A Backcountry Skiing Trifecta!

Hello, readers! You are welcome to join me again on another summer skiing trip! This past Memorial Day weekend I met with brothers Todd Baribault and Allen Baribault. They flew into Portland from Santa Fe and Vermont respectively, where Todd and I were high school friends. We met up the following day with an agenda in mind: A Backcountry Skiing Trifecta! All throughout the Cascade Range are volcanoes that, much like an ice cream cone, have loads of snow waiting to be skied! The brothers and I had looked at some maps and came up with a loose idea to hit several mountains that were in the Portland-Bend periphery. It became clear that the major objective was to be Mount Adams, the second highest mountain in Washington. Before doing Adams, we figured we’d work our way up to it doing smaller peaks in the vicinity: Mount Saint Helens and Mount Hood.

In order to save time, we camped at the respective trailheads of our ski destinations. It makes it easier as you just make coffee, breakfast, gear up and go. I met the brothers in the parking lot of Mt. Saint Helens. A little history about Helens: it last erupted when it blew its top off laterally in 1980, reshaping the land, causing about 57 human casualties with hundreds of homes and infrastructure lost. A very dramatic and explosive upheaval that is apparent when you are on top of the volcano looking into the crater. The mountain is still active, has steam escaping and may erupt again sooner than later. The mountain is home to several glaciers, one of which is the Swift glacier that we skied down. It’s an interesting juxtaposition of skiing on glaciers and active volcanoes; the iconic fire and ice story that shaped and molded the Cascade Range.

Hiking up for about two miles we used approach shoes and made it to the area called Worm flows where the snow snakes around, following old lava flows to where we donned on our skis and snowboard. Todd is a splitboarder, Allen is a telemarker, and I do alpine touring or AT for short. Skinning took several long hours with a couple stops for food and water. The approach was generally an easy, low angle. Only one time did we need to take off our skis and boot up a steep pitch. Mostly it was skinning to the top of the crater. Upon getting closer to the summit we encountered a volunteer worker with the Forest Service who informed us of the potential danger. At the top there is a massive cornice, where wind blows the snow which accumulates on the leeward side of the mountain building up gradually over time. It leads to a drop of around 2,000 feet into the crater bowl. People walking out on this cornice have died due to it breaking off, so the volunteer had put up flags and warned us of its imminent danger.

There were several groups on the crater that day as the weather was prime for summer skiing. It had started off cloudy which had helped us on our late start and gradually broke up to be scattered cloud cover, but at the top it looked like clouds were ready to encapsulate us! On the mountain it’s best to be concerned about the weather and constantly judge what it is doing, as it can move in fast and be potentially dangerous. We took our opportunity and transitioned into downhill mode and carefully skied past the flags marking the deadly cornice to a snow field that looked promising on the Swift glacier. The top 2,000 feet were prime summer corn skiing! What a fabulous time to be out! Making our way back to the trail which we started on, we did a sort of lollipop loop, going up one way then back down another. Back to the car, beer in hand, we did roughly nine hours total and 5,500 feet of vertical!

Our next objective which we could see briefly from the top of Helens was Mount Hood, a very prominent and very active volcano in Oregon, clearly visible on a clear day. It’s home to six different ski resorts, many glaciers and many ski and mountaineering ascents to be had! We chose (actually I have to give 100 percent credit to Allen for trip planning this all the way from Vermont) to start from Meadows ski resort on the southeast side of the massive volcano. This put us in prime position to gear up and head up the Wy’east face, a giant snowfield off the Newton Clark glacier. Skinning up, we discovered we were yet again bringing up the rear in the train of folks attempting to ski the same line as us. No matter, the snow was still good and not too soft or too firm as we ascended. As we continued it became clear that we needed to put our skis on our packs and boot up using crampons, as the slope was steadily increasing to about 45 degrees of steepness. We caught up to the second to last group and hung out with them taking selfies and photos at the top of the Wy’east face, not quite at the summit, as that would take climbing gear which we did not have. Looking down the other side you can see down into the crater bowl, a huge 1,500 foot sheer drop off down into the abyss where other skiers, mountaineers and recreationalists awaited, as well as fumaroles where steam escapes the volcano, showing that it is still active and venting. That side is also where the Timberland ski resort operates, continuing to its spin lifts while we watched and admired the scenery. Looking south, you could see other volcanoes rising up, such as Jefferson, the Sisters, and Bachelor. Skiing down was extremely fun as the snow was perfect, not too hot, not too cold and it was steep, allowing adrenaline to shoot into the bloodstream, eliciting several whoops and hollers, as this was what it’s all about. We followed the group before us down into the glacier where it was more like Helens, less angle but still fun corn skiing. Then we traversed around, much to Todd’s pleasure, back to the Meadows ski resort, then back to the vehicles and chips, salsa and beer. What a day! Total time was about eight hours and about 5,000 vertical feet of skiing!

The final chapter in this saga is Mount Adams. Let me say this, the road wasn’t all the way open to the campground, as there was snow blocking it and that means that there were cars parked all over the one-way road, with no room to turn around at the top. I’ve never seen such a popular destination be so much of a junk show! On top of that my Tundra decided it was going to lose a brake pad, evacuating all but the bare minimum of brake fluid! Anyways, be wary of the road conditions (as well as your brakes) and the number of people up there recreating.

It was definitely the largest of the trifecta that we were doing, and now also the most tired and exhausted from our last two forays, we opted to start the earliest we could, waking up at around 4am to start the slog up this gigantic volcano. It was tough going, I almost had to bail. My feet were getting punished by my boots and it was almost unbearable, but I ground my teeth and endured the pain. What’s the saying again? No pain, no Adams? That’s not it but you get the point. We ended up packing our packs as full of food and water as possible. It’s amazing how many calories and water you consume when you’re trying to get on top of a mountain as big as Adams! Adams was relatively benign and we ended up skinning all the way up to Pikers Peak at 11,600 feet, which we decided was enough and left the proper summit and the southwest chutes for another day. It was windy up at Pikers so we admired the beauty for a bit. Being able to see our previous adventures on Helens and Hood was incredible and you could feel a tangible sense of accomplishment. Skiing down had sun crust and high winds for the first 1,000 feet and wasn’t the best of skiing, but farther down the snow softened up and proved to be fun skiing all the way.

Back at the cars we docked a whopping 7,000 feet and about 11.5 hours on the mountain. Talk about done. Getting the boots off was such a simple esoteric ecstasy, it is indescribable. After having one last beer we all set off on our separate ways. What a trip! Our bodies might have been ruined for a couple days but it was worth it to see the bucolic sights that the mountains afforded. What a time to be alive and out adventuring!

This article appears in Source Weekly June 12, 2025.