Gannett - If peak bagging follows hand grenade or horseshoe rules I won :)

So close... My neighbor calls me last week and said he was talking to his cousin Rod and he wanted to climb Gannett Peak this year from Green River Lakes but couldn't find anyone to go with. I called Rod as Gannett was in my sights... I had been watching the weather and it was looking like Sat would be a perfect day. The plan was to leave Friday afternoon sleep in the car at the trail head until 3:30 summit by noon and be back to the car in time to get home before church on Sunday. That was the plan anyway. We arrived at the trail head at 10:30 and slept until 3:30 as planned. We had a full "Harvest" moon and beautiful clear skies, all was starting out perfect! The first two miles weren't as fast as we hoped (due to a couple unplanned pit stops because of the pizza, chocolate milk and muffin fighting in my stomach :(). We arrived at 3 forks in a little over 3.5 hours. From the trail you could see Tourist Creek and the water was flowing pretty good. I wanted to try Wells but we decided it wasn't worth the risk chancing the water so we started across a meadow to find a place to cross the river. We stopped for a second to look at the map and all of the sudden we hear this low roar... then the ground started shaking EARTHQUAKE!!(here is a link). So it wasnt the biggest of earthquakes but it scared me pretty good. I sat there looking at the rocks above the canyon we were about to ascend and wondered if they were shook enough to come tumbling down. After a moment of silence and the mountains staying were they were we decided to proceed. We tried to convince ourselves it must have been an airplane or something else. Here is a pic of where I was standing during the first earthquake I think I have ever felt. Its hard to explain the rumble we heard prior to the ground shaking but being in the quiet mountains when it happened was a very surreal experience. We walked upstream to find a good place to cross. There was a downed tree that we waded to, climbed up on, and walked across. Not the ideal way but we didnt fall. Here I am crossing the tree Once across the river we picked up a faint game trail headed downstream which took us to a few cairns pointing up Tourist Creek. The cairns were short lived and after ditching my trail shoes and hiking poles (because I get sore feet I decided to pack my approach shoes and wear my Brooks Cascadias on the trail) we started the endless boulder hopping. I kept remembering being told "Tourist Creek is a bear" and I would have to agree! We went high on the climbers right side of the canyon to get out of the car sized boulders and into the smaller more manageable ones. Here is a pic of the traverse across the boulder field. The views were amazing and "almost" made you forget how exhausting jumping across a mountain is. Route finding was easy and we were soon at the divide getting our first glimpse at Gannett. We were moving slower than I anticipated and were now about 7.5 hours into the hike. Here is a pic from the divide with Gannett in the background. As you can see the snow that fell a week ago hadn't melted yet. It was hard to tell just how much that was going to effect the rest of our hike from here and we pressed on. As recommended we stayed to the left and avoided descending to Scott Lake. At Lake 10795 we stayed left and then crossed over and up another boulder slope toward the base of Minor Glacier. Here we stopped for a PB&J sandwich and Rod discovered he was out of water. Knowing we could get good water from the glacier we headed across and found a great place to fill the camelbak. This has to be the best tasting water ever! The traction on the glacier was solid and we traversed directly across to the base. Here is Rod coming across As you can see we were starting to get into snow. We also met up with tracks from previous climbers and I was glad to be able to have another reference for the route. We started up the finger to the col heading to the saddle then the tracks we were following started heading right. The better line was to continue straight up, so we kept to the shorter route. We reached the couloir heading north and their were no tracks?? Here is a picture of me looking at the map verifying this was the correct way. We continued on assuming the others knew of another route further across the face. We slowly worked our way through the loose rock and soft snow to the saddle. Here is where things got interesting... The Class 4 section had firm snow and ice in it making it much harder to climb. I started up and climbed one section that Rod didn't feel comfortable with and there he decided he would play it safe and turn around, it was the downclimb that worried him. Hearing about a fixed rope from earlier trip reports I decided to continue on and try to find it. I did find an empty sling and figured someone had taken the rope. I really wanted to touch the summit!! I knew I could climb the route but was unsure about the descent. I was so close to making the first section but the last few moves were very slick and the holds were not the greatest. I looked on the south side trying to convince myself that the exposure wasn't that bad... crazy!! I even considered summitting and waiting for another group to come up the main route and beg for a rappel, again not smart. Not knowing what to do (and not even knowing if I would have trouble downclimbing what I had already climbed) I decided it was a great time to say a little prayer. It was after that that I knew I needed to leave this summit for another day. The downclimb proved easier than expected as I found alternate lines down the sketchy parts I climbed. Soon I was back with Rod at the saddle looking at the amazing views in all directions. Here is a pic of where I think I climbed to: It was now a little after 4:00... the realization that we would be be hiking in the dark twice in the same day started setting in. Rod was a trooper and pushed himself amazingly well to the top but I wondered if he had enough in him to make it back. We did pack emergency bivouac gear but that was an option I really didn't want to rely on. Also I knew my wife would start getting worried if she hadn't heard from me by Sunday morning (I had my cell phone on the entire trip and in one spot on the west side of the peak during the climb I received 2 txt messages. I stood there trying to get a message out to her letting her know we would be late but the signal was gone and I couldn't get it back). I'll try to abbreviate the return... we followed our route back and didn't have many issues. I did take a short detour to see if I could tell which route the other climbers had taken. Shortly after the spot where their tracks headed south they took shelter in some larger rocks then turned around and went down. I wondered if maybe they were there a couple days prior when the weather forcasted 70mph winds?? I am typically a good navigator but Rod had to "refresh" my memory a few times when the terrain didn't look familiar. We made it to the descent into Tourist Creek when darkness set in and we dug our headlamps back out of the packs. Coming down the boulder fields in the dark would definitely be more of a challenge. As some of you know I have replaced my camera, gps, maps, watch, and many other techno toys with my iPhone. I use "Runmeter" to track my route and pace. I then use "Trimble Navigator Pro" for detailed topo maps and to point out my exact location. The Runmeter app came in extremely handy to track the last part of Tourist Creek to our stashed gear... it led me exactly to it in very dark conditions. We changed back into our trail shoes and decided to try to find a shortcut to the trail. The route was shorter but involved bushwacking through some pretty thick trees/downfall and then navigating another boulder field. We reached the river and worked our way downstream hoping to find a shallow place to cross. Luckily we found one, crossed and bushwacked up to the trail... what a relief to be on a trail again! We had been hiking for about 19 hours and ONLY had about 11 miles to go. We both started off at a good pace but after about 2 miles or so Rod yelled ahead telling me his "Rocktane" had wore off. **Rod had never tried GU before and prior to the trip picked up a few Rocktane flavors (he hated the orange :)). I also learned from a climbing partner on a previous Teton climb that "Zip-Fizz" can work wonders when you are starting to crash and I gave him one to pack at the car. It was a combination of his will and determination and the little kick of caffeine every few hours that was keeping him going. I knew Rod was going to make it and I really wanted to be at the car so I continued on ahead clearing the way of all the things that go bump in the night (trust me there are a lot of them when you have been awake for 20 or so hours). I rolled in to the car at 2:23am... Here are a few of the stats pulled from my phone Total trip time = 22 hours 53 minutes Total Miles = 36.65 Total Calories Burned = 6394 Total Elevation gain/loss = 12472/-12472 ft ascent ***This ascent figure had me confused also... when I got home and transferred the track log into my map program it read 7865 ft of ascent I then transferred it into Google earth and it read gain/loss 10756 -10756??? Here is my theory - the gps in my phone is more accurate than my 4/5 year old Garmin, I believe it tracked the up and down of the boulder hopping along the way giving a extremely accurate gain/loss figure. Plugging it into a topo program the figure there is based on the contour lines therefore the variation isn't as much. No clue on Google earth. I changed clothes and put on the Crocs, wow were they a relief! I also hoped I had enough time to get some sleep so I would be able to drive at least to cell reception to call my wife and let her know all was OK. About an hour later Rod came strolling in... he seemed to have plenty of energy and was even smiling (I was delirious still though so who knows :)). We drove to cell reception woke my wife up (dang she is a good sport) then continued on until snake river canyon where I decided I better rest for as little more. After a short rest we were off again. My dad lives in Afton, WY and as we passed through I called and talked him into making us breakfast :)... Although he made me earn it by setting up his new iPhone5. The Wind River Range is definitely one of the coolest around. Now that I have recovered a little I would recommend this trip to anyone able (although if I do it again i am going to try the Wells Creek route).

Thanks to all those that helped with TR, beta, etc!

 Here are some links if you want gps info
Google Earth KML
GPX File

Map of the route:

Picture showing the route from Tourist/Wells Divide Tony

King for a day... Well in a day

Yeah I have that stupid song from the Thompson Twins stuck in my head now... 

After seeing a window in the weather i convinced the family (minus daughter that hates hiking and prefers shopping with grandma) to take a trip to Kings Peak. We left Cache Valley after Garrett's soccer game around 6:30 and headed to the trailhead. Luckily I new the way as Garmin really wanted me to take the two track back roads a few miles before the Ft Bridger turn off. 

Based on intel from a previous trip I learned that the front bed (passenger seat) of the Subaru was sufficient for a few hours of sleep and I knew Garret + one adult fits very well in the back so we left the tent at home and slept in the car. It wasn't the best night sleep we have had but it worked... 

We were on the trail by 5:30am with one headlamp and the cheapest single aaa battery flashlight my wife could find in our house. Needless to say we probably could have used more light but me made due. Garrett in front with the headlamp, I followed next and Jill was last with her prized flashlight. Going up the trail I couldn't believe how big the rocks were and how eroded the trail was (more to this later). 

Garrett was setting a fast pace and the miles were flying by. This is a LONG approach! We made it to the cutoff to the shortcut gully and Jill decided she would stay back with Dakota the dog as from a distance it looked steep and scary. Garrett wasn't scared so we headed through the marshes to the entrance (I lucked out and picked a direct line to the gulley and didn't have any issues with swamps). 

As we started up the gulley I thought for sure we were the first ones up but upon closer inspection there were 2 people about 2/3 of the way up. They were moving slow and luckily they were being careful as there were many lose rocks. I let Garrett lead and he found that the "down" trail worked well for the climb. It had rained the day before and the dirt wasn't very lose. He would run up the trail 20 yards or so then wait for me to catch up and repeat the process. I have no idea where he gets the energy but I kept waiting for him to quit and he didn't. In fact he caught the group ahead of us at the ridge and we ended up being the first to summit this day. After taking summit pictures and having our traditional summit feast, PB&J and Gatorade we headed back down to find Mom. The climb from the top of the chute to the summit reminds me of Hyndman and was relatively easy to climb/descend. One thing to be prepared for is there are several false peaks during the climb 

We were back to mom in no time and started the long trail back to the car. Once we crossed the foot bridge Garrett wants to trail run a little, mom didn't so we went on ahead and planned to get the car packed so when she got there we would be ready to go. I learned previously from hiking in the dark that distance seems shorter it was still 5.5 miles back so we decided to only run the smooth section and walk the rocky one. This is when I learned my next lesson... Rocks look much larger when casting shadows from the headlamp of a short 9 year old. I thought the entire trail was ridiculously rocky on the way up but on the way down it had many (too many) nice runable sections. Determined to see if Garrett had the endurance to make it I was pushing him a little... All was great until he tripped on a root and fell. After some consoling he was back up and moving although we slowed the pace a little. We made it back to the car at 3:18. Total trip time of 9hrs 48mins and 23.01 miles. Mom rolled in a while later and we headed home 

It was a great day! 

Here are a few pics: 

This is the first major intersection. You want to go left. 
 

This was our route to the shortcut chute. I'm guessing they must graze sheep up there as there were many narrow trails to follow. I picked the most direct route and it works perfectly. 

 

One funny thing... There are a ton of Rockchucks up there. At the base of the chute I had Garrett stand on a rock so I could get his pic and one came out right buy him. I'm pretty sure he thought it was a bear because he jumped off and ran to me with a look or terror in his eyes 

Here is Garret on the summit: 
 

It must have been cold as there appears to be a little frost on my beard.



This is a great hike, challenging as far as the distance goes but nothing too technical. The views were amazing! It is a very popular hike though... even on a Friday in Sept there were probably 20 cars in the parking lot and at least 25 people summited after us (all had camped overnight). 

KML Link - LINK

Granite Peak - as a day hike

What a day!... After following the weather forecast for a while Saturday was shaping up to be a perfect day to try to summit Granite Peak. I was determined to make this trip happen as it is hard to have schedules and weather align like they did. Again I have to say thanks to this forum as not only did it give me the details on the BEST ROUTE BY FAR for Granite it helped me find someone crazy enough to attempt this trip with me. I really didnt want to hike solo in the night in grizzly country :).

Got a call from Doug in Boise on Thursday and quick plans were made to meet in Idaho Falls Friday afternoon to head to Cooke City, MT and begin our journey early the next day.

I met Doug as planned, we loaded up my Subaru and headed for the start of the trail as Bob and Splattski described in their excellent trip reports. The drive through Yellowstone was nice but since we weren't their to see buffalo, antelope, deer, etc it was a little annoying having to stop in the middle of the road and wait for people to get their wild animal pics... We finally arrived in Cooke City and grabbed a bite to eat and a few last minute supplies. I always like to check in with the wife before I get into the mtns and lose cell service, just so you all know Cooke City does not have cell service at all. It does however have a wifi hotspot at the visitors center (which was closed but the crowd in front using the hotspot kindly gave us the password “yellowstone” in case anyone ever needs it). With technology from Apple I was able to get a txt out to my wife. Now for the part the locals don’t tell you. If you drive up the Lulu Pass road on the way to the trailhead right at the first junction AT&T has full 4G coverageJ.

We arrived at the trailhead around 8:00 and were greeted with one of the coolest old mining towns I have ever seen. Instead of going straight to sleep we had to explore all the old cabins and abandoned mining equipment. Here are a few pics… its almost worth the trip just to see this stuff.

After finishing exploring the mine and getting our packs ready we decided sleeping in the Subaru aka “MotorRu” would be safer than sleeping on the ground in bear country. I must have done a great job at hydrating as I had to get up and pee twice in the short 6 hours we attempted to sleep… sorry Doug.

The alarm went off at 3 and we were on the trail with headlamps blazing around 3:30. There was a lot of talking between us during the beginning of the hike. Doug’s bear bell wasn’t making enough noise so I decided I would have to do it J. I blame the extra talking on my first and worst wrong turn of the day… while following a trail I missed a creek crossing and ended up walking a full 180 degrees without realizing it. This was one of the eeriest feelings I have ever had… we were headed south and I thought it was north! We were navigating with my iPhone but to save batteries I had it off in my pocket as the trail was pretty good the trail started getting worse and worse so I finally took out the phone and realized we had strayed. Looking at our location on the map I thought we needed to go left (but I thought north was south). We went left and the location indicator on my phone was showing we were going further from the trail. Something was wrong, had my phone lost our position,  was the map messed up?? Doug took out his GPS and verified north and south, we decided to trust my iphone map program again and bushwacked in bear country through lush grasses and thick forest back to the trail adding probably about a mile to our already long journey ahead of us.

Below is a picture of the map. The red line was our tracks the blue line was our intended path based on the map from Bob and Splattski. Notice the fun little loop just north of Lady of the Lake J

For those of you trying this hike in the dark with no moon and high efficient led headlamps here is a little advice (if you do this in the daylight it is way more obvious of a trail) :

1.       If you ever start following a trail that hasn’t been well travelled you are on the wrong path!

2.       Look at the map above the red arrow shows the first stream crossing. As soon as you get to the stream cross it,  DO NOT FOLLOW IT DOWNSTREAM J

3.       At the blue arrow there is a major trail junction, stay right (unless you want to go to Aero Lakes). When we were there someone had put trees across the path to the right as it isnt the main trail but is the one needed for Sky Top Creek.

4.       Just after the blue arrow is the 2^nd stream crossing. Again do not head right until AFTER you cross the steam and get back on a well-travelled trail. We bushwacked steep heavily forested trees trying to find a trail as my freehand of the map wasn’t accurate here.

Once back on the trail things went pretty smooth navigation wise… well maybe we had a few scenic detours and “short cuts” but all in all it wasn’t bad. A mile or so before Lone Elk Lake we had enough light to turn the headlamps off and start to enjoy the amazing scenery along the way. I couldn’t believe how green everything was and how much water is in the area. I knew from the map there would be a lot of lakes but was surprised with the vegetation.

Here is a picture of Sky Top Creek

I am not a photographer but I got extremely lucky with this picture. This is looking across Rough Lake at “The Spires” and peak 11379 with a perfect mirror image reflecting in the lake.

Here is a picture of Granite Peak from above Sky Top Lakes. This was the first good look we had of the mountain. It was hard to believe the top was only 2000ft higher than we were… I swear it looked much higher!

We started our final ascent around 10:15 and passed a party coming down after already summiting earlier. They said we had a group of 5 ahead of us and to watch out for falling rock. This is becoming a popular route as there were at least 15 or so people using it this day (and probably another 30+ lined up to do it tomorrow). Most had a printed map from the summitpost TR and Splattskis website J.  The directions were perfect and finding the SW Couloir (I still don’t know the correct pronunciation of that word…) was easy. Now the true fun begins, Doug may disagreeJ. I love scrambling and easy rock climbing and truly enjoyed my route to the top. Someone had put up fixed ropes and webbing in a few places along the way. It really isnt needed and I made it a point not to, besides I trust myself more than an unknown anchor and aged rope.

Here is Doug just below the first fixed rope… I may have the camera tilted as I don’t remember it looking that steep in person.

Tom and I must have similar taste in routes as I chose straight up the middle of this picture. There is an “easier” well cairned route to the right but I prefer solid rock over the loose stuff and had no problems.

Once on the ridge the route to the top has several cairns. I chose staying climbers right along the top, the exposure was a little spooky in a couple places but overall not too difficult climbing. I shared the summit with a few other climbers and had enjoyed my favorite summit lunch PB&J. It was 11:30 and we had been hiking for 8 hours, I felt surprisingly good but still wasn’t looking forward to the hike out.  

Here is a panorama from the summit (I finally found an easy way to resize pics J, use the “Export Picture  to Folder “function in Picasa)

Doug enjoyed the way down and we safely took our time. After checking the fixed rope and anchor I decided it would hold and would make a fun repel so we used it. Here is the picture Doug’s wife isn’t supposed to see, please don’t tell her.

Once down the mountain I kept a steady pace knowing I needed to be back to the car in time to make the 6 hour drive home. Need to keep the wife happy and get enough sleep to be able to make it to my early Sunday church meetings. I tried taking a couple shortcuts on the way back… some worked much better than others and probably ended up costing us time overall. One thing about me is I am sort of like a horse headed back to the trailer… Once I can “smell” the car I pick up the pace. At mile 20 I decided to run the flats and walk the hills back to the car. After a while I decided hiking in the dark makes the trail seem shorter as I didn’t realize the car was still over 5 miles away.   I arrived back to the car at 5:50… I had ran out of water about 2 miles before the car and couldn’t wait to get the cold chocolate milk in my cooler! It felt great to change into comfortable clothes and the crocs and I packed up the car and thought I would have a little time to take a quick power nap before Doug showed up. I was either too excited from the amazing day I just had or too sore from the endless rock hoping as there was no way I could sleep. It didn’t matter anyway as soon Doug came around the mining cabin. You could tell he was glad to be done. He had also run out of water and decided to tough it out to the car instead of pumping water from the lake.

What a day! 25.5 (although we are officially rounding up to 26.2) miles, 14 hours 20 mins car to car, 6781 total feet of elevation gain/loss, 4057 calories burned, new friendships made, many new stories to tell, no bear sightings, perfect weather, just amazing!! I highly recommend this trip to anyone able as it is definitely one of my best hikes to date.

     

We completed our Idaho 12ers by climbing 2 in one day!

As Garrett's summer vacation was coming to a rapid end he and I decided to attempt to climb our last 2 12ers in one day. Thursday was my birthday and I have a 2 year tradition of birthday peak bagging (Grand Teton/2011 and Carrauntoohil/Highest Peak in Ireland/2012). For 2013 there couldn't be a better way to spend my birthday!

 Me on Top of the Grand 2011

Carrauntoohil from trailhead

Carrauntoohil up close. I went up the left of the pic and down the right. This was a very cool hike!

Enough of me... back to Garrett's goal of finishing the last two Idaho 12ers before school started (Monday the 19th). Because of the local fair, where my daughter participated in Horse 4H (Halter and Equitation), Pig 4H (Showmanship and Quality) and Garrett showed our family dog in Showmanship and Obedience, we only had the day of my birthday to climb. After getting my Daughters pig (named Bacon) entered, washed and prepped Garrett and I loaded the MotoRu (Our Subaru motor home)and headed for Mackay.

We found the trailhead just fine, set up camp and got some sleep. We wanted to wake up early knowing we had a big day ahead of us. The alarm went off at 4:45... Garrett did not want to wake up. I realized it takes a group to get him going in the morning, during our Church/Donaldson hike he didn't complain once when he knew other people were getting up preparing to leave. When it is just dad I guess an early start isn't as much fun. After some chocolate milk and a lot of convincing from me we finally got started up the trail at 5:45am. 

The trail was very well marked (or so I thought). In my rush to get to the top I missed a fork in the trail and ended up following trail markers that are for the descent of the scree gully, ugh. I figured we would go up the scree and hope to find a good route.

 Here is a cool pic of Garrett with Mt. Idaho in the background.

Here is a close up of that cool looking tree from the previous picture

Here we are starting to see what we were going to have to climb to get to the top. Its going to be a while before Garrett picks the route as he wanted to try to go directly up the middle.

I took this picture on the way down but it shows our route to the top. We stayed to the right of the gully and found pretty decent footing. All in all it really wasn't a bad way up.

On our way up we tried to stay on solid rock and out of the scree and talus as much as possible. We did get off the ridge in a few places due to trail markers (which again are probably for the descent). In hindsight on the way down I realized taking the ridge up as far as you can seems to be a better route, more exposure but better footing. Here is a pic of our climb to the left of a loose section.

At around 10:15 we were on top of the summit of Mt Idaho. Here is Garrett's favorite summit pose with Borah in the background. There wasn't a summit register on top??

The shortcut down the scree gully was fun! Garrett found a cool feather and wore it in his hat the rest of the way down... asking me every 5 minutes or so if it was still there.

After getting back on the trail back to the car we made good time and finished the first one for the day around 12:30. Our lunch of choice while hiking is PB&J sandwiches (made only with mom's homemade raspberry jam) I made a couple and we ate and relaxed for a bit then headed off to the trailhead for our second peak of the day (Lost River Peak).







PART 2 - Lost River Peak


 My Dad came over from Star Valley, WY to explore the area by Challis and soak in a hot springs there. He also wanted to see these big mtns his grandson had been climbing. Its too bad the smoke was so bad while we were there as you really couldn't see the mountains very well as the day progressed.

One cool thing about Lost River Peak is you have cell coverage for pretty much the entire way. There were several people tracking our progress during the climb and it was fun to be able to send pics, txts, and emails along the way. We arrived at the trailhead for Lost River and started the relentless climb to the top at 2:00. It was starting to get real smoky as the wind changed during the day. I'll take smoke over thunderstorms though, the weather still showed 0% chance of rain. Here is a pic of Garret by a cool dead tree on the way up the lower section

 After climbing the lower ridge we beelined up through the trees coming out exactly where we wanted to at the start of the super gully. There was a real nice campsite that someone made. Here is a picture of Garrett standing in it.

Now the fun began... this climb was physically tough! Bad air, steep slopes, no shade, LOOSE scree, tired legs, hot temps, etc made this one the hardest climb of the 12ers for me (although it was by far the most fun descent, more on that later). Here is a pic of Garrett before the real steep fun began. We tried to stay left and climb the rocks when possible. I use hiking poles and they were essential for making forward progress in the loose sections.




 Once we got past the narrow section we made our way left to the west ridge. The smoke was so thick you only see a red dot where the sun was.

 Here is Garrett on the bottom of the west ridge with the smoked out peaks in the background

Here is Garrett walking up the west ridge. Notice how you cant see the road in the background due to the smoke.




Once we made the top of the super gully the hike along the knife edge ridge to Lost River peak went fast. At about 5:50 Garrett found the summit register and celebrated his 9th and final 12er!!

Now the fun began... going down the super gully was a BLAST!! I was glad that we were the only ones descending as we forgot Garrett's helmet so I let him use mine. We were hoping to be back to the car by 7 originally, because it was after 6:20 before we started down the gully we knew it wasn't possible (or was it). Here is Garrett ready to run down the gully.

I used my phone to video the first half of our descent but it didn't turn out.. makes it look like we were on flat ground, it was real disappointing as we flew down the top part! We had to stop midway down to empty our shoes. Look how many rock we were carrying in our shoes, ouch!

Not sure if I read about this before but we tried a little trick to keep the rocks out of our shoes for the rest of the way down. It worked amazing! We didn't have to stop again to empty our shoes.

With one full stop to empty shoes it only took us 30 mins to go from the top of the SG to the small camp at the base of the SG. Definitely the best 12ers for the descent! Even the rest of the way down through the trees went fast as we were back at the car at 7:10... if we just wouldn't have had to stop to empty shoes we may have had a chance to make it to the car by 7...

Here is Garrett at the car throwing his hat at me in victory

Here are a a few links to GPS data of our day:
Mt Idaho
KML Link:
GPX Link:

Lost River Peak
KML Link:
GPX Link:

All in all our day consisted of 10,000 ft Vertical elevation gain, 12.42 total miles and just over 12 hours of hiking/climbing. The next day dad was sore and Garrett was back to his normal. In fact the next morning as I was going up the stairs with Garrett to his room he sprints up the stairs as usual and I pull myself up the rail as my thighs burn in pain...

What a great time we had in the mtns of Idaho over the past several weeks! We met several great people during our journeys and hope to see all of you again. Each mountain presented its own unique challenge as no two are alike in my opinion; these aren't your typical tourist hikes where you follow a defined, maintained trail to the top. We were very fortunate as the weather was always perfect for us. Garrett was a trooper, he amazed me each time we climbed as he never once wanted to give up (well maybe except for the traverse to LR from Breit were I decided to turn around and a few early morning starts :-)I just hope I am able to keep up with him in years to come as he progresses and I become older.

 A BIG thanks to all that helped us reach our goal!

2 More complete (Church/Donaldson) only 2 to go.

We met a group of 8 people from Boise to Burley for this climb. 2 peaks, 8 miles, 5500 ft elevation gain and over 9 hours of entertainment.

Below are a few pics and recap of the journey.

Here is a picture of the 2 peaks we climbed. The one on the right of the picture is Mt Donaldson the one on the left in the shadows is Mt Church.The route to the saddle climbs right up the middle angling to the right.



Here is a picture I got from the web that shows the route up through the cliffs/scree to the top of the saddle.



Garrett showing me the way up the "stairs"


Here he is showing me a shortcut to the top of Donaldson. The picture makes it look steep... it was :)


This is Garrett on top of Donaldson #6


Here is a picture of Garret and our local sherpa guide Kerry on top of Church. This was Kerry's 9th and final 12er!It was Garretts 7th.We met Kerry and a group of 8 people the night before our hike. Garrett out hiked all of them. He was quite the celebrity on the hill as everyone had to have their picture with the 9 year old that was climbing these big mountains.


Here is Garrett helping me down the scary ridge from Church


I loved this pic. Garrett is doing a fun scramble back up to the ridge on Church. Look close he is half way up the cliff.


Here Garrett is making sure I don't get out of control on our scree slide down to the rock skipping pond.


This is a cabin in the mouth of the drainage leading up to Church (N Fork of Jones Creek??). I sure wish I knew the history of it.





Click Here for a link to all the picture we took during the climb.

GPX Link - Here is a link to download the GPX tracks if you want it.

KML Link - Here is a link to download the Google Earth tracks.

Only 2 more peaks to go... Its going to be tough to get them done before school starts, wish us luck.