~6000 ft saddle between Copper and Iron. From there we had to drop a bit and then push for the summit (~1:30 PM). For the hike out we found our way down the steep slopes S of Iron and scrambled S / SE until we met again the Wonderland trail around 4400 ft.

Back to the cars:  5:40 PM

Given the amount of navigation, terrain and snowpack evaluation, no fall zones, sustained steep hard snow downclimbing (especially on Pyramid ), this linkup qualified as Intermediate outing and I highly recommend it in good weather and snow pack conditions. 

Perfect snowpack is a must for this one given the significant amount of travel in avy prone terrain .

On our way to Pyramid on Sun AM.

Starting the summit push requiring a significant amount of frontpointing.

Success Cleaver route from Pyramid summit.

On our way to Copper - Iron saddle (carryover with overnight packs).

Iron summit.

Map