Above the ponderosas

We did it. We summitted Mt. Washington. It's the most scared I have ever been in my life.

First I have to say that I climbed with the best group of men in the world. Fun, funny, and just happy to be up there -- not in a race to summit. I would never have made it anywhere near the top without their help. They were incredibly patient and generous with my dad and me, who know next to nothing about harnesses, ropes and carabiners. Also, they carried the climbing gear. Thanks, guys.

Thanks also to my wonderful husband and mother-in-law, who watched the children so that I could climb.

So we drove to Hoodoo and then turned onto a dirt road, where we found the Pacific Crest Trail. We walked along it for about an hour. It's a nice hike through an alpine forest, feet shusshing in volcanic ash. Lots of beargrass and lupine in the understory; also huckleberries and wild strawberries, which, on the way back down, Jason and I stopped to eat. (Just for fun. A dozen huckleberries wouldn't feed a mouse.)

After an hour we turned onto the trail which climbs up the mountain. It was immediately steeper and less travelled than the PCT. We stepped over blown-down tree trunks, and the soft limbs of little pine trees swiped at my face -- lodgepole pine, mountain hemlock and whitebark pine, I think Steve said. It started out steep and then got even steeper, so that I huffed and turned red and we mostly stopped talking.

And then, abruptly: Boom. The top of Mt. Washington in our faces. We stood on bare lava rock with some pumice pebbles and stunted trees and bushes. Bees, ants. My brother-in-law showed us where the glacier had cut away at the side of the mountain -- a thousand feet below us, down that slope with the boulders at the base -- and one of the guys asked when that had been. Then they all riffed on how the glacier had been there up until the Reagan administration, when it rapidly began receding; revived a bit during Clinton's years; then disappeared altogether with the election of Bush Number Two. Everyone laughed but my dad, the sole Republican among us.

Above the treeline it was an exhilarating feet-and-hands scramble over fairly loose rock to gain the spire. We were not likely to fall, but if we did, we'd have bumped and slid down a scree slope, abraded head to toe, for several hundred feet.

So then we stood on a narrow ridge and the experienced climbers planned our route. One at a time we roped up to climb about 50 feet, with Terry holding back until last to be sure we all had our gear right and -- in my case, at least -- weren't paralyzed with fear. I have been to the climbing gym a few times, enough to know that this route had excellent hand-holds and lots of them, but I was terrified. I felt that I was in the sky, anchored to earth just barely by my hands and the tips of my shoes. Clutching abrasive volcanic rock.

Above that point we slowly picked our way to the top: foothold, handhold, foothold, handhold. It was not so steep that we needed a rope but we were definitely climbing. Up in the sky. When were finally reached the summit the others were joyous, practically leaping, but I held onto the rock for dear life. I wondered how the hell I'd get down. I watched the bees and butterflies which swooped around us, a flock of starlings, a golden eagle.

So much smoke on the horizon it looked like sunset. Wildfires are burning across the northwest.

From one side of our perch we could see nearly the full extent of the fire that burned two years ago from Suttle Lake to Mt. Jefferson, plus all the beetle-killed trees interspersed in what remains. From the other side we could see the lava flow from Belknap Crater. 1500 years old and there's still nothing growing in it but lichen. It's an interesting juxtaposition.

Anyway, we got off the spire by downclimbing and roping up for one belay and a rappel. The rappel was an act of faith. I was so scared I put it immediately out of my mind, so sorry, I can't describe it. I'll post the pictures when I get them.

Rather than hiking back down that steep trail we decided to surf the scree field. It was a several hundred foot slope of volcanic ash and beautiful pumice stones (pink, green and purple; they made me think of big, sharp Fruity Pebbles). Each step set off a small avalanche of pumice stones; if I balanced right I'd slide with it. Step and slide, step and slide.

At the base of the scree field is an alpine meadow, pictures of which convinced me to attempt this climb in the first place. Yellow flowers everywhere. I was still unsteady and wanted to walk holding onto rocks, but this was a (comparatively) flat dirt trail. Two or three hours later we reached our cars.

Ten miles round trip. My whole body felt sleepy and I needed to oil my knees. I did not feel safe again until I stepped into my house.

Here's a nice picture. (The men took lots of photos but I haven't seen any yet.) No snow when we climbed, of course.