The plan was for Mike and Jonathan to climb the Emmons Glacier, while Mark and Doug climbed Ptarmigan Ridge. Things did not exactly work out. The weather was too warm and the snow was too soft. The going was OK for Mike and Jonathan until they got to the steep part of the Inter Glacier. There was no boot track and they started to sink up to their knees with every step. Making progress up a steep slope, with a heavy pack, in knee deep snow is extremely difficult. This put an end to their climb.
Mark and Doug had a long traverse, in soft snow, around to Ptarmigan Ridge. We had hoped to get to the 10,300' level on the ridge on the first day, but instead had to camp on the West side of the Carbon Glacier on the first night. We would make it to the 10,300' bivy the next day. This photo shows the Carbon Glacier with Ptarmigan Ridge in the distance.
The actual climb would have started on the lower right side of this picture and gone up and to the left.
The Liberty Cap Glacier and The upper part of Ptarmigan Ridge. There are 2 popular options once you reach the buttress at the top right of this photo. One is to go right below the buttress. We were leaning toward the other option, which is to take a left and find a path on the glacier. While we were killing time at high camp, we heard a loud noise, looked up and saw an avalanche. A huge block of ice had calved off of the LC Glacier and swept right through a large part of the route that we might have been on if our progress had been better! We spent the rest of the day napping and watching climbers on Liberty Ridge make slow progress. One group took 8 hours to climb a section that should have taken 2-3 hours. Between the ice-fall danger and slow going on steep snow, we decided to bail out on the climb.
We got up at midnight hoping that the snow would be firmer at night. It was better, but still pretty soft. The sun rose as we approached St. Elmo's Pass and we got to the car in time for breakfast. Maybe next time. :(
For our first climb of the year we went on a "winter" climb of Mt. Hood. This was an all-nighter. We drove down Friday evening and started hiking at about midnight. Mike and Mark, father and son, near the top of the ski area. 
We climbed the Old Crater Variation. There was a constant shower of small pieces of snow coming off the cliffs above. Mark near the top, about 700' above the crater fumaroles. 
We got to the top ahead of schedule. We wanted to see the sunrise from the top, so we killed some time by taking a chilly nap at 11,200'. It was worth the wait! Mark on top. 
Doug on the summit. 
We had to walk along the crater rim to get back to our route. To Mark's right is a 2,000' drop, to his left is a 700' drop into a fumarole. Not a good time to stumble! 
Looking down into the crater and Timberline ski area. The line of snow on the left is the Hogsback. To the right of it are some fumaroles. 
Mark had skinned up to 9,000' while Doug packed his skis and boots. It was nice to ski out in 15 minutes after taking 3 hours to climb up to that point. We could not have asked for better weather and snow conditions in March.
