Trip Report
Basic Glacier Climb - Whitehorse Mountain/Northwest Shoulder
The climber's trail is in good condition nearly the whole way up, snow conditions were a bit punchy until ascending past 3300'. The summit block's snow cover is nearly gone, just below the summit block, although the moat is still crossable, it has large open pockets below the most climbable face of the snow. We did not feel comfortable attempting to reach true summit due to those gaps and the degraded snow conditions on the vertical face.
Kerri Wheeler
- Sat, May 13, 2023 — Sun, May 14, 2023
- Basic Glacier Climb - Whitehorse Mountain/Northwest Shoulder
- Whitehorse Mountain/Northwest Shoulder
- Climbing
- Turned Around
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- Road suitable for all vehicles
We opted to split the trip into two days to compete with the warm temperatures.
Day 1: Arrived at the trailhead at 12:30 PM. Ascended to Lone Tree Pass to set up camp. Trail was in good condition, easily navigable despite large amounts of debris in some stretches (thank you to whoever took the time to flag, it made for easy route finding), we opted to move through the trees to get parallel with Lone Tree Pass rather than use the gulley all the way up as it appears others did. There was fresh rock fall and wet slides from the hillside as seen here in the photo. Traverse track drops below the run out picture.
Day 2: Got moving just after 3:15 AM. Traverse between Lone Tree Pass and High Pass was straightforward in the dark, just keep the rocks to the northeast in sight and stay high. It was a really warm start to the day, but snow conditions allowed for pretty good purchase with crampons both in trees and on exposed areas of the crossing.
Roped up at High Pass at 5:20 AM. Made it just below summit block at 6:40 AM. Snow was in good condition to easily make the traverse and to get up headwall and also easy to get purchase with ice ax and tool descending. As mentioned in the summarized description, we assessed the moat and vertical snow wall in front of us and opted to turn around at that point. The snow is nearly completely melted 10' up from moat, snow wall remaining between moat and summit block is vertical and the snow quality was not optimal to make it the last stretch.
Glacier was in good condition, nothing of note. Took our rope off at High Pass and got ready to head back. Traverse back from High Pass to Lone Tree Pass was shaded so despite warm ambient temperatures, the snow wasn't too shabby on the boot pack and made for an easy time back.
Descent from Lone Tree Pass back to Neiderprum Trail was overall fine. Be aware that there was fresh slide and rockfall just below Lone Tree Pass, we watched several snow rollers bound down the hillside and took note of the fresh trail of rock debris that hadn't been there the day before. It was wet snow, but didn't have significant post holing until we got back down to that 3000' zone. Once hitting the woods again, there wasn't anything too eventful on the way to the cars.
Overall, it was an absolutely beautiful trip, the sunset at the campsite was a dream and hitting High Pass just before sunrise made for a colorful and exciting stretch across the glacier. 
