The Classic Corn Line
The SW Chutes of Mt. Adams is perhaps the most famous corn ski in Washington. Dropping off our second highest volcano, it is a moderate 3000 ft run that seems to reliably produce corn on the level of a Midwestern farm. After nearly a decade of backcountry skiing in the PNW, I still had surprisingly never skied it. With a sad snowpack across the state, and limited options remaining for Memorial Day Weekend, I thought it was a good time to finally go for Adams.
John, Chris, John’s friend Ben and I met up Saturday morning on the south side of Adams. I had not been to this trailhead since 2015, when I climbed Mt. Adams as my first big mountaineering objective. We were able to nab one of the last parking spots at the trailhead, starting at a leisurely 7 AM. It felt so wrong to be starting so late for a spring ski objective, but that is one of the appeals of Mt. Adams!
Normally, there would be snow from the trailhead in late May, but this year has been historically bad for the Southern Cascades. Many sites peaked at only 50% of typical snowpack. We reached consistent snow cover around 6300 ft. The snow was well frozen, despite nighttime temps around 55F at the trailhead!
The south side climb of Mt. Adams is about as simple as it gets. We took Suksdorf Ridge and it was easy skinning all the way to Lunch Counter at 9k.
The climb to the false summit is around or slightly over 30 degrees for much of the way, so you could either boot or skin. We watched some hikers glissade down in firm conditions, getting dangerously out of control.
Atop Piker’s Peak, a brutal westerly wind greeted us. It was after 11, but the south side was still underripe, so we knew that the SW Chutes still needed another hour or more to soften. Instead of waiting around in the cold with others, we decided to head up to the true summit. There was a nice wind sheltered spot here to take a break. I was reminded how boring the summit views are on Adams – possibly worse than Rainier??
The initial descent off the summit was pretty rimey and bumpy. When we got over to the top of the SW Chutes, things seemed hopeful. We dropped a steeper south facing pitch that was softening nicely, but as the line curved back to the SW, it got rimey again. There was even visible blue snow that looked a bit like blue ice. We found a place to stop and wait for a bit, lying down to avoid the wind.
John said he had never seen this much rime on Adams during his previous descents. A bad snowpack forces you to venture onto the higher mountains earlier than normal, when the upper elevations are not yet fully transitioned to a spring snowpack. I’ve had more encounters with rime this spring than during other seasons, when I waited until later in the spring to go so high.
We watched other skiers go by and could see that it was corn 500 ft below us. We knew that the bottom was likely baking, so around 1:20, we decided to just ski.
Around 10,500 ft, the snow turned to nice corn, although all the existing tracks were a tiny bit bumpy. For such a large feature, it is incredible how skiers manage to track out the chutes!
The snow finally started to get sticky near the bottom, confirming our decision to bite the bullet and ski. We could see the drifts where last weekend’s storm dropped over a foot of fresh snow and those patches of white snow were particularly sticky. With strong winds and rime up high, I think we timed the run the best we could given the conditions – 3,000 ft of perfect corn was simply not in the cards today.
Originally, we had planned on a “Double Adams” day, reascending from 8k back to the false summit to ski the Avalanche Headwall. John had done this double in the past, but we all agreed that the snowpack was not transitioned enough to resist overbaking for three more hours.
The traverse back to the south side was a bit tedious with the low snowpack, with a fair amount of skinning and booting across rocks.
While it wasn’t the top to bottom ripper corn that is often advertised, I still enjoyed finally getting to ski the SW Chutes of Mt. Adams after so many years! I really do think this is the classic moderate corn line in Washington – approachable and reliable – and certainly worth driving down for.