We Beat the Storm! (Well, Sort Of)

Having spent the last six years living in California, I wouldn’t go as far to say that I take the nice weather for granted, but it has come to a point where if I have a running event, hike, camping trip, etc. coming up, the weather is generally not of grave concern for me.  I just assume the weather will be nice because after all, it is California, right?  This is not always the case.

 

This past weekend my friend Edith organized a hiking trip with a bunch of our friends to the summit of Mount Langley in the Sierra Nevada mountains to celebrate her birthday.  The original plan was to make it an overnight backpacking trip but when we were unable to secure a permit for camping in the John Muir Wilderness, Edith reserved a couple of campsites at a nearby campground just south of Lone Pine, California.  The new plan was to hike on Saturday and spend Saturday night at the campground.  I never questioned the weather until some of our friends began posting the weather forecast on the Facebook event page during the days leading up to the hike.  The forecast changed throughout the week and even improved slightly, but as of Friday we were still looking at a forty percent chance of thunderstorms in the afternoon and early evening.  Some of our friends were concerned about attempting the hike in such conditions.  When hiking in the rain it’s important to be cautious, but it is generally safe if proper gear is used and is even enjoyable for some people.  On the other hand, hiking at high altitude in thunderstorms is not safe.  Being at high elevation in the wilderness during a storm puts you at a higher risk of being injured by falling trees or rocks, or worse, being cooked by lightning.  After talking with the group, it was decided that we would still attempt the hike but if the weather got ugly, we would turn around immediately and get back to safety as quickly as we could.  So, on Friday night I walked in the door after work, ate a quick dinner, and promptly laid down for a nap.  Three hours later I woke up at 10:30 PM, gathered all my gear, and began the three-and-a-half-hour trip to the trailhead around 11:30 PM.  Nestled in the Eastern Sierras of California, Mount Langley has an elevation of 14,032 feet, one of the tallest peaks in the state.  The hike to the summit is about twenty-two miles roundtrip with breathtaking scenery, including alpine forest, blue mountain lakes, grassy meadows, and granite mountain peaks.  Due to the elevation, there are also patches of snow along the route all year around.  If you’re a nature junkie, it doesn’t get much better than here.

 

Once I was out of the late-night traffic of the Los Angeles area, I made a right turn in the town of Mojave and my route became a dark and desolate road that passed by the mountains through Owens Valley.  When I arrived in the small town of Lone Pine at 2:15 AM I stopped at Lee’s Frontier to grab some food and water for the hike.  As I waited in line at the register, the guy in front of me was eyeing the sausage snack display and asked the clerk if they had a snack called “little dudes”.  The clerk looked at him quizzically and said the store did not carry them.  “Oh man, we had those in jail, they were really good”.  You encounter some interesting characters when you inhabit convenience stores in the middle of nowhere at 2:15 in the morning.  After the food and water purchase, I hit the road once again.  From Lone Pine it’s two left hand turns and twenty-three miles to the trailhead.  An easy drive, but the only minor detail is that over those twenty-three-miles, you drive the equivalent of a vertical mile and a quarter into the sky up a twisting mountain road.  The factor that poses the greatest challenge to hiking Mount Langley is the altitude.  About ninety percent of the trail is above 10,000 feet and it tops out at the summit at 14,032 feet.  Oxygen levels are noticeably lower at this altitude and hikers often become susceptible to altitude sickness which is the result of being exposed to low oxygen levels at high altitude during strenuous activity.  As I drove up the pitch-black road, the terrain shifted from desert rocks and plants to alpine forest with tall pine trees.  The road eventually emptied into the parking lot of the Cottonwood Lakes trailhead.  Several tents were set up at the nearby campground and early morning hikers were making their preparations outside of their cars and tents.  There was no cell phone reception in this remote area of the mountain wilderness, so I drove around the parking lot in search of my friends.  I quickly spotted Edith and Christina getting ready near their SUV.  We said hello and after parking my car and making my final preparations, I walked over to the trailhead.  Our group of ten consisted of Edith, Tuyet, John, Christina, Meredith, Iris, Iris’ boyfriend Dave, myself, Alfredo, who was an old friend of ours that met up with us at the last minute, and his friend, Patenco (I’m sure I spelled that one wrong, sorry buddy).  I had hiked with Edith, Christina, Tuyet, and Alfredo before and was meeting Dave, Patenco, John, and Meredith for the first time.  I had not seen Alfredo in three or four years, so It was great to have him there.  We all greeted each other and began our trek just before 3:30 AM, making our way through the midnight wilderness over the river crossings and along the switchbacks, talking casually.  Just after the sunrise a couple of hours later, the trail gave way to a grassy meadow with granite rocks strewn about.  The summit of Mount Langley rose directly in front of us in the distance.  There are two ways to access the summit; via Old Army Pass or New Army Pass.  Old Army pass is shorter, but more technical and New Army Pass is slightly longer but less technical.  Both routes lead to the final section of the trail to the summit which is a steep two-mile climb through rocks, following a series of large cairns.  We decided to take the shorter more technical route and followed the trail to Old Army Pass.  The sun had now made its way into the sky and the sunlight sparkled off the Cottonwood lakes as we passed.  After passing through some gorgeous mountain scenery, we climbed up the switchbacks to Old Army Pass and began the two-mile push up the boulder littered winding path to the summit, using the cairns as our guides.  The weather was holding up perfectly so far and we hoped it would stay that way, although we knew it could change in an instant.  The weather at high altitude can change abruptly, and we knew that we’d better be ready to turn around and get back to the trailhead very quickly if things were to get ugly.  Along the ascent we met up with Rochelle, Delores, and Shirleen, all of whom were part of the LA hiking scene and were friends with Alfredo.  During the final climb our group had spread out considerably.  Tuyet had began to feel the effects of altitude sickness so John and Meredith stayed with her along the way.  Despite the group spreading apart, we all kept each other in sight, and we all made it to the summit within about forty-five minutes of each other.  We all displayed strength and resolve along the way; Edith was contending with sleep deprivation, Christina was hiking with a Plantar Fasciitis injury, other people were dealing with slight altitude sickness, and I myself was feeling sleep deprived as well.  Once we made it to the summit we all came back to life and when Tuyet arrived, her eyes filled with tears of joy.  As long-distance hikers, these are the kind of moments we live for; pushing our minds and bodies to the limit, contending with the pain and misery, and reveling in the accomplishment of completing the task at hand.  Like life, hiking twenty-two miles almost entirely above 10,000 feet has euphoric moments of joy and elation as well as demoralizing moments of pain and despair.  “This hike is amazing, but I wanted to quit a million times” Christina joked at the summit.  After taking some pictures, we quickly began making our way back down the trail to beat the storm.  The forecast called for a forty percent chance of storms in the afternoon and by the time we left the summit it was approaching 12:30 PM. 

The weather remained nice throughout most of the descent, however with two miles left, it began to rain hard and we heard the crackling of thunder.  We put our rain jackets on and hustled down the last two miles of the trail in an effort to stay safe from the storm.  By the time we arrived back at the trailhead at 5:30 PM the thunder had stopped but the rain was still coming down.  Our group embraced in a hug and congratulated each other on our successful summit.  Despite the heavy rain during the last two miles, we were very fortunate that the weather had played out the way it did.  We expected at any moment that we would need to turn back, but we beat the storm and were able to summit and make it back safely.  We were proud of our accomplishment and decided to go celebrate with some hot pizzas and beer at the Lone Pine Pizza Factory before heading to the campground.  My plan was to hang out at the campground for a while then drive home.  As we drove down the winding mountain road from the trailhead into Lone Pine all seemed right with the world.  Until we came around a bend in the road and saw a line of about six cars stopped.  In front of the first car in the line was a massive slew of mud and water on the road with two cars stuck side by side in the mud and unable to move.  Shortly after stopping I saw Iris walking up the road.  I rolled down my window as she approached.  “Hey Iris, what happened?” I asked.  The heavy rainfall had created a mudslide on the mountain road and two cars had gotten stuck, blocking the road, and making it impossible to continue down to the base of the mountain.  We decided to turn around and head back up to the trailhead, get some sleep, and try again in an hour.  An hour later, we approached the site again.  The two cars were still stuck but this time a police car was there.  We learned that they needed to pull the cars out of the mud and then clear the road, which would take at least a few hours.  It was becoming increasing apparent that we would not be able to get down from the mountain anytime soon, maybe not even until the next morning.  Back at the trailhead we shared food with each other and Alfredo made sure that I was okay since I wasn’t prepared to stay overnight.  We mostly stayed in our cars to keep warm.  Even though it was the middle of July, the temperature dropped into the low fifties as the sun began to set.  All I had left to eat was a half a bag of trial mix, so Meredith, Tuyet, and John gave me some potato chips and Iris, Edith, and Christina each had an extra blanket that they lent me.  I felt foolish that I hadn’t been more prepared but none of us were expecting a mudslide to keep us from leaving the trailhead.  As I sat in my car, I wondered how long we were going to be stranded here.  I had almost no food and water and I was already hungry.  Besides, how would we know when the road was clear?  There were no rangers in this area so who would notify us?  I decided that we’d better take matters into our own hands.  I got out of my car and told the group that I was going to drive down and check on the road.  If it was still being cleared, I would wait on the roadside and when it was clear, I would drive back up to the trailhead and let everyone know.  There was no cell phone reception, so we would have to settle for this method of communication.  The others were hunkering down in their cars to sleep for the night as I left and drove down the road.  As I approached the site of the mudslide, I could see in the darkness up ahead that the cars were still stuck, but there was a bulldozer in front of them clearing mud off the road and a tow truck had just arrived.  The road was still impassable, but progress was being made.  I turned my car around and parked on the shoulder, about a tenth of a mile up the road from the chaos.  For the next hour I sat in my car on the roadside listening to music, flipping through pictures on my phone, and staring into my rearview mirror.  All I could see were flashing white and yellow lights from utility vehicles in the darkness.  I was unable to tell if the cars had been removed from the mud.  I sat there hoping that it wouldn’t be too long before the lights disappeared, the road was clear, and I could go deliver the good news to my friends that we could be on our way.  Two cars came driving down the road past me, towards the carnage.  “Yeah, good luck guys” I said to myself, fully expecting that they would turn right around.  But strangely, after pausing for about thirty seconds, the cars passed through the mudslide.  “No way” I said.  Was the road clear?  I immediately started my car and headed down towards the mudslide to see if I could pass.  As I approached, I realized that there was much more mud on the road than I initially thought.  The pavement disappeared and was covered in mud as far as the beams of my headlights could reach.  I was immediately waived down by two guys in reflective vests, signaling for me to stop.  When I rolled down my window, they greeted me, and the first guy said “so, you want to make an attempt at passing through this?”  I thought he was being sarcastic but wasn’t entirely sure.  “Eh, probably not a great idea, right?” I replied.  He explained that the two cars I had seen minutes earlier barely made it through the mud and if I was going to try to pass, I would be doing it at my own risk.  I don’t even have a four-wheel drive vehicle and if I got my car stuck in this mess, I’d be screwed.  I turned around and parked my car in the same spot up the road to continue waiting…and promptly nodded off.  I awoke thirty minutes later, confused of my whereabouts for a moment.  When I gathered my senses, I saw in my rearview mirror that not only were the lights from the tow truck and bulldozer still flashing, but I saw three lights approaching my car from about a hundred feet behind.  They looked like headlamps and were getting closer by the second.  Who were these guys?  Were they the tow truck guys walking up to tell me to beat it?  As they approached, they walked along the driver’s side of my car.  I prepared to roll down my window, but they turned out to be hikers and kept walking up the road.  It was now 11:30 PM.  Even if the road were to be cleared tonight, none of us were going to make the three-and-a-half-hour drive back to Los Angeles at this hour of the night.  There was nothing else to do but drive back to the trailhead.  When I arrived I parked my car, adjusted my seat into a lying down position, covered myself with the blankets that were lent to me, and rolled up my sleeveless vest to use as a pillow.  Everyone else had gone to sleep long ago and the parking lot was quiet and still.  It took me a little while to fall asleep as I turned over in the front seat trying to get comfortable.  I ran the heater during the drive back to the trailhead but the heat was slowly escaping through the car and the temperature outside had dropped into the high forties.  I was tired, hungry, and cold, and I still wasn’t exactly sure when we were going to be able to get down from the mountain.  How much worse could it get?  The answer was “much”.  Despite the grim situation, I was thankful that our group was safe, and everyone kept a positive attitude.  It could have easily been one of us stuck in that mudslide.  It had turned into a beautiful night.  The sky had cleared, and the moon shined brightly above the pine trees.  As I finally fell asleep, I took a moment to think about where I was; up on a mountain in a parking lot in the wilderness at 10,000 feet above sea level after hiking twenty-two miles through the Sierra Nevada mountains.  Not too shabby.  In fact, it was pretty cool.   

When I awoke the next morning at 5:45 AM, I felt rested, despite only getting about five hours of sleep.  A few minutes later I saw Christina approaching my car.  We greeted each other when I rolled the window down and I told her I was going to check the road again.  When I arrived at the mudslide area, the vehicles were gone, and the road had been cleared.  Thank goodness!  We were finally able to pass and head back home.  I told everyone the good news when I arrived back at the parking lot.  It turned out Tuyet, Meredith, and John had left at 2:00 in the morning and were probably already home by now.  The rest of us packed our stuff up and laughed and joked with each other about how crazy this trip had become.  Who would have thought that we would be able to beat the rough weather during our hike, but a mudslide would keep us trapped in the parking lot over night?  A few minutes later we were all on the road heading home.  It was an unforgettable experience and another great trip with great company.  Not only was it a lot of fun, but some very important lessons were learned; It probably wouldn’t hurt to have some extra food and water when going on adventures like this.  You never know what could happen.  A mudslide in one of the driest states in the country could trap you at a trailhead.  Never take a successful summit for granted, it’s all about the team work, and even if the weather forecast looks rough for a planned hike, go for it anyway.  But if you hear thunder or see lightning, you’d better be ready to turn around and get your ass back to the trailhead quickly!            

Mount Shasta, Round 2 - Rocks and Wind

The state of California has numerous landmarks.  Some notable ones include the Hollywood sign, the Golden Gate bridge, Half Dome, etc.  One of the many, and perhaps one of the more secret landmarks of California, is Mount Shasta, a potentially active volcano just off the 5 Freeway near the Oregon/California border.  Standing at 14,157 feet, Mount Shasta is a free-standing mountain and dominates the Northern California skyline.  It is completely blanketed by snow during the winter months and even into the spring and summer, the slopes above 10,000 feet are largely covered year-round.  In June of 2017 I found myself with my friends at the Bunny Flat trailhead preparing to climb this beast of a mountain.  There are several routes that lead to the summit but the most popular route, and the route we were going to take, is through Avalanche Gulch.  Our plan was to climb up to Lake Helen Campground, camp for the night, and push for the summit early the next morning.  We arrived that night at Lake Helen as planned, however when morning came, we were awakened by 50 mile-per-hour winds blowing snow, ice and camping equipment down the mountain.  We waited at the campground for a couple of hours, hoping the winds would dissipate, but they did not let up one bit.  There was no other option except to hike back down to the trailhead.

This past weekend, a year later, another opportunity came to attempt Mount Shasta.  We had been monitoring the weather forecast closely, but unfortunately it looked like the winds were going to be fierce on the day that we were planning to summit.  Due to its prominence and altitude, Mount Shasta is notorious for drawing in extreme and volatile weather, making it difficult for meteorologists to accurately forecast mountain conditions.  These forecasted wind speeds were merely an educated guess and we hoped they wouldn’t be as severe as they were anticipating.  The original plan was for me to drive to my friend Tony’s house after work on Thursday night.  My friends Nemo, Cisko, and I would all pile into Tony’s Jeep Rubicon, hit the road at 8:00 PM, drive through the night, meet up with the rest of the group at the trailhead, climb to Lake Helen Campground on Friday, camp for the night, and push for the summit very early on Saturday morning.  I had planned to leave with them on Thursday night, however due to unforeseen technology issues at work, I needed to come into the office for a few hours on Friday, rather than take the whole day off like I had originally planned.  My new plan was to leave Los Angeles after those few hours of work on Friday, drive myself up to Mount Shasta, hustle up Avalanche Gulch, and catch up to the group at some point along the way.  It certainly wasn’t ideal, but the situation didn’t weaken my spirit, and I was looking forward to attempting this climb again with my friends.

Getting up to Mount Shasta is an endurance event in its own right.  The drive from Los Angeles is between nine and nine and a half hours depending on traffic.  I rolled into town shortly before 11:00 PM on Friday night.  The drive up to the small town at the base of the mountain had been fairly uneventful until I was driving up a pitch black, twisting road through the Shasta-Trinity National Forest to the trailhead.  As I came around a bend, I saw three dead deer lying in the middle of the road.  Startled by the bodies, I slowed to a stop.  Then, to my relief and delight, the three deer were not dead or even injured.  They stood up as I approached.  It was a mother and two fawns.  They stood still and stared at me for a few seconds before casually walking off the road and disappearing into the wilderness.  After that brief delay, I resumed forward progress.  It was very dark, so I drove cautiously, looking for more animals that may be crossing the road.  Several minutes later, a cluster of parked cars emerged in the darkness, indicating that I had arrived.  I took an empty parking space near the sign marking the beginning of the trail.  When I opened my car door, the cold mountain air came pouring in, crisp and refreshing.  I stepped out of my car, admiring the surroundings as I stretched.  It was an absolutely stellar night.  The sky was filled with thousands of shining stars and the tall pine trees that surrounded the parking lot were engulfed in bright moonlight.  In front of my car, the mountain stood prominently in the darkness above the tree line.  I walked over the restroom, brushed my teeth, took out my contacts, retrieved my blanket and pillow from my trunk and spread them out in my backseat.  My plan was to start climbing at around 4:00 in the morning, about the same time that my friends would start pushing for the summit from Lake Helen.  I would hustle up the mountain and hopefully catch them along the way or at the summit.  Before going to sleep, I took one last look at the mountain.  In the darkness, the Lake Helen camping area was visible on the snowy mountain side, well off in the distance.  Somewhere up there my friends had set up camp and were probably already hunkered down for the night.

 

The rooster alarm went off on my cell phone at 3:45 AM the next morning, and I slowly awoke and began preparing for the trek.  The trail from Bunny Flat would lead through the wilderness to the mountain, which looked to be about a half a mile in the distance.  The trail would climb to Horse Camp and would end at Lake Helen.  From there, it’s a more technical climb up the snowy mountain face to the summit, which requires the use of crampons and an ice axe.  I made my final preparations, threw on my pack, and began hiking up the trail towards the mountain.  2017 had been an enormous winter for California, and last year the whole trail was covered in snow all the way to the parking lot.  This year, however, all the snow had melted, and the trail was much easier to navigate.  I hiked through the wilderness, passed by Horse Camp, and by the time I arrived at Lake Helen two hours later, snow had taken over, and the sun had risen.  There were about a half a dozen tents scattered throughout the campground and I set my pack down to drink some water and put on warmer clothing.  Just then, I saw my friend Monica standing outside of her tent looking up at the mountain.  I ran over to her and after saying hi, she explained that Tony, Cisko, and Nemo were the only three out of the group that decided to try to climb to the summit.  Monica, Mariel, Carisa, Linda, Edgar, Ronald, and Ronald’s teenage son Leo had decided that the winds were too severe to attempt the climb, and they stayed at the campground.  The wind had let up a little by the time I arrived, but apparently throughout the night, it had been fiercely strong and howled ruthlessly through the campground.  Carisa, Mariel, and Edgar emerged from their tent and said good morning.  Carisa had been suffering from migraines during the climb up to Lake Helen, but was now feeling better thanks to the magic of medicine.  “You should be able to catch up to those guys” Monica said.  “They’re taking it pretty easy”.  “Cool! I’ll see how far I get” I said.  I bade the group farewell and began the long climb from Lake Helen up to the Red Banks, where I would make a left and climb up Misery Hill to the summit.  Up ahead of me on the slope, several climbers were struggling up the steep, snowy terrain.  To my right up ahead, I could see a man sitting on the mountain side with the rest of his group standing over him.  It looked like something was wrong, but I wasn’t entirely sure.  A strong gust of wind blew down the mountain, causing me to almost lose my balance.  Immediately after it dissolved, I heard voices shouting from above: “Rocks! Rocks!”.  A couple of seconds later, three melon sized rocks came bouncing down the mountain right past me.  The spring snowmelt had dragged rocks and chunks of earth down the mountain and the strong winds dislodged them from the snow near the Red Banks, which were about two thousand feet up the slope in front of me.  By the time the rocks flew past me they had gained enough speed to do serious physical harm if they were to strike a climber.  A bit rattled, I sluggishly continued climbing up the steep incline.  I caught up with a couple from San Francisco.  “Is that guy okay down there?” I inquired.  I pointed to the man sitting on the mountain below.  It now looked like his friends were attempting to carry him back to the campground.  “He was hit by a falling rock.  I think they said his leg may be broken” The guy answered.  Just then, the wind howled and almost blew me over again.  I was growing concerned for my safety and questioned whether I should keep going.  I decided to keep moving forward while being overly cautious to avoid getting injured.  The climb to the Red Banks was steep and tough.  I moved at a snail’s pace in the snow up the 40-degree incline, using my ice axe to help push myself up.  Strong gusts of wind howled down the mountain and pellets of ice bounced off my helmet and snow goggles.  The Red Banks were getting closer and closer with each step, but they still looked to be well off in the distance.  During the last few hundred feet, I was on all fours, using my ice axe to pull myself up the mountain side.  Shortly after reaching the Banks, I saw two men in front of me as I crawled up the mountain.  They were making their way back down, and when I said hello as they passed, I realized it was Tony and Cisko.  Their faces had been disguised by their goggles, helmets, and face warmers.  We embraced in a hug and they explained that they did not summit due to the strong winds and falling rocks.  I learned from Tony that the man sitting on the mountain below had his ankle broken by a falling rock.  Still not good, but less severe than a broken leg.  Upon witnessing the incident earlier that morning, Tony dispatched a rescue team to bring in a helicopter to airlift the man to safety.  I began having doubts about whether I would be able reach the peak.  After a quick break, I slowly moved forward as Tony and Cisko continued back to Lake Helen.  I kept moving and found Nemo a short time later.  He had been climbing at an aggressive pace and was able to summit but advised me to be very careful if I chose to continue.  As he continued his descent, I stood there, unsure of what to do.  Just then a gust of wind blew a few more rocks right past me from Misery Hill and a small stone struck my arm.  I had about three quarters of a mile to cover before I reached the summit, but the strong winds and flying rocks were scaring the hell out of me.  A skilled climber could have trekked to the summit in high winds, and even could have powered through the flying ice pellets, but melon sized rocks being blown at dangerous speeds down the mountain created a major safety hazard.  The Mercy Medical Center in the town at the base of the mountain was not where I wanted my journey to end.  So, demoralizing as it was, I turned around and began making my way back down towards Lake Helen.  There would be no summit today.

 

Descending the slope was just as vexing as the trek up, and I struggled to find an effective way of moving down the steep mountain face.  I tried numerous methods, including side stepping, going down backwards, and the spider crawl method, which involved sitting on my butt, and moving down the mountain with my arms and legs.  Several other climbers were glissading down the slope along the shallow troughs in the snow.  I inched down the mountain from the Red Banks in one of the troughs when suddenly I heard shouting behind me.  “Look out! Look out!”.  A glissading climber was coming down towards me at full speed and I dove out of the way and rolled a good ten feet down the slope, narrowly avoiding collision.  It was a long slog to get back to Lake Helen.  Glissading would have been the fastest way to get down, but the slope was extremely steep, and I refrained from using this method out of fear of hitting a rock and colliding with other climbers.  After an hour and a half of spider crawling, side stepping, and going down backwards, I finally arrived at Lake Helen.  Tony, Cisko, and Nemo had just packed their camping gear and were getting ready to head back down to the trailhead.  Monica and the rest of the team had gone down a while ago and were most likely sightseeing around town.  During the descent from Lake Helen, I saw that there was another glissading shoot carved into the snow.  This descent was less steep, so I decided to give it a shot.  I took off my crampons, sat down, and let gravity take me down the mountain.  I soon discovered that glissading down a snowy mountain takes practice.  The idea is to slide down the mountain and use your ice axe to stay in control, digging it into the snow to slow yourself down.  Like snowboarding, it takes practice to develop the skill and move at a decent speed while still maintaining control.  “Woohoo!” I shouted as I slid down the trough.  By no means was I an expert in glissading.  My butt was numb, and my pants were soaked, but it was a fast, effective, and fun way to get to the bottom of the slope where the snow ended.  Once the snow ended, Cisko, Tony, Nemo, and I made the quick descent back to the trailhead.  As we made our way down to Horse Camp, I was in awe of the beautiful setting.  Colorful rocks lay strewn along the path, tall green pine trees dominated the landscape, and snow-capped mountain peaks jabbed at the sky in the distance in front of us.  Once back at the trailhead, we caught up with Ronald and his son, Leo.  Tony had heard that Monica, Mariel, Linda, Carisa, and Edgar were having lunch at Black Bear Diner, so we drove over there to meet up with them.  When we arrived I met Linda, who had been sleeping when I hiked up to Lake Helen.  She had driven down from Portland, Oregon to join us on this adventure.  After enjoying a hot meal, sharing stories, and lots of laughs, we said our goodbyes, congratulated each other on our attempt, and began the long drive back home.  The traffic was lighter coming home than driving up, and I finally arrived back home shortly after 1:00 in the morning after nine hours of driving.  I dropped my bag, changed my clothes, brushed my teeth, and promptly fell asleep shortly after lying down.

After two attempts and no summit at Mount Shasta, I would be lying if I said I wasn’t a little frustrated.  Even though I was annoyed that I had failed to reach the summit again, I was thankful that I had gotten back safely and that I was still able to enjoy the natural beauty of this mountain.  No mountain is worth injuring yourself or dying for.  Summit or no summit, Mount Shasta is one of the most beautiful mountains I’ve ever seen.  There truly is no place quite like it.  I may not have summited this time, but I know that somehow, some way, we’ll be back next summer for round three.  Third time’s a charm!