Mt. Rainier - Emmons Glacier
Route Details
Area - Mt. Rainier, WA
Access - Access to Emmons Glacier is via the White River Campground and climbers parking area located within. The road to the trailhead is closed during the winter and usually opens around the last week in May (~May 20th). There is quite a bit of red tape (permits) involved. You can get your permit during the drive to the trailhead at the White River Ranger Station, but keep in mind the ranger station closes at 5pm.
Total Trip Time - Single day push is possible but not usual. Total roundtrip climb/ski trip time usually 14-16 hours.
Total Distance - 16 miles
Main Ski descent - 8400 ft
Elevation Gain/Loss - 10,400 ft
Max Slope Angle - 35-40 °
Guides
Not available on onXBackcountry at time of writing
FATMAP (below)
Local Beta - If you're coming through Greenwater, WA both Greenwater Collective and Wapiti Outdoors are great spots to drop into. Greenwater Collective recently expanded to include snacks and they have a nice outdoor seating area. Wapiti offers a lot of local gift shop items and also has a coffee/smoothie/milshake counter in the back.
Trip Report 6/24/2023
The Emmons Glacier route is both a popular climbing and ski mountaineering route located on the northeast side of the mountain, away from the much busier Paradise area to the south. The route really only becomes accessible once the road to White River opens around late May.
My buddy Olly and I had been bagging peaks April through June, and were feeling ready to try a single day push on the Emmons route. Even with the road to White River open, the route is over 10k feet of elevation gain and 16 miles round trip, making it about as big as it gets in the lower 48.
We arrived at the White River Ranger Station just in time to get our permit before they closed at 5pm. We then parked the car at the overnight lot in the White River Campground, ate dinner, and got some sleep before waking up at midnight to begin the climb.
We had to hike on foot in tennis shoes for the first 4 miles. Once we were around 6k ft. elevation we could stash the tennis shoes and begin skinning. The climb to Camp Curtis was fairly uneventful and smooth. We made good time, and by 5 am we already made it just above Camp Schurman by the time the sun began to rise.
Around Camp Schurman we roped up as we has to navigate around multiple cravesses.
We were able to climb on skis for only about an hour above Camp Schurman, eventually needing to transition to crampons and skis on our backs as the slope steepend.
We made much slower progress once the skis were on our backs. It took us another 6 hrs to climb the next 4,600 ft. At 14,200 ft (200 ft below the summit) a large cloud had formed around the summit and we discussed out options.
We decided to get our skis on our feet and ski down while we still could see without being in a total whiteout. Once back below 13,500 ft we were back in the sun with clear skies to the north.
We took a much needed break at Camp Schurman, even taking our boots off to stretch and dry our feet a little. After almost an hour break we put our gear back on and skied the remaining portion down to just below Camp Curtis. From there we had to climb a couple hundred feet to gain the ridge and then skied all the way down to where we had left our tennis shoes at around 6k ft. The final 3 mile hike was a little rough but we were in good spirits knowing we had come 200ft close to the summit in a single day push on Rainier.