Mount Baker Park Glacier Headwall
I’ve always wondered what kind of outing I’d be capable of off the couch, and on this day I really paid for it trying to attempt two classic steep ski lines on Mount Baker.
The Coleman Headwall looking manageable, the second line we’d intend to be skiing on this day
Zoom in and peep the two ski tracks on the headwall and read why it stung below
Notes
- This was probably ~15 miles and ~8400 feet of vertical gain in a little over 10 ½ hours.
Unsolicited Thoughts on Those Outings That Leave an Imprint
I do think about this one a lot. It’s always disappointing when you personally fail on something, not for any sense of external validation, but mostly because you know in your heart that you could have done better.
As stated earlier, I’ve thought about what I could do after a long layoff, e.g. could I summit and ski Rainier with no warmup for example? By this date, it’d been seven weeks since my last ski day doing the Spearhead Traverse. Seven weeks of being mostly sedentary, going on a couple light trail runs, not engaging the skiing muscles, and dating someone who had no interest in exercising frankly. Not trying to pass the blame, just laying out the scenario.
And man I got thrashed on the Coleman-Deming route. We were moving pretty smoothly, but after a little over 5000 feet of gain before the route steepens up on the Roman Ridge/Headwall, my legs started locking up in a way that I’ve never experienced before. No amount of mental willpower could move them, so I had to sit down three or so times for about a few minutes to even be able to move them again. Not a great feeling to have your partners wait on you in that circumstance.
I actually thought about giving it a quit before the final 1700 feet booter, but gave it a good fight and eventually caught up to my two partners. The booting actually helped since I could engage other muscles and I think it was the weight of skis on my feet while skinning that caused the muscle fatigue.
Still made it to the summit in not a particularly slow 6 hours. So I still skied the Park Headwall, and it was actually not that scary looking down. The turns were good but I did not ski in a style that I’m proud of - I’d love to give this another go. At the bottom of the line, my legs were physically rock hard upon touch. We started seeing small wet natural slides coming down at the bottom of the line so we had to book it out.
Eventually we made it to the top of the second line of that day, the Coleman Headwall. By now my legs were torched, and hearing my partners describe the very variable conditions going down, I had to forgo the skiing the line. In the present and in hindsight this was a great decision given how much I was cramping while booting at this point too. I skied the Coleman-Deming route just fine and I was totally okay with that given that it was my first time descending this line!
So while I have no regrets about my decision making on this day, I do regret the circumstances leading up to it a bit, and it certainly did sting seeing the ski tracks down the headwall that I knew I could also make if I was normally prepped.
While writing this, I’ve forgotten most of the visceral corporeal sensations I felt that day, and I’ve never been to replicate it since even with the most heinous leg workouts, but the memory remains. I vow to never be caught off guard like that again, and need to continually stay on top of my game and not get complacent. In talking to my friends, they liken it an ayuascha trip where the impact of the experience stays with you more than the experience itself.
Isn’t this why we do anything we’re drawn to - for the emotional imprint that it leaves on you? At least that’s the case for me. In this way, I think back fondly on this one because I value the fire that it lit under my ass more than if the outing went completely to expectations - I just need to make sure that that fire doesn’t go out.
Here is a video of Lucas skiing the variable conditions on the Coleman Headwall that day. Very glad I bailed - f doing jump turns on variable snow with legs that don’t work.