My first time up to Mount Ruth and Steamboat Prow. Definitely worth the effort but it's definitely...an effort. River crossing no problem on the day.
Got a timed permit on recreation.gov for the Sunrise corridor the evening before at 7pm. Plenty available for all time windows, $2.
Started the uphill hike around 7.40 in the morning, the trail to Glacier Basin camp is shaded by trees and smooth. I didn't quite know how high the Inner Fork was running (GAIA recent satellite imagery showed no snow) so I had brought trekking poles and a backup pair of socks. In the event, it was very easy to rock-hop across the two parts of the stream after following an established social trail down the river bank. It took a few checks against the route GPX to pick up the trail on the other side. Hint: if you're not walking right past the rusted out engine/pump, you're off track ;-). The climb up to the ridge starts pretty quickly. This is also where the first snow fields show up. The ridge up to the crest is melted out and has a visible climbers track on it. I had to cross a low-angle snowfield at the start but that was just because I was slightly off track. Once up at the big ridge leading to Mt Ruth, the (rather cool) wind picked up and I ran across a marmot and a ptarmigan mom with five chicks - very well camouflaged! The route up to the summit of Ruth is not always visible in the mix of rock and minor snow patches so a GPX can be helpful here as well - the target is always visible though. The shoulder of Ruth has a relatively steeply angled snowfield on it so I put on my (new, needed to be tested ;-) ) crampons. Some parts of the snowfield have bad runouts so I'd recommend some form of traction. Microspikes might have been enough but the top few inches were slushy and the longer spikes came in handy on the full-on crampons. Eventually I transitioned back on rock for the last few 100 feet up to the summit. Having followed the shoulder ridge, it was maybe a Class II scramble at that point.
After a quick break, I continued on to Steamboat Prow which is another 1000ft above. The route is clearly visible from Ruth, however there is a smallish cliff after coming down from the summit block that required some smart route selection to keep things at a class III level. Ultimately just three big steps but YMMV if one is too far off to the right of left. At this point the altitude starting slowing things down. It had taken ~3h to get to the top of Ruth. Getting to the top of Steamboat Prow took another 50min. The snowfields on the way were no problem with just boots. A decent lunch break with stunning views of Little Tahoma, the Emmons Route up Rainier (lots of parties out, looked like a complex route around lots of crevasses), the camps below and long distance views all the way to Baker and Glacier were the reward.
On the return, I glissaded down almost the full length of the Inter Glacier. The top layer was slushy enough that I didn't have to use much in the way of brakes. Near the bottom, the runoff is audible through the snowfield so some caution is required exiting the glissade tracks back onto rock. From there it's just a pretty scenic hike back down to Glacier Camp. In keeping with the fact that the last few miles of a hike are the most dangerous, I ran into two bears on the (pretty busy) trail back down to the parking lot. They were both coming up the trail and only one of them was impressed enough with my noise making to scamper off the trail right away. The other one kept coming and only eventually decided to leave the trail as well. Gotta love finding different ways to raise one's heartrate ;-).
- Travel Stats: 12.68M / 5500ft according to my Garmin watch, 7h40 elapsed / 6h moving time
- Equipment: Mountaineering boots (B2), trekking poles, crampons. Carried ice axe and helmet, used neither as it never got steep enough on my route and I never had anyone above me but obv. use your best judgement.
- Wildlife: zero people after Glacier Camp to Steamboat. Several Rainier parties coming up the trail on the way down. One marmot, 6 ptarmigans and 2 bears. Almost no bugs.
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