On the road in real time via the ol’ iPhone. My brother Isaac and I are currently driving the California 101 south of San Francisco heading for Pismo Beach. Our travels down the 1 were without visibility and thus quite uneventful, in fact it was nearly miserable to be honest, but now we are happily fast on out way to our Nana’s 90th birthday reunion. Although climbing Shasta was a bust this trip has been fun overall.
Rising to an elevation of 10,056 feet the Middle Sister positions itself within the central Oregon Cascades as the smallest of the Three Sisters. However, it is still one of only five Oregon peaks to climb over the 10,000ft level, including Hood and Jefferson and all of which are visible from the Middle Sister’s summit. The above image was captured along the Hayden Glacier’s crevasse filled landscape. The below image pictures Isaac Holk during his traverse of a frightening ice patch near the summit.
A solo climb along the Wallowa/Imnaha Divide sounded a little lonesome, so my planned outing into the Three Sisters became the trip of choice. Isaac and I did not get very far into the wilderness on our first evening, but we did manage to find an amazing campsite atop some large flat rocks and although we remained in the treeline the surrounding views were incredible. Here you see the Middle Sister through a long exposure.
Labor Day weekend is not the most ideal time to find solitude in mountains, seeing as how many people want to get one last outdoors trip in before the summers end, but I too fall victim to this desire. The idea is that I will head out early Saturday morning toward one of two destinations: The Three Sisters Wilderness with my brother or the Wallowa Mountains solo. Either way I hope to capture a few more night shots like the one above, taken in Joshua Tree National Park over Memorial Day weekend.
Waldo Lake is Oregon’s second largest lake and also holds the position of being one of the world’s cleanest lakes. I recently had the pleasure of revisiting this wondrous place and neither words nor photos are capable of describing the beauty felt during my stay. I hope this never changes.
Recuperation. I still have not written a report on my six summits climb due to continuing exhaustion from the trip, but I plan to sometime next week. The above image is from near Mount Bailey’s summit. The view is of Mount Thielsen through an interesting hole in the mountain’s rocky ridge line.
My first solo climb in mountaineering occurred Sunday night through Wednesday morning. The trip took place within Oregon’s Mount Thielsen Wilderness, Crater Lake and the surrounding peaks. Over the course of 32 hours, from 9am Monday until 5pm Tuesday, I climbed approximately 34 miles and had summit Six peaks, all of are under Jeff Howbert’s list of Oregon’s 100 Highest Peaks. The above image is of Mount Thielsen’s north face as seen from Thielsen Creek just off of the Pacific Crest Trail. A trip report will be written shortly.
With my trip out to the Wallowa Mountains perfectly planned I proceeded to take Micah up on his offer to do a little fishing a day prior to heading out. We went up on the Clackamas River and despite not catching any fish the two of us had a great time. However, I did brush into a bit of poison oak and this has since halted my Wallowa trip to a standstill.
My SPOT personal locator beacon triangulates my position atop Tipsoo Peak prior to sending out an okay message to friends. I have taken the GPS Messenger out twice now and it’s been outstanding in pinpointing my positions. Thus far I have only used the device to send out okay and custom messages, but I am very well pleased with the service it provides. Hopefully I will never need to use it in a distress call situation, at which point my position becomes that of a rescue operation. Come tomorrow I will be climbing in some of Oregon’s most remote mountains, the Wallowas, and likely would not do it alone without SPOT as my lifeless companion.
My recent trip down through the southern Oregon Cascades proved rather eventful. Although I did not summit two of the peaks I had sought after I did have a fantastic time exploring new territory. My original intent was to climb Mount Scott, Mount Bailey, Howlock Mountain and Thielsen East Peak. Instead I climbed Scott, Tipsoo Peak and Howlock Mountain. I also had the privilege to slack-pack for 79 year old PCT runner Bob Holtel, aka Ultra-Buns. A full trip report on my days of adventure and climbing can be found here: http://www.summitpost.org/trip-report/642509/the-holly-sawtooth.html.