Ruth Mountain

We wanted to get an early start on Saturday morning, so we drove 3hrs up to the North Cascades after work on Friday evening. We set up tents in the parking lot and tried to sleep. I've been excited to climb Ruth for a couple years now, and was anticipating good weather.

We started at 7am (should have started earlier) and the approach was easy enough. There were quite a few landslides & areas of left-over avalanche debris that we found our way through.

First sight of Ruth Mtn in the distance

once we arrived at the Hannegan Camp, the real upward progression began

Leaving Hannegan camp behind us and headed toward Hannegan pass. The snow was hard enough that snowshoes were not necessary.

There was quite a bit of very steep snow... Can you spot my buddy Jake kicking steps for us above?

Rachel's dad as we headed up towards the arm of Point 9530. You can see where we started our hike from in the valley in the distance. 

Since the snow was pretty steep and quite hard in places, we put our crampons on.

This is the place where I should NOT have stopped and taken a picture. When we saw the remnants of a small wet avalanche, we all became a little nervous.

I was following Jake up as we approached the east arm of Point 9530

After going around point 9530 (the hill on the left), we were all not liking the feel of the snow. It was becoming deeper, much softer & sometimes it would slough down the side of the mountain as we took steps. It was at this point we thought it would be best to head back (without a summit) before the snow became anymore unstable. It was a bummer not to reach the top, but the mountain would always be there.

Things aren't always what they appear to be. This picture MIGHT look like someone who is triumphantly raising his ice ax as as he is reacting to the pristine beauty of the North Cascades. However, if you look a little harder, you realize that he is actually chasing his wife while yelling "Dammit Kim, SLOW DOWN! I need to catch up!" I believe the raised ice-axe was more of a threat.

Ruth Mountain, we'll be back for you!

Jake had no interest in hiking back down, so he decided it would be a good idea to fly & ski instead... He launched from the top of Point 9530.

Jake in his happy place... He ended up landing on the shoulder there, and then continuing over the side of the mountain to meet us WAAAAY below. Easily saved him over an hour of hiking in nasty snow.

Coming back down

Having fun heel-plunging as we came down the steep slope

As we were looking around this place, I was telling Rachel Rachel how I often fall into the trap of thinking that we need to go to distant & exotic places (like Nepal) to find rugged mountainous beauty, but then I arrive at a place like this and realize how much beauty is right in our back-yard. I'm very grateful for adventurous friends to share life with!
Photo: Jon Warren