If climbing and skiing Shasta in 36C heat didn't do us in, driving straight to Mt Hood Oregon certainly helped. We rolled into the parking lot at about 2am, 1 flat tire and a few wrong turns later, and were pleased to see the 2nd half of our volcano convoy posse already parked and sleeping in the Timberline parking lot.

With only 5000 ft of mountain above us and a chairlift to help, an 8am sleep in was in order. No alpine starts this time round.

When we woke up we knew we definitely weren't in Kansas anymore (not that we ever were), and things here would definitely be different from the rest of our backcountry ski stops on the trip. First off, breakfast entertainment was a huge posse of teenage ski racers doing parking lot aerobics and lunges. That woke up most of the boys on our trip.

Then came the Windell's camp kids, rollin' in with the base pumpin' and pants so low that there was no denying we were definitely kitted out like backcountry geeks for this trip. It was still 30 something degrees C, and kids were sliding past with HUGE down parka's, big toques, balaclavas, you name it.

Come decision time about the chairlift, it was pretty clear that everyone in our crew was a skier more than a mountaineer. We'd come to ski, and the quicker we could get up Hood, the sooner we could ski it. $30 later we were hanging at the top of Timberline's top chairlift with all the racers and jibbers.  They were headed down for a lap, we were headed up.

Some easy slush skinning led us right up to the crater where some of us bookpacked around, and a few chose the direct approach, walkin' right through the crater in search of magma or something. Mmmm, sulfur sniffing. Now that would be one lame place for the snow to cave in... nothing like getting swallowed by the bowels of the volcano.

A 45 minute bootpack from there had us on the summit, busting out some Lonely Island dance beats, mooning, and generally offending any living creature around us. From the peak we caught a clear view of St Helens, Adams, and Rainer, 2 of which were next on our list, just to remind us that not every day would be as easy as Hood.

So without further ado, we dropped in to 5,000 ft of isothermic thigh-busting schmooo, laced with some dirt, rocks, and occassional ice patches just for good measures. Thank god I didn't know my binding DIN's were set at the absolute minimum until AFTER the day. Ummmm, ya, way to go on that one. That oughta be one advantage of the new G3 Onyx - apparently they'll get you down the mountain safely even if your'e a total moron.

We all made it up and down without a glitch, claiming Volcano #2 for the trip. And nothing could stand in the way of burgers, pizza, some emergency boot work, a stop in a local watering hole, and then another drive to stop #3 - Mt Adams, Washington.

Mt Hood Resources

• Timberline Lodge & Ski Resort
• Trip reports on CascadeClimber.com
• Mt Hood Weather Reports
• Mt Hood details on SkiMountaineer.com