Today is the day

After months of preperation, acquisition, conditioning, and planning, we finally arrived at the Paradise Wilderness Information Center on Saturday morning at 9 am, right on schedule. It was exhilirating just to be there, we'd climbed over 5,000 ft in the car already just to get there, so we were greated by beautiful alpine meadows and impossibly clean air. I was also very relieved to finally switch modes from worrying about what needed to get done before we could go to actually just doing it.

We went inside to verify our climbing reservation (which I'd made in advance to ensure we'd be able to climb on the days we wanted and camp in the right places when we needed to). We got a bit more intel on the recent weather and our intended route. We were told the weather was supposed to hold through the weekend, and that Cathedral Gap, one of the cols (mini-mountain passes) we had to cross through, had completely "melted out." Which was fine, it just meant that we'd be climbing on scree (exposed, lose rock) instead of glacier.

From there, we hit the head one last time, downed a liter of water each, hoisted our insanely heavy packs, and started up the trail. Mom and Dad decided to join us for the first bit, which is actually paved. The entirety of the mountain is ringed by trails that are used by 10s if not 100s of thousands of people a year, so in order to deal with erosion issues the lowest and most populated trails are paved. I didn't mind a bit, since it meant I could get used to hiking with the pack without having to think about foot placements, though I'm sure Matt was less enthused as he was wearing plastic mountaineering boots with solid plastic soles (think lowered ski boots with hinged ankles and you're pretty close). Matt and I limited ourselves to an extremely slow pace in order to get used to the heavy loads and ensure we had enough stamina for the long haul up to Camp Muir at 10,000 ft. So the for of us trudged along, taking in the scenery and greeting the people going up and coming down, all asking what our plans were, etc. After 1,500 ft or so of elevation, Mom and Dad had had enough -- we said our goodbyes and we continued up, leaving the pavement and getting onto a dirt trail, all the while being eagerly passed by scads of tourists in tennis shoes and t-shirts. Our route took us up a very popular trail that is frequented by a lot of tourists before it hits the glacier. We took a little break off to the side as the trail dead ended into a glacial stream, then set up the snow. The route was well broken in so following foot steps was fairly easy, though careful foot placement and the occasional kick step was needed. At first we encountered waves of kids playing in the snow, but soon they all fell away, and it was just us and others who were either outfitted for glacier travel or who looked like they were headed for the summit. We also got our first preview of what I was hoping would be our post summit treat, "glissading," or the intricate art of sliding down a steep glacier on your ass. It looked like a lot of fun and a quick way to descend hundreds of feet in a few seconds. We also started quizzing people who were obviously coming down from the top. In the beginning it was mostly, "how was it?" To which everyone responded very informatively, "great."



Eventually we got more specific, "how was the route," "how was the summit," "how do you feel," to which we got fairly homogenous responses. The route was great, well marked, trodden in, with nothing "out" or "gone" as can often happen on glacial routes when snow bridges collapse or yawning chasms open up where the path was supposed to lead. Everyone also said it was "windy." We heard this several times, and started leading our questions with it. One guy actually stopped to say, "it'll blow you right off the cleaver," referring to Disappointment Cleaver, a ridge of exposed rock in our route we would have to climb onto and then ascend to get to the upper glaciers that would take us to the summit crater. This of course was very heartening, but I supposed at that point since they all summitted all would be well. Cavalierly we kept asking how the summit was, and occasionally we'd get a dirty look instead of a hearty reply, and I realized that not everyone coming down had actually made it. And on up the snow we trudged.

Along the way we scrambled over a few patches of exposed rock and stopped on one section for a quick lunch. I was surprised to see a full blown river appear out of the glacier at one point, pour over some rocks, and disappear immediately again under the glacier, directly adjacent to our path. It made me think about exactly what I was walking on.

Finally in the early afternoon we spotted the collection of small buildings that make up Camp Muir in the distance. This actually seemed to make the climb harder, as we now had a concrete landmark to show us just how slow the going actually was. As the day wore on into late afternoon, we finally made it to the rock outcropping and dropped our packs. Hallelujah!

tbc...