II. Backpacking
Warm, sunny days! Mosquitoes! Rain, wind, fog, snow and cold! A clear, full moon night in a snowfield! A black bear, a lone coyote, whistling marmots, deer! A fantastic sunrise from Camp Muir! Glissading! Trudging up steep trails carrying a 42 lb. pack! The little flask of Grand Marnier!
I remember saying sometime in the past year that I wanted this summer to be more recreational, to get back to some camping and take the triathlon thing a bit more casually. So with 3 car camping trips, 3 day-hikes and 4 backpacking trips, I guess I achieved that!
Backpack to Sheep lake in mid-August:
I took Camille and her friend Alina on this easy 2-miler that is part of the Pacific Crest Trail on the eastern boundary of Mt. Rainier National Park. Sure, I had to carry most of the gear for 3 people on MY back, but it still felt harder than it should have…and these 2 girls went leaping up the trail like mountain goats, faster than I could keep up with. We had planned for 2 nights/3 days out, but after a full day of side hiking, exploring and swatting at the dratted mosquitoes, we agreed to hike out before sundown on day 2. The girls swam in that cold mountain lake and scrambled a few rock faces, so it felt like we'd done enough. We headed for Enumclaw, arrived unannounced at my brother Tommy’s great home: a lodge-like cabin that he and his wife Stina built – and enjoyed a clean, comfortable, bug-free night.
(yep, I have some photos of the girls at Sheep Lake, but I'll post them later...)
Three backpacking trips to Mt. Rainier National Park:
August 22: My friend and I hiked from Sunrise to Granite Creek then to Glacier Basin for 2 nights/3 days and around 15 miles of hiking. Perfect weather and big vistas made up for some hard climbs and descents.
August 29: An out of state visitor wanted a Mt. Rainier experience while visiting here over Labor Day weekend. So we car camped a couple nights and day hiked around the Paradise area. On the second day, we included a start up to Camp Muir, one of the base camps for climbers summiting Mt. Rainier. Well, we got a late start, fog surrounded us and snow started falling which made route-finding potentially difficult or impossible since we had no GPS or experience on the climb. So we were satisfied with hiking part of the way up, throwing some snowballs, glissading a little on the way down and returning safely for hot chocolate. The final 2 days of that weekend, we backpacked part of the Wonderland Trail (a 93 mile loop around Mt. Rainier) to Indian Bar, for a 15 mile round trip. The scenery was beautiful despite the cold, wind and on-and-off rain.
September 13: We returned to Paradise to backpack up to Camp Muir. The
weather was perfect! Clear and warm, it was shorts-and-tank-top-hiking in the snowfields and there were no challenges finding the route this time. There was a highway of climbers and day-hikers going up and down the route. But the hiking was tough! It was all uphill with that overnight pack and increasing altitude and it took about 5.5 hours to hike the 4.5 miles and 4600 feet of elevation gain. I definitely felt the lack of oxygen in the last ½ mile or so. And jumping crevasses kind of spooked me.
Once at Camp Muir, relaxing at sunset, cooking a meal and enjoying hot chocolate was quite rewarding There was no wind, a full moon rose and there we were with a commanding view of mountain peaks to the south, the horizon to the east, and this big, hulking beast of a mountain at our backs. Pitched the tent in a snowfield by moonlight and in silence (except for the regular rumbling and crashing of rockslides on the other side of this basin or the crunch of icy snow under our feet) and it was quite surreal! Not being used to 10,000 ft elevation, I had some shortness of breath, headache and restlessness making sleep a little difficult.
The basin faced east and so did my tent door making for a big bright view of the sunrise. Hiking down was much easier. After experimenting with various ways to glissade (or slide on your butt through the snow in some fashion), I settled on using my folded Thermarest (to pad the bumps and keep my rear from freezing!) covered by a heavy duty garbage bag (more slippery than the Thermarest surface allowing a faster ride). I don’t think it helped me get down the slopes much faster than if I just kept hiking, but it was a ton of fun!
