Bittersweet

We were successful early Wednesday morning in our summit of Mt. Hood. The weather was perfect except for a constant cool wind. The ice couldn't have been better for clawing into with our crampons. We had great views of the surrounding mountains: Three Sisters, Jefferson, Adams, Ranier and St. Helens.
Derek and I were pooped. Bob didn't show any signs of wear and he's 51, ten years older than me. He's been to the top at least 40 times. Five years have passed since Derek and I had been up with him. The biggest difference apparent to both of us was the difficulty involved in coming down. A different set of muscles is used and if your knees are a little overworked, it can be very painful in the easiest declines. So you resort to glissading whenever possible. That's where you sit on your butt and slide down trails made by butts before yours. I couldn't do it this year because my pants gathered up too much and made my private life scream for mercy. Derek had moderate success until about a third of the way down when his crampon got caught and wrenched his foot into an awkward position. He described a healthy pop or snap in his ankle and he was done for the day. Mountain rescue had to be called in to get him off the mountain, a three hour ordeal involving snowcats transporting medical techs up to him to assess his condition and organizing hauling him down to the Timberline Lodge parking area where paramedics looked at him a little more. His wife Deanna drove up from Gresham and took him from there to the hospital last night. I haven't heard how bad his ankle is yet, but I'm sure it's going to have an impact on the business for a while. Despite the sad ending, it was a great day. I'll be putting the rest of the photos into its own page and link you to it in a future post.