My 3rd summit of Mount Hood and my 4th distinct route to the summit. We started skiing up from Timberline Lodge around 4:30a with a calm, clear night sky. We reached Devil’s Kitchen around 8a, had a quick snack, and transitioned from skis to climbing gear. We followed a boot pack through deep snow to the base of the Headwall (Variation 1). We gained the steep snow up into the rime ice gulley system and set our first belay station using a screw and a picket. From here, we roped up and climbed our entire 70m rope length, protecting the route with screws along the way. In this first pitch, there were 3 distinct 20 ft ice steps linked with steep snow. The first was thick, solid ice at maybe 50 degrees that took sticks and screws well. The second ice step was a bit steeper, but thin and mixed with rotten rock and snice. The third was the crux, and it was vertical but solid and with great features, including a fully enclosed ice tube to climb up through. We set our second belay station above the crux on steep snice with 2 screws backed up with a picket. By this time, the solar radiation was intense—I could feel my skin burning and ice was steadily cascading off the rime formations all around us. Next, we simul-climbed a steep snow gulley with decent exposure until the route mellowed out with moderate snow and we solo’d the rest of the way to the summit. After a much needed food break, we traversed the catwalk and down-climbed the Old Chute before reaching our skis back in Devil’s Kitchen just in time for a magnificent sunset and alpenglow splashed back over our route we had just completed. The ski back down to Timberline was under the night sky and variable at best. Some might say it was a sheet of ice and an awful time.
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IG: @RadishUprooted
Completed + Filmed on March 30th 2024
6.8 mi, 5.3k vert
CHAPTERS
0:00 Intro
0:24 Approach
2:15 First Ice Step
4:10 Second Ice Step
8:00 Third Ice Step (Crux)
10:57 Exiting the Headwall
12:32 The Summit
13:25 Old Chute
14:13 The Ski