Date: 2007-09-15
To: WillieGoat's climb up Rainier
Miles today: 0.0

A little more then a week after finishing the AT, I was off on another adventure. Before leaving for the trail, I signed up to climb Mt. Rainier with a charity organization called Summit for Someone. I had to raise money that went to The Big City Mountaineers and in return I got to climb Mt. Rainier. First of all, I think that this was a very worthy cause and if you do a lot of reading on Trail Journals, I bet that you'll think it's a worthy cause as well. I'd encourage all of you to look in to these organizations and to look into contributing to or volunteering for either or both of them, you'll be glad you did.On with my climb. On 9/12, I flew out to Seattle, rented a car, and drove to Ashford where the Rainier Mountain Inc. "base camp" is located. I had a hard time staying on the road with views of this gigantic mountain looming in front of me. I eventually had to pull off to the side of the road to take a couple of pictures. It was both exciting and intimidating to be able to see what I'd gotten myself into. This was definitely a long way from the AT.The next morning we started day one of our three day summit program. We drove from Ashford to Paradise (5,000') and hiked part way up the mountain to a permanent snow field for a day long snow school. This is where they told us everything we needed to know to safely climb the mountain. We went over, walking in the snow, using crampons (on snow and on rock), self arresting techniques, roped travel, and team arresting. They definitely cramped a lot of information in, and playing at about 6,000-7,000' was enough to take our breath away (both from the altitude and from the views).We drove back to Ashford that afternoon and got ready for what would be a long and exciting 2 day climb to the top of Rainier. We woke up the next morning to a slight drizzle, but luckily the cloud level was at 4,500' so by the time we go to Paradise we had nothing but sunshine. Day 2 consisted of a 5,000' climb up to Camp Muir. The first part of the route was all sand and rock, but within about 2 hours we found the snow and left the sand behind for good. The rest of the day we climbed up the Muir Snowfield, complete with crevasse navigation and everything. We got to Camp Muir at 10,000' by around 4:00, where we settled in, had dinner, and got briefed on what would happen on the summit push the next morning. We got in our sleeping bags by about 7:00 and tried to get some rest, which ended up not being very productive.Our guides woke us up around midnight, and by 1:00 am we were suited up and ready to tackle the mountain. From here on out we would be roped together in teams of 3 clients and a guide. For safety reasons, we couldn't unclip from the rope for any reason, not even to go to the bathroom, so we got pretty familiar with our rope partners. On the way up, we would climb for about an hour to an hour and a half at a time and then take a quick 15 minute break to get some water, something to eat, and to add some cloths. The higher we got the colder it got, with no relief in sight until the sun came up. I started off wearing just a base layer shirt and pants, and by the time I got to the top I had on a base shirt, a thermo shirt, a soft shell jacket, a hat under my helmet, and two pairs of gloves. The real savior was the down jacket that I rented and wore every time we stopped walking. The climb up was a lot tougher then I thought it was going to be and at around 13,000' I started to feel a little bit of altitude sickness so I thought I was in trouble. The guides reassured us all that we were doing great, so we continued to push on and when the sun came up at about 6:00 it all became worth it. I just wish the pictures could do the views up there justice.We climbed into the summit crater (Mt. Rainier is a volcano) at about 7:00 am, not a bad mornings work if you ask me. After a short break, we continued across the crater and climbed up the other side of to the highest point on the rim. Before we knew it, we were standing at the very top of Mt. Rainier at 14,410'! It was amazing. On the way up I started to think that this might not be my type of climbing, but when I got to the top I was hooked. The views were amazing! The guides apologized for the clouds that covered everything below 5,000', but that didn't matter much to me, it was still incredible.About an hour after we got to the crater we started our 9,000' descent back down to Paradise. With the sun up, it was a whole new trip on the way back down. In a way I was glad we started in the dark, or else I would have been a heck of a lot scared on the way up. This was one heck of a steep mountain. There were times that we were walking on a glacier and the mountain just dropped out of sight. If we were to have fallen there, that would have been one hack of a slide. Luckily that didn't happen, and we got back to Camp Muir around 12:30. We took a lunch break there and packed up all of our stuff and then headed the last 5,000' to Paradise and the end of our trip. What a day, no wonder we had to start out at 1:00 am. By the time we go back to the parking lot we had climbed up over 4,000' and then back down more then 9,000'.Wow, what a trip. It truly was an amazing climb, and the fact that I was able to help out other people while doing it made it that much more special. Thank you so much to everyone who supported me and the BCM. Together, we helped change the lives of teens across the country! I've posted all of my Rainier pictures on Trail Journals after our AT pictures, so feel free to look through those and hit me up if you have any questions.