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7,807 feet
Southwest Couloir, Grade II, 30-50 degree snow

The Approach

With the North Cascade highway opening up last weekend I had to take advantage. I have had this moderate route up South Early Winter Spire (SEWS) in my mind for awhile now and thought that it would be a great start for the year. It was easy to get Dylan and Mark excited for a chance to get out of the city and into the mountains.

Dyaln and I got off of work at about 10:30pm on Saturday night. We picked up Mark and all of our gear and headed for the cascades. At about 4am we pulled into the Liberty Bell overlook. We set up a tent on the pavement hoping that the dark storm clouds wouldn't release in the night.

After a decent nights sleep we climbed out of the tent headed up the hill. We were following a pretty good track up the north slopes of Liberty Bell which eventually traversed right and toward the large basin where it would meet up with the Blue Lake trail. I think we probably added about an extra 1/2 mile or so from starting at the overlook. We still made OK time considering the occasional knee deep break through.

After about 2 hours we made it to the base of the couoir where a party of 3 just started to solo the route. We took a break and racked up for the climb.

The Climb

After giving a quick introduction of alpine climbing to Mark and Dylan (this was there first) we roped up and started climbing the couloir. We decided to simul climb the route and only use belays if necessary.

I lead up the coulior which became pretty steep right away. Although steep I still felt pretty safe considering the run out didn't seem so dangerous. We were going a bit slow at first as Dylan and Mark took precious steps until they became comfortable with the exposure and the use of crampons.

The angle mellow out once you reach a fork in the route. The Southwest Couloir follows the right fork, as far as I know the left fork is un climbed. After about 50 feet up the couloir you really start to feel the exposure as the walls close in on you and the slope gets steeper. I placed a couple pickets while the snow was nice and deep but felt much better when I could place small stoppers and cams in the walls that surround you.

About half up the route I had to make some scary moves around a big rock outcrop. I placed a good stopper in the rock as I turned the rock on mixed ice and rock. I had to turn my tools and use the picks to get good purchase in the shallow snow/ice. It felt great climbing through this crux, it wasn't really hard but defiantly gets your heart pumping! I quickly found a gear placement to try and protect it from above for Dyaln and Mark.

We climbed through a couple more short sections with hollow and mushy ice/rock until it was basically just a snow gully again. While making the final moves to the top we met up with the party of 3 again as they were preparing for there decent. I brought Mark and Dylan up and discussed putting our rope together so we could descend quicker. Although great in theory, it didn't work as planned.

The views from the top were simply amazing! I have never been here this early in the since and it was quit a site to see the surrounding peaks in all there winter glory. We took a couple photos and prepared for our descent.

We started rapping the couloir thinking that the two ropes would make it quicker. We quickly realized that with 6 people and two of them being very inexperienced, it wouldn't be as fast as we thought. The descent ended up taking twice as long as the climb. I felt bad for the other climbers as they wasted a lot of time with the rappels. All though they helped us tremendously, we just slowed them down. It was great meeting you guy's and thanks again for the double rope rappels!

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