Devil's Peak Hike
My brother and I have good times together. It will be a sad day (for me) if he ever gets married. ("That will be a saad dayyyyy, a saaad dayyyy. That will...") But let's not think about that right now.
For the record, 5.5 weeks ago we had the first bishop ordination at Hopewell since Bro James Roth was ordained sometime before I was born. The vote was Friday evening (May 16), and Saturday my brother and I went hiking southwest of Mount Hood.
The destination was Devil's Peak Fire Lookout. We never made it.
On the way to the trailhead, our 2001 Toyota Echo scraped along on the ridge of snow between the tire ruts. In the interest of being able to exit from the place when we were done there, we parked in a snow-free area along the road and hiked the rest of the way to the trailhead.
The trail was initially free of snow. We counted down trees across the trail until we reached 30 or something. As we ascended higher, the air became swelteringly hot along the steep trail. We reached the first trail portion with snow on it after at least a mile. It's nice to hike near snow, because you can take a handful of snow to suck the heat out of you, rub it on your face, etc.
It's nice to hike near snow. On snow is another story -- not exactly nice, but a good challenge.
Before long the entire trail was covered with snow. We crossed a couple streams, and then the trail became REALLY sketchy.
It became "Do you see any blazes [on the trees]?" "Let me wait here while you go look." "There's an orange thingy." "I'm not so sure about this." "So we can see those blazes behind us -- when we come back we'll be able to see where to go from here."
The adventure began to defy much of what I've been taught about staying on the trail, not getting lost in the woods, etc.
But we did have a GPS unit, and there were always the streams to follow in the event we completely lost the trail.
Progress was slow -- hiking in snow takes extra time and effort, and searching for the trail was tedious.
Conversation included: "Do you want to keep going?" "If I was here with my girlfriend I probably wouldn't do this." "Ummmmm." And also "Well, we shouldn't get lost because we do have the GPS unit and we can follow the streams."
My brother proposed that we quit the trail entirely and head out for the peak. I considered this with significant trepidation, but neither of us are to be outdone by the other and we decided to go for it. I should note that by this time the snow was at least 3-4 feet deep. I made tracks with a stick for a while, and we tried to make good footprints to follow back.
We crested one rise and found someone's geocache -- a whiskey bottle hanging on a tree with a note inside written on a Marlboro cigarette box. It was hard to read the writing, but included something like "You'll make it." Normally the bottle would be a little ways out of reach, but due to the snow cover it was near eye-level.
We kept going and eventually came to a false summit near a fairly steep drop off. I entertained ideas of avalanches and snow cover that was unsteady or covering some massive hole.
We were very close to the real summit, but it was late and we were tired and there was no obvious way to reach the summit from our position. At this point my brother mentioned that the GPS unit might be low on batteries. So we turned it off to save the batteries for when we really needed it.
We filled our water bottles with snow (and a fir needle or two) and began following our footprints. The footprints had melted to some extent, and the stick marks were easier to follow. Occasionally I would see patterns in the snow that looked like partly melted footprints, and would follow them and go astray.
All went well until we had almost reached the first stream. At this point I saw a blaze on a tree and went that way... and came to the stream only to discover the stream was steeper and covered with more trees at this point than where we originally crossed. There were down trees all over the hillside, some partially covered with snow. I wonder what were the chances of setting one of the trees to shifting and crushing me? Thankfully it didn't happen.
We chose a tree laying across the stream in a downward angle, and slide down it to reach the other side. We could not find the trail. After crossing the stream, the trail was supposed to be near by, but all we found was a VERY steep slope covered with vegetation.
We discussed the situation, and decided to turn on the GPS unit. It notified us we were 400 feet away from the trail (!!), 400 feet away and up a very steep hill.
We began to descend toward the trail, eventually found it and took a picture of our crazed but happy faces.
A full body workout was that descent -- the sort where you have to sometimes spot a tree to let yourself fall/slide toward so it can catch you.
Yes, it was a good hike and we didn't die or become perpetually lost. It was a good time.
For the record, 5.5 weeks ago we had the first bishop ordination at Hopewell since Bro James Roth was ordained sometime before I was born. The vote was Friday evening (May 16), and Saturday my brother and I went hiking southwest of Mount Hood.
The destination was Devil's Peak Fire Lookout. We never made it.
On the way to the trailhead, our 2001 Toyota Echo scraped along on the ridge of snow between the tire ruts. In the interest of being able to exit from the place when we were done there, we parked in a snow-free area along the road and hiked the rest of the way to the trailhead.
The trail was initially free of snow. We counted down trees across the trail until we reached 30 or something. As we ascended higher, the air became swelteringly hot along the steep trail. We reached the first trail portion with snow on it after at least a mile. It's nice to hike near snow, because you can take a handful of snow to suck the heat out of you, rub it on your face, etc.
It's nice to hike near snow. On snow is another story -- not exactly nice, but a good challenge.
Before long the entire trail was covered with snow. We crossed a couple streams, and then the trail became REALLY sketchy.
It became "Do you see any blazes [on the trees]?" "Let me wait here while you go look." "There's an orange thingy." "I'm not so sure about this." "So we can see those blazes behind us -- when we come back we'll be able to see where to go from here."
The adventure began to defy much of what I've been taught about staying on the trail, not getting lost in the woods, etc.
But we did have a GPS unit, and there were always the streams to follow in the event we completely lost the trail.
Progress was slow -- hiking in snow takes extra time and effort, and searching for the trail was tedious.
Conversation included: "Do you want to keep going?" "If I was here with my girlfriend I probably wouldn't do this." "Ummmmm." And also "Well, we shouldn't get lost because we do have the GPS unit and we can follow the streams."
My brother proposed that we quit the trail entirely and head out for the peak. I considered this with significant trepidation, but neither of us are to be outdone by the other and we decided to go for it. I should note that by this time the snow was at least 3-4 feet deep. I made tracks with a stick for a while, and we tried to make good footprints to follow back.
We crested one rise and found someone's geocache -- a whiskey bottle hanging on a tree with a note inside written on a Marlboro cigarette box. It was hard to read the writing, but included something like "You'll make it." Normally the bottle would be a little ways out of reach, but due to the snow cover it was near eye-level.
We kept going and eventually came to a false summit near a fairly steep drop off. I entertained ideas of avalanches and snow cover that was unsteady or covering some massive hole.
We were very close to the real summit, but it was late and we were tired and there was no obvious way to reach the summit from our position. At this point my brother mentioned that the GPS unit might be low on batteries. So we turned it off to save the batteries for when we really needed it.
We filled our water bottles with snow (and a fir needle or two) and began following our footprints. The footprints had melted to some extent, and the stick marks were easier to follow. Occasionally I would see patterns in the snow that looked like partly melted footprints, and would follow them and go astray.
All went well until we had almost reached the first stream. At this point I saw a blaze on a tree and went that way... and came to the stream only to discover the stream was steeper and covered with more trees at this point than where we originally crossed. There were down trees all over the hillside, some partially covered with snow. I wonder what were the chances of setting one of the trees to shifting and crushing me? Thankfully it didn't happen.
We chose a tree laying across the stream in a downward angle, and slide down it to reach the other side. We could not find the trail. After crossing the stream, the trail was supposed to be near by, but all we found was a VERY steep slope covered with vegetation.
We discussed the situation, and decided to turn on the GPS unit. It notified us we were 400 feet away from the trail (!!), 400 feet away and up a very steep hill.
We began to descend toward the trail, eventually found it and took a picture of our crazed but happy faces.
A full body workout was that descent -- the sort where you have to sometimes spot a tree to let yourself fall/slide toward so it can catch you.
Yes, it was a good hike and we didn't die or become perpetually lost. It was a good time.
posted by Claire at 18:52
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