Mt. St. Helens Expedition

Back in early March, I embarked on an expedition with my friend Mike from work.   Our mission was to conquer Mt. St. Helens.  We both snowshoed up the mountain, but used different methods to descend.  Mike snowshoed back down while I snowboarded.  Carrying the extra weight of my snowboard and boots up the mountain was worth it, because the descent was nothing short of epic.  Since it was fairly early season for climbing, we almost had the mountain to ourselves; we saw less than 10 other people during the entire day. 

Mike gearing up at the truck in the dark.  We left at 3AM  to get to the mountain and start before the sun came up.  Needless to say, I did not sleep but a few hours the night before because I was so excited for the trip (and because I was up until midnight getting all of my gear ready).

That's me in the far distance towards the center of the picture (this shows how much faster Mike is at snowshoeing).  It was my first time on snowshoes, so what better time to try than when climbing a mountain with a 40+ lb pack on my back?  The bulk of snowshoes definitely takes some getting used to, but I only tripped a few times. :)

Some beautiful snow formations including drifts, cornices, and even a few small avalanches

...about half way up, and we were finally above the clouds....and the views abounded!

Mt Adams in the distance with a lenticular cloud.  The cloud looks cool for its lens shape, however, Mike (who is an experienced mountaineer) educated me that it is actually not a good sign since these clouds form when there are high winds at the top of the mountain (high winds over on Mt Adams means high winds on Mt St Helens are likely, since there are no peaks in between to block the wind).

I had to take a few breaks to rest my legs because they started cramping.  Mentally, I can push myself and my body to do things that are far beyond my capabilities, however there comes a point where my body will not keep driving, no matter how hard I push.  This is one of those times.  At least it was a nice sunny day and the view was so spectacular, that I didn't mind kicking my feet up to relax every now and then. 

As we approached the top portion of the climb, it was very important to try and keep skin exposure to a minimum.  Even with SPF 50, I developed a nasty sunburn on that little part of my forehead that you can see exposed in this picture.  The more intense UV rays that come with high altitude, coupled with the reflection from the bright white snow, results in blinding bright sunlight.

Well, we almost made it to the top.  We got within a few hundred feet of the top edge of the crater before the harsh conditions forced us to turn back early.  The high winds coupled with pure ice on a steep incline made for conditions that Mike judged to be not worth the risk of completing the summit, even with the crampons we had packed.  Given the state of my almost failing leg muscles, it was not too hard for him to convince me.  Besides, Mike reminded me of an experienced hiker who died the previous month at Mt Hood due to a fall.  We decided to not become a statistic and to live for future adventures.  It took us about 6 hours to climb 5700 feet up the mountain. 

As Mike proceeded to snowshoe back down, I had a little time to kill so he could get a head start (as my descent by snowboard would be much faster than his walking down).  I sat for 30 min to enjoy the view, eat my lunch, and rest my legs some more in preparation for what might be considered the most epic ride of my life. 

Solitude.  Bliss.  Carving deep snow with fresh tracks everywhere I turned.  No rules. No boundaries.  No people.  No work.  No stress.  Just me and the mountain, becoming one in a true moment of Zen.  I respected her sheer size, immense beauty, and insurmountable strength.  She rewarded the efforts of my climb ten-fold. 
These are the closest that my feeble words can come to express how this day felt and what it meant to me.  Until you have pushed yourself to do extraordinary things, and until you have seen the tops of mountains that you have climbed with your own two feet, you have not truly lived.  I long for my next adventure, yet I fear this will one day be my downfall.

on the way down, Mike caught a shot of my snowboarding just before dropping into this cornice

*I want to give a very special thanks to Mike for providing his expertise and companionship on this climb.  I really could not have done it without him.  I also respect to the fullest degree that he did not let his pride get in the way of making a safe judgement of whether we should proceed with the final few hundred feet to the summit.