Intermediate Alpine Climb - Mount Adams/Adams Glacier

The forecast called for clear skies, decent temperature (2C, a bit on the warmer side), and almost no wind. We left Tacoma at 830, stopping for coffee at McDs/Starbucks (the pillars of modern society). We reached the Killen creek TH before noon where we were instantly assaulted by a hail of bugs. We moved quickly through the swarm and sandy and dusty tail before hitting consistent snow at 6000 ft.

After a bit of routefinding we made it to high camp at 7000 ft. Spoke to some climbers on their way down from Adams Glacier. The route was supposed to be in prime condition with good snow bridges and an easy exit heading left at the top. Afterwards we made it to camp at Lake 7505 where we set up camp on a dusty patch above the snow. 

We woke up at 2am to the harsh light of a full moon. Another party had passed us an hour earlier and we saw their headlights moving up the glacier. We roped up as 2-man glacier teams and made it to the base of the climb in short time. Somewhere along the way to the base I dropped my phone. It is now a part of the mountain.

We kept to the right portion of the glacier almost the entire way. The lower icefall was composed on three ice steps, each about 45 degrees that ran for a full pitch each. It was mostly steep snow with some crumbly ice in places and solid glacial ice in others. We didn't place protection here and needed only a few overhead swings. We simulclimbed this section up to the elevation of the exit ramp to the North Face of Northwest Ridge. 

On the middle icefall we came across a few snow bridges over small crevasses. The bridges were still solid but they may collapse in the coming weeks. We protected these with a running belay of deadman pickets and screws where the ice was bare. This section was straightforward. By now we were in the sunlight and were near the base of the upper seracs.

At the upper icefall we elected not to cut left to the top of the North Cleaver, but followed another team (one of whose members had done this before) into the maze of seracs.

Navigating the seracs was three pitches of climbing on solid ice which we pitched out.

This took us to one more snowbridge across a small crevasse, then a slog up to the summit plateau. Chase and Krzys headed for the summit while Jeff and I made water and coiled ropes.

The descent of the north cleaver was a nightmare. Sometimes we sunk down our hips, other times we couldn't break through the hard layer just below the top. The lower portion was unending choss. More than a few times we had routefinding issues due to the lack of cairns. When in doubt we kept to the right and eventually made it to the switchbacks right above the lake. I would suggest not descending this line unless it was completely covered in snow, or ever. Carrying over to the south side would have been more tolerable.

At this point we were probably the last ones on the mountain. We slogged back to the cars without stop. The mosquitoes were just as vicious. The traffic jam between Olympia and Tacoma didn't help.