The Watson's Traverse is a fabled Northwest ski mountaineering epic, that begins at the Kulshan Cabin, (above Glacier,WA) traverses over the 10,781 ft summit of Mt. Baker and ends at the Mt. Baker ski area. Dwight Watson, Erick Larson and Andy Hennig first completed this traverse in May 1939 covering the nearly 18 miles in a very long day. With snow pack in the North Cascades well above normal and a perfect two day weather window, conditions for the traverse could not have been better.Fellow TNF Seattle employee Chris Hall and I started talking about doing this traverse earlier this winter while ski touring on Mt. Herman. From the summit of Herman the views of Mt. Baker are incredible and week after week we could see the Park Glacier getting more and more filled in by strong pacific storms. Initially we did not know much about the history of the Watson's Traverse but believed that the Park Glacier and its very steep head wall could be skied. After doing our homework and studying previous years trip reports we devised an ambitious plan to complete the traverse in true alpine style, following the path of the original party.
On the night of May 18 I picked up Chris at 10:00 PM and we rushed up to the Heliotrope trail head to begin the traverse. The lone negative impact from the heavy snow year has been
limited access to trail heads with low elevation snow prominent down to about 2500 ft. We were forced to stop 2 miles from the end of the road making the traverse even longer. Once we arrived early in the morning on the 19th we began wildly throwing our gear together trying to find the perfect combination of weight versus necessity. We would be crossing 4 separate glaciers, so our combined gear would not be light due to required technical equipment such as a harness and rope. Finally at 2:00 in the morning under the vast starlight sky, we started the long slog up the road to the trail head. We made steady progress up to Heliotrope ridge and the Hogsback, where we encountered other groups of climbers. Most wer
e headed up the same ascent route that we would be climbing (Colman-Deming) but one ambitious group was climbing the north ridge with ski's on their backs! After a short break we left the Hogsback and made our way onto the Colman glacier where we roped up. The route was so filled in that the normally heavily crevassed glacier involved just one bridge crossing.
limited access to trail heads with low elevation snow prominent down to about 2500 ft. We were forced to stop 2 miles from the end of the road making the traverse even longer. Once we arrived early in the morning on the 19th we began wildly throwing our gear together trying to find the perfect combination of weight versus necessity. We would be crossing 4 separate glaciers, so our combined gear would not be light due to required technical equipment such as a harness and rope. Finally at 2:00 in the morning under the vast starlight sky, we started the long slog up the road to the trail head. We made steady progress up to Heliotrope ridge and the Hogsback, where we encountered other groups of climbers. Most wer
e headed up the same ascent route that we would be climbing (Colman-Deming) but one ambitious group was climbing the north ridge with ski's on their backs! After a short break we left the Hogsback and made our way onto the Colman glacier where we roped up. The route was so filled in that the normally heavily crevassed glacier involved just one bridge crossing.We skinned the entire route with the exception of the steep Roman head wall and arrived on the summit just before noon. The accent had taken nearly 9 hours and we had gained 8700 ft in elevation. We drank, ate and rested on the summit for about 30 minutes, enjoying the panorama of the North Cascades. The views were amazing and the sky as blue as I have ever seen it. With light winds and cool temperatures in the 20's the Park Glacier seemed to be in perfect shape to ski. Questions always arise when you don't ascend what you descend but Chris and I were confident in our abilities and decided to go for the traverse. Having come this far the thought of
turning around barely crossed our minds. Having our fill of water and food, we de-skinned and clipped in for an epic descent down the Cockscomb ridge and onto the vast Park Glacier. The ridge skied very well with variable snow conditions from bullet proof ice to wind blown powder. The surprise came for us when we dropped onto the Park glacier to find boot top powder. The decent was one that we will never forget! Once down the Park in an area called Glacier Saddle we took a look back at our line of descent. It was amazing to see the imprin
t that we had made on Mt. Baker. Soon our attention turned from the elation of the descent to figuring out how to get to Ptarmigan ridge and cover the 9 miles back to the ski area. The traverse out across Ptarmigan Ridge was uneventful and very long. We literally stumbled into the Heather Meadows parking lot at 7:00 PM, a full 17 hours after starting.Total Mileage: 17.5 miles
Elevation Gained: 11,000 ft
Duration; 17 hours
Jeff Schomaker and Chris Hall
TNF Seattle
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