Yesterday we skied Mt. Bailey. Today, Mt. Thielsen! 2 Volcanoes 2 Days. We got started from the Mt. Thielsen trailhead at 6:30am and hiked snowless through the trees for 3 miles towards the west ridge. We had plans to ski something on the northwest face.
We gained the ridge with the summit view within a few hours and decided we would ski this face (the snow on the northwest side looked like it would hold up the longest to the bright sun). The summit route is on the southwest side of the mountain and mostly snow free, so we skinned as far as the snow went and changed back to our tennis shoes for the summit rocks.
It was about 800ft from where the snow stopped to the summit rocks. I think this might be a better ski in early April.
The summit pinnacle is literally a bunch of small boulders all piled on top of each other. Below is a picture of the route on the south side of the summit rocks. We climbing straight up this. Some say it's a class 5 roped climb, others, a class 3 scramble. I think it could go either way depending on the route you choose, right in between, a class 4 scramble, no rope necessary.
We reached the summit at 11:30!
We headed down and were skiing by about 12:30. Perfect corn for about 1500ft!
We popped back up onto the ridge and followed it down through the trees to the trail. We saw one other person all day. Great to meet you, Shelly. Just three women ripping on the mountain today!