West McMillan Spire and Terror Glacier

West McMillan Spire is one of the more accessible Picket Range summits, an eight-thousand-foot granite tower in the heart of North Cascades National Park. The standard ski mountaineering execution leaves Goodell Creek and climbs over seven thousand feet through forest and broken alpine terrain to reach the West Ridge, then drops the SW Face onto the Terror Glacier for the descent.

The line is exposed and committing. The summit ridge presents a "butter knife edge" with thousand-foot drops on either side; the false summit is corniced; the true summit pitch crosses thin hollow snow over rocks. The SW Face descent runs about twenty-five hundred feet onto the Terror Glacier, where lower-angle skiing continues back to the upper Goodell drainage. Forest approach below four thousand feet often requires bare-ground hiking until the snow line.

This is a serious Picket Range objective. The Terror Creek country sees almost no traffic. Limited beta, route-finding through complex terrain, and the exposed summit ridge demand experienced parties. April spring corn windows are the standard. National Park Pass at the trailhead.