Mission Range Traverse

McDonald Peak

The Mission Mountains are a wild range.  In the Missions, finding the "trailhead" does not mean that you've found the trail.  Here you make sure to bring a chainsaw, just to get to the parking area.  The approach trails are not labeled correctly on maps, and the off trail brush is THICK.  Not to mention that over half of this range is a grizzly bear sanctuary, completely closed off to humans in the summer months.  This combination of pure adventure, steep relief, alpine basins, and ample technical mountaineering opportunities truly make the range a ski-mountaineer's paradise (or maybe just my idea of it).  But not without some serious work, the range has a reputation for not letting people in - stories of horrific bushwhacks, stuck cars, turned around before finding a trail, and extreme weather buzz whenever the Missions are mentioned.  Its no surprise so few of my own attempts in this landscape have come out successful.  I have spent years trying to tame this wild mountain range and have been turned back more often then not.  Here are some words and images of what can happen when all things line up...

We ran a late night shuttle and after getting us lost for a short minute we eventually came to rest at the Ashley Lakes parking area under a starlit sky moments before mid-night.  Five hours later Inge Perkins, Jeffrey Friess, and I threw skis and boots on the packs and hit Sheepshead's west ridge beginning our attempt to traverse the tallest portion of the range.  The sun rose as we traversed into the steeps of Sheepshead's west face.  Being my 5th time on the mountain this season route finding felt extra smooth.  Nevertheless the face still provided for plenty of entertainment as it was in the most technical of condition that I've seen it yet.  Rock, alpine ice, and even a step of pure water ice kept us focused.  Inge and Jeffery didn't seem to mind though as they raced up the face, a first time for both of them.  The classic view was stunning as always, on top of our first summit.  We looked south and were a little in awe of just how far ESM, our final destination really was.  

After skiing the vertigo-educing east ridge of Sheepshead we made a short pitch to the summit of McDonald Peak (range high point).  Our first 'big' run of the day - the east face of McDonald awaited in the early morning light, good corn and soft powder.  2,000'+ down to Icefloe Lake.  The next climb was working a route up to Glacier Peaks NW ridge.  We found our way through the cliff bands eventually climbing the perfectly plainer west face of Glacier Peak.  A crux of the route appeared next as we down climbed the rime bulges into the south couloirs.  

Another fine corn run down the south face of Glacier Peak and nearly 10,000 vertical feet of climbing into the day at this point we decided to take a short siesta below the Garden Wall while the Jet Boil went to work.  A smooth 2500' skin brought us to the Mountaineer Peak sub summit and what would be the most un-certain part of the route.  I was not sure if this ridge would go as it did include some class 5 down climbing to gain the wide ridge to Lowery Peak area.  The many transitions between shoes - boots - crampons - axes - skins - skiing, and more technical terrain then anticipated added to the overall time of the day.  The ridge eventually mellowed out and a nice sidewalk skin was welcomed after a morning of front pointing and ice-skinning. 

Shadows became longer as we picked up the pace through the easy skinning and we were up on our last summit of the day in prime timing.  It was rewarding to look north from the top of ESM seeing nearly our entire route glowing in the evening sun.  I downed the last of my cookies on this final summit and basked in the rays after climbing lots of cold north and west facing terrain.  The spirits of the group were just as high as on top of the first summit nearly 12 hours earlier and we all smiled while ripping skins making surf-like slides towards the reservoir as the golden sun sunk to our right.  

The entire tour felt super relaxed thanks to awesome likeminded teammates.  It never felt like we were pushing it, there was never any "suffering", it just felt like another day in the mountains.  My story may seem a bit anti-climatic, but this amazing day just felt like another sunny one in the mountains.  The next morning though found Inge and I devouring multiple breakfasts, bakeries, and gallons of coconut water to recover.  It is also worth mentioning that this was Inge's first walk in the Missions and most likely the first female to ski traverse the southern range.  Nice work Inge.

See bottom for stats.

En route to McDonald, Sheepshead run behind

McDonald east run

In good spirits at Icefloe Lake

Inge climbs with our tracks visible on McDonald Peak's east run behind

Glacier Peak west face

Skiing south off of Glacier Peak

Our next skin gully visible center frame

Glacier Peak south face run visible behind

Inge using ski anchors to aid climb the final steps up ESM

Final summit!

Aprox. Route

Stats:

12,400' vertical climbing 

16 hours skiing / hiking

Summits: Sheepshead, McDonald, Glacier, ESM, plus ridge high points

Fuel:  

3x - Omnibar

2x - big cookie

2x - slice home made bacon arugula pizza

2x - snicker bar
2x - granola bar
~ 4L water (melted half way through / with added electrolytes)

Gear:
- Julbo Dust glasses with photochromic Zebra lens
- G3 Soulfly ski

- 1x Petzl SumTec ice tool

- 1x BD whippet
- Camp aluminum crampons
- ski crampons

- avalanche kit

- SPOT transmitter 

- Jet Boil + pot

- music

Thanks for reading!