Who: Matt, Joe
When: 8/21 - 8/22
Activity: Summit Mt. Adams / Pahto (overnight)
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/p/CEkAtu2B-iKIPLr8a1whZU9r3CbzAWAuyo0NHY0/
Joe and I left from Seattle around 4pm in Seattle. After driving about 4 hours I realized that I had left my boots sitting by my front door of my apartment. We immediately pulled over to discuss our options.
Joe has good intuition about this kind of stuff and suggested we continue forward to check if the ranger station at Trout Lake had boots that I could borrow or perhaps advice on the nearest location where I could pick up a pair. In the worst case scenario, I could disrespect the mountain and attempt the summit in my sambas. I was very skeptical about our chances in Trout Lake but Joe totally was right - a wonderful ranger Camden happily assisted and let me peruse through a surprisingly large selection of size 9 and 10 boots.
After our short detour to Trout Lake around the around 9:30. We quickly made it up to lunch counter shortly after noon where we set up camp and spent the rest of our day lounging on the shelf.
On Sunday morning we rose at 4am to attempt to reach the summit for sunrise. We made good time and reached the false summit around sunrise. After a quick photo shoot we continued on and topped the true summit shortly after around 7am.
During our descent we glissaded where it was safe and spent some time with another group who was doing the same. From there we packed up our camp and headed back to the car.
Some other quick thoughts:
- This was the first time I've ever had the pleasure of picking up a fresh zip loc of my own shit. After ~10 years of outdoor activities it's good to know that new exciting experiences still await.
- I'd recommend doing the climb earlier in the season when it's mostly snow covered. Constantly putting on and pulling off crampons was a pain, plus walking up snow was much preferable to the loose skree.
- Ice axes are incredible tools!
