Descend Into Madness

See the album here

It began innocently enough. Long ago when I first moved back to LA I began perusing guidebooks of local mountains that I had been too busy racing my bike to pay attention to the first time I lived here. And, those who know me know that I love a challenge, and that if you tell me something is really hard you'll make me want to try it even more. When I read that Iron Mountain was "the hardest climb" in the San Gabriels, I was totally in. Just a matter of when.

But life happens, and there are many, many other adventures to be had. Also, the route I wanted to do required a shuttle (I was pretty sure--and after having done it you have no idea how grateful I am that I didn't try to do a yo-yo) and I usually end up going solo on my rides and runs. However, my time to pull up stakes from SoCal is really drawing nigh, and I've been making a real effort to cram in all I can while I'm still here. At June's ortho class I brought maps and such to dinner with my friend Steve, who thought it sounded like a good enough time. We made the plans for after I got back from Colorado.

I at least had the presence of mind to set an early start time, which is good because I ran a little late, then the car shuttles took longer to set up than planned, etc. But we stepped off the chair at Baldy around 10:30 and thought we'd be fine. Off we went up the rude beginning that is getting onto Devil's Backbone. Every time I do that route I see how people get themselves into trouble in winter--windy, icy, and dangerously exposed, sometimes on both sides. We clambered onto the top and discovered the usual hordes at the summit--fortunately, Baldy has lots of stone windbreaks to accomodate them.

We didn't tarry long, and we struck out for West Baldy which we could see. I missed the use trail to the summit of West Baldy and I'm glad I stopped a hiker coming up when things didn't seem right--turns out we were headed down to the Village via Bear Flat. That would not have done. We turned right and scrambled straight up the hill onto the top and looked around. On the map it seems fairly obvious which is San Antonio ridge. In the field, in retrospect, it was decently clear, but we wanted to be dead sure--ending up on the wrong ridge would have been worse than ending up in the Village and having to hike 4 miles up the road. There are no trails from West Baldy, so we were on our own. We scrutinized the ridge to our left, and shot bearings off what we thought was Baden-Powell (it was) and at least I still remember how to do that...

Still not 100% certain, we agreed to hike to the first peak on the ridge and turn around if it seemed...not right. As we started down the steep shale slope, we found a faint use trail, and as we continued slipping and sliding down we began to see cairns and figured we must be on the right route because there was nothing else out here to get to. We had a bit of trouble keeping to the ridge to find the saddle because we kept having to dip below the edge to avoid thick stands of pretty vicious chaparral. We were averaging about 1 kph, and figured we'd get to Iron around 6 or 6:15. We downed some chow and set off again. The chaparral was harder to avoid in this section, and after crashing through a short stretch we decided to don pants--stinging nettle my ass, we saw none. But I'm oh so glad I thought there might be and insisted be both bring pants.

We kept making our way along the undulating ridge, and finally around 4:30 found ourselves staring at Iron Mountain's fabled arete. If you don't know an arete is a rugged, rocky knife edge in mountains. It was class IV for sure, but even if we had ropes the rock was so loose and crumbly it wouldn't have held. We eyed it and got spooked--it looked sketchy. We discussed alternatives: we could try to go back the way we came and suffer back up all the loose crap and chaparral we descended, we could try and descend into the Alison Gulch drainage and find the old mine trail to the car, or we could try and descend into the drainage on the other side and pick up the Fish Fork canyon and hike out via the narrows to the car. All of them involved hours of grueling work we didn't have, and only bail-out #1 was a known quantity. We gulped, took deep breaths, and decided to try the aretes and hope it looked better on the other side.

The rock was loose, but if you were slow and careful and tested all your holds before weighting onto them, it was ok--not quite as scary as it looked, but a screw-up would have meant serious injury or possibly death, so it was a little tense for me. Even while it was tense, it was still kind of fun--I pretended I was Jamie and thought of how much fun she would have been having. It took a while, but we finally made it to the top at 6:30PM. What a relief! I signed the register, we had a quick bite, and 10 minutes later we were headed down an obvious use trail down the south ridge. The light was beginning to turn golden, but I figured (based on what I know about my pace) we would be at least down onto the properly built trail that made up the bottom 4 miles to the car by 9, if not at the car by 9. Unfortunately, I didn't figure Steve into that. Poor Steve!

He was strong the whole way to Iron, and was doing better than me on the arete being a better climber. But by the time we got to the top he was out of water (we both were) and tired, and had blisters on the pads of all his toes which made his descent pure and slow misery. Add to that that while the "trail" was better than nothing, it was steep hardscrabble in many places and studded with yucca onto which you could impale yourself if you weren't careful. I agonized over our slow pace, watching the sun drop lower and lower and the light turn redder and redder until it was going, going, gone. I forgot to pack my headlamp--I never dreamed I'd need it. I didn't think Steve had one either and was getting really nervous because we were still on that shitty trail in the dark. There was a point at which I squatted down on my heels and "glissaded" down that way. It turned out to be the safest and most expedient way down in many places. I tried to keep my panic at bay and told myself that we were ok, we were safe, we were on trail and headed down, all we had to do was keep moving, even slowly and eventually we'd get to the car.

Fortunately Steve had a headlamp and fortunately (did I also mention it's about new moon time so that was no help?) the trail was still fairly easy for me to see in the dark, with no confusing forks or treacherous sections. I also happened on a white manzanita bush as it was getting dark and flashed on when I went to ecology camp in 5th grade and they taught us that if we were thirsty we could suck on a manzanita leaf (the white works best since it's bigger) and it would help us salivate and feel less thirsty. Damn if that shit doesn't work! Thank-you Whiskeytown Environmental School!
I kept leading the pace, and I could hear an occasional moan or mumble from Steve behind me. I felt wretched--I know how much he was suffering and it was all my fault (I warned him that this was an untested route and anything could happen, but still...it's my nature to feel responsible). I have been in many an adventure race and felt just like him--blisters, thirst, hunger, nausea, exhaustion, etc.--just wanting to curl up and not move another inch for a week. It's then that you rely on your teammates, and I tried to be a good one. Towing was not an option, and he wouldn't let me take his pack. So I tried to keep calling out our elevation as we dropped to try to keep his spirits up. Every time I checked in with him he quoted the episode of the Simpsons where Homer becomes a missionary and shouts "Get me off this damn rock!".

By this time we were at least onto better trail, but around 10PM we came to a clearing and Steve lay down and curled up like a shrimp. He was officially miserable. I ticked off our options: we could both stop and sleep in the dirt, I could leave him and hike to the bottom to get water and hike back up, or we could keep going. They all sounded pretty hideous, but Steve opted for the last and hauled himself up. He kept telling me how hardcore I was but really, he was. I know how hard it is to dig beneath that suffering and keep going when every fiber of your being is shouting "Fuck this!" and wills you to quit. And for the record I was better off than he was, but I was pretty done too.

At last we saw the lights of the campground below, and popped out. We headed over to the nearest one where people were still up (it was nearly midnight) and asked for water. An older man was nice and gave us some ice and his last small bottle, but this younger sketchy dude walked up to a tree in front of us and pulled out 5 knives that had been thrown into the trunk, and then crawled into a tent and made some strange crashing noises. Steve and I thanked the nice man and headed out the last half mile to the car. 12:15 was the official finish time. Except that we still had to drive up to the ski lift to get my car. 1:30AM then. That bottle of gatorade that Steve left in my car for the finish sure tasted good. I led him down the mountain and onto the 210 while I took the 10 and jesus h. christ on a raft that was one of the scarier parts of the outing. I drew a grateful breath as I exited onto Cloverfield. I hobbled into home and texted Steve I was home safe. He did the same. I had to extrasuperduper scrub myself to get all the grime off--it was like patina! I think I crawled into bed at 3:30 after drinking another pint of water.

And damned if I was just wired! Could not sleep. Decided to get up and go to review class with Kirsten (it was pretty excruciating) like a good kid. I drank another pint on waking and it was still a few hours before I had to pee. Cripes. Today my quads are screaming at me and my whole body is so tired it's hard to concentrate, but I'm still glad we went and did it. I got my wish. And even Steve agrees. Yes, he's still talking to me and seems like he still wants to be friends. We survived the gnarliest hike I've done outside of racing. Fair play to you, Steve.

Engineer's Guide to Cats

Jen sent this to me last week so I am using this study break to put it up here, especially for Karen! The corporal cuddling technique made me laugh, but the cat yodeling made tears come out of my eyes.

Happiness Is

Watching the sun set and listening to the birds conversate while reading the Mountain Gazette with a Mothership Wit in hand. That is all.

Colorado My Home

6-22-06

Yeah, finally getting around to finishing this. The internet tradishunz are unreliable here at Chateau LoLo this week, what can I say? I’m back in LA now, and not exactly happy about it. Would you believe I cried actual, real tears as the bus pulled out of the Boulder park/ride? Yes, I did—I didn’t want to leave that much. What a life I can see for myself there and then some—the only hard part is trying to choose between Ft. Collins and Boulder. I see why some people say that Ft. Collins reminds them of SLO—it’s similar, a smallish college town with bikes a-plenty (almost a 1:1 bike/resident ratio) and more delicious beer than you can shake a growler at, and some killer housing stock to boot, trails and climbing areas right next to town, with proximity to more if you want to venture into Rocky Mountain National Park or go the other direction into southern Wyoming.

I did finally get to visit New Belgium (they were closed on Monday after I finally found it) and it’s a pretty neat model of business and sustainability—they even give you a cruiser (many people have been enjoying Fat Tire Ale, a flagship beer, for years) after a year of employment and a trip to Belgium after 5. I also had plenty of time to wander around town on foot and explore, and even run some trail around one of the local reservoirs, which kicked my ass since I haven’t been running and it was hot and dry as a bone that day. I also got to spend many hours with my brother’s girlfriend’s mom Mary, who was kind enough to put me up and feed me and let me watch her garden while picking her brain about all things Ft. Collins or Colorado. She has a beautiful old house about 100 years old right in Old Town, adorned with prayer flags her friends bring her when they vist Nepal and a garden (she is an amazing gardener/farmer and even does work professionally) filled with baby herbs and veggies just starting to grow in the ground. She rides and hikes and backpacks and skis and shoes. She co-founded an outdoor school with her ex-husband. I’m really quite in awe of her. She also dos indeed make a killer pesto from the basil she grows, which we sampled on pizza with pignolas for dinner. People rode by on bikes day and night—students, cyclists, commuters, you name it. Seriously, I think I might have to flip a coin.

Jamie’s birthday on Tuesday was also lots of fun—she is gorgeous no matter what she wears or how grubby she gets but damn that girl is exquisite when she dresses up! We met some friends at the sumptuous Med for dinner and drinks and I had a nice time getting to meet even more of J’s very wide circle of friends. One of them was a cyclist (one of the few—most of ‘em just climb) so I made sure I got some beta on the local riding scene. It sounds agreeable, to say the least. Wednesday was more of a lazy day—we met Jamie’s lovely LA friend Donna for coffee at Amante (seriously amazing) and then I tried to motivate to go to the school and poke about but lagged and then it looked like rain (it didn’t much). I did get to have dinner with my old classmate White Eagle and catch up with him on the personal and professional goings on, which was no end of fun because we each keep in touch with different people. He had a rough first year owing to joining a practice full of dishonest douchebags, but he’s on his own now and doing fine. I also had an interesting (and tasty) beer from Left Hand out of Longmont called Juju Ginger which tastes like, yeah…ginger. It was really quite good. If it sounds like I’ve done nothing but drink beer and eat pizza for two weeks, that’s about the size of it, btw.

Thursday was my last day in town. We met Donna on her way out at her beautiful hotel for breakfast, and then bought tickets for a ride on Banjo Billy’s Bus Tour of Boulder—we just HAD to. In the mean time, we resolved to…laze on the couch and watch a beautiful little film called Once. I have the soundtrack in my head to this day (when it’s not playing the Decembrists, that is). We got downtown in time for lunch (yeah, you guessed it—pizza at Old Chicago’s and a local micro called Hazed and Infused (very good!). We found a bunch of older ladies sporting red straw hats in front of the Boulderado hotel and figured this must be the place.
We got on the bus that was built to look like a log cabin but came out looking like a hillbilly shack (read the whole story by clicking on the link above) and set off to hear tales of ghosts, suicides and sex scandals that are the stuff of legend. We even got mooned by 3 frat boys as we drove through the CU neighborhood known as The Hill. The stories made Jamie sentimental and not want to leave Boulder for even a little bit.

The final adventure was a bbq on a farm east of town where Shala (who wasn’t able to take me skiing that day but promised she would if I ever came back) does some work. The ramshackle barn was full of cool old stuff, including a very old-timey sleigh and piles of old skis. Even the gates were made out of skis. Soon a few of Shala’s climbing buddies showed up and we started in on the food and beer. A couple of groups each showed up with a dog, one of which was an adorable 4-month black lab/border collie mix that I just wanted to scoop up and take home. He had fun nipping the heels and trying to herd the other dog (a chow mix of some kind) until the chow put him in his place. A few of us played on the swing hanging from a giant oak tree until we realized we were getting eaten alive by mossies. There was even a guy who grew up in Santa Rosa so we had fun picking each others’ brains and comparing California with Colorado. The sunset set the clouds over the mountains on fire, and then a large moon came up and lit up the place almost like it was day. Lightning split the sky a few times in the east and thunder rumbled but no rain came. They say that’s pretty typical. What an awesome way to spend a summer evening—I am totally signing up as soon as I figure out where.

Alas, Friday morning dawned and it was time to stuff everything back into the suitcase and pack (how had I ever gotten it all in to begin with?) and head on over to the bus stop to come back to LA. Jamie and I laughed as we hugged good-bye and promised to keep in touch (neither one of us really has any idea where we will be or what we will be doing in about two months) and that was it. I really did cry for a few minutes as I left—just welled up and got all plum-pitty and sad as the bus pulled away. I guess I should pay attention to those heart strings—they grew like honey-suckle vines around a Kentucky barn in those two weeks I spent there. It's been so long since I could make a choice about my life from my own heart I've almost forgotten what it feels like. The other song I’ve had stuck in my head since I’ve been back? Colorado My Home from The Unsinkable Molly Brown.

3 Days in Snowmass

6-16-08

In Ft. Collins now, waiting for lunch to arrive. Now I’m confused, because so far I really like this place too. I’m also fairly certain that when I visit Bend I will like it, and if I go to Utah to hang with Jamie in October I will find that agreeable too. I have a distinct pain about leaving California too. I just handed over my driver’s license to get a beer (Skinny Dip from New Belgium, simply divine!) and thought that if I move here I will have to give it up and get a Colorado one. Which shouldn’t be giving me this much anxiety because all I have to do is return to California and apply for one and I’m a Cali girl again. Totally silly. I think too about what if I stayed in northern Cal, and while part of me really wants to, another part of me would feel like I was missing out, settling for the comfortable and the known rather than seize this opportunity to start over in every sense of the phrase and explore part of the world I have never before seen. It is clear that that would be the best thing for my adventuring…I would pretty much have to learn how to climb and backcountry ski to live here, and I’ve wanted to do that for years so what is my problem exactly? Separation anxiety, I suppose. And because I really do love California with all my heart and soul, it is a hard place to leave. But opportunity is deafening…

So I’m going to wander about the town and see what’s here today, and then have dinner with Jen’s mum who apparently makes a mean basil pesto. More on Ft. Collins later.

The backpacking though! Just wow. Eye-popping, jaw-dropping beautiful those Elk Mountain are! The driven-too-hard-for-my-own-good part of me is a wee titch disappointed that we didn’t get all the way to the top, but most of me is just slap-happy I got to see what I saw. And I got to meet Jamie’s friend James who is seriously good people and might even take me up Rainier in August after my boards!! It deserves some exclamation points—if I get to do Shasta with Craig in August and the JMT in September this is going to be the best year of adventure I’ve had in a long, long time. And that’s not even considering canyoneering in Utah in October with Jamie…

So, we got to the trailhead around 1, after lunch in Glenwood Springs and finding Jamie an Ensolite pad at a local army surplus store. Even without the polarized glasses, everything looks riotously green and blooming and…the prodigal summer, I guess. Get it while you can, ‘cuz life (or at least the growing season) is kinda short. My new pack is awesome btw—totally comfortable. And while I will always love cooking in the backcountry, I may have made at least a partial conversion to dried food that cooks in a bag from Mary Jane’s Farm, especially for days of long hiking when all you want to do is eat and not wait half an hour for dinner to be ready. Anyway.

Everything was going swimmingly until we hit our first creek crossing. We could scooch across a log over a very cold and fast-moving snowmelt runoff, or find a better ford. We opted for the ford and hiked back downstream a ways, nearly got attacked by a mean dog belonging to some douche who was camped WAY too close to the creek, and found a spur trail leading down to…the best place to cross. Which wasn’t great, but…James went first, and toward the far side stepped in some holes up above his knees (he’s 6’1”). Jamie and I cast side-long glances at each other and I set out, trying to position myself so my knees wouldn’t get buckled by the current, and was quickly in so much pain from the frigid water I just crashed through to the other side as fast as possible. James and I surveyed the wet hems of our shorts and ruefully joked that we had wet our pants. Jamie made it across, and we prepped feet and changed back to hiking shoes, and soon encountered another trib that wasn’t as easy to cross as James had remembered. We hopped across rivulets and threaded our way upstream, and finally decided to build a bridge from some deadfall. They said it was an easy crossing, but it looked sketchy so I opted to go back down and wade. After that the bushwhacking along an intermittent game trail into our Camp 1. It wasn’t the traditional Camp 1, but we were tired and it was getting late. We found reasonably flat spots with good access to Snowmass Creek and a relatively bare spot for a camp fire. James was a champ and volunteered to pump water both nights (about 7 liters at a time!). Jamie and I set about trying to find firewood.

We discovered that even though it hadn’t been super warm, the marshmellows had glued themselves together in a morass of sugary, bleached goo. The chocolate shattered like glass. The graham crackers weren’t much better off, but we made due and they were delicious. The temperature also dropped precipitously, and I was grateful to be able to dry out my shoes and socks (too bad one sock got a little too close to the heat and burned…at least it was an old pair). I slept ridiculously well, considering it was my first night out. I think I finally crawled out of my tent at 8:30, about 2 hours after I normally get up. The sun was melting off all the ice crystals from the leaves on the ground, and as soon as the sun came up it was HOT.

More creek crossings and cow path scouting awaited us. James found a bunch of vertebrae in the debris of a slide area. The trees were bent over at a steep angle to the slope and the uprooted fir trees were obviously from much higher up. I discovered the joy (and by joy I mean ouch) of stinging nettles that, while not too high were stingy enough if you dragged your flesh through them just right. We reached the traditional Camp 2, had lunch, then set down packs to cross the talus slope toward the waterfall. I wanted to try to get all the way to Pierre Lakes at the top, but the trail was anything but clear after we came to another snow-covered slide, and we opted to turn around there after taking some awesome pics of Jamie frolicking. Jamie added that she wanted to try to hike back to trad Camp 1 in the interest of less trail time the next day, and we had a lot of daylight left so off we went.

We found tent sites that were a bit downhill. Jamie said the next day if the tent door hadn’t stopped her she would have slid down into the creek. We woke up to the most amazing vista right outside the door. Have I mentioned that Mary Jane’s Farm is the best? We made short work back to the car—the slowest part was opting to scooch across the creek on a log that was a LOT rougher on actual contact than it looked from the shore. Foolishly, I opted not to don pants. James says he got some pretty great shots of me making painful grimaces as scraped my tender inner thighs along that damned tree.

The next few hours were a most wonderful sightseeing tour of Colorado. We headed toward Aspen for lunch, and then drove up Independence Pass where, upon getting out of the car we were accosted by a woman who wanted to know if we had “any beers for sale” that she could purchase to take the sting out of waiting for someone to come and tow/fix her car so she could get home to Leadville. It was chilly and windy at 12-something thousand feet, and I reflected that I shouldn’t be wearing sandals until I saw the woman ahead of us hobbling through the slush in wedge-heel sandals and gave her the award instead. We did the obligatory pictures at the vista deck, and spotted two really hot guys and skis getting ready to head up to where a few people on snow mobiles were already towing skiers. Jamie swears one of them was Bear Grylls. God I love this state!

After that we sped through Leadville and on to Idaho Springs, where we sat in an expensive and over-chlorinated hot spring tub that wasn’t nearly as nice as Avila but felt good all the same. Then, on to Beaujay’s for pizza and beer. I had a Skinny Dip (summer offering from New Belgium) and Odells 90 Shilling (do click through on the link and read the side bar where you can actually take classes in brewing science and the best master's project in the world), both awesomely delicious. We even got back to Boulder in time to upload pictures and watch The Flying Scotsman with Agnes draped over the top of the teevee. The pack, btw, performed brilliantly--light and so comfy--I can't wait to add ultralight bag, shelter, and cookset to the mix for the JMT in September. What a brilliant trip!

Soundtrack of Boulder Part 1

The Decembrists are coming!

Boulder Dispatch #1

So, I've been here for about 3 days now, and I really, really don't care if I never go home, other than to collect my kitties of course. I would have to get really, really good at riding bikes and climbing rocks and mountains, and running them, and wouldn't that totally suck? I can't believe how clear and clean everything looks, and just...uncrowded. I'm sure this town has its share of ass-hats as well, but so far everyone I've met (and Jamie knows LOTS of people being the beautiful and charismatic social butterfly that she is) has been pretty cool. And I know that I'm still in the throes of novelty as when anyone goes to any foreign country, and in about a month I'll probably be crying for the familiar (although not all of it, I guarantee). But still. What an awesome town this is!

I got in Monday night, and headed over to South Sun brewery where Jamie works to have a beer and wonder what to do with myself until she got off. As it turns out I didn't need to wonder much--I had hardly started my fragrant and herbaliciously hoppy FYIpa when a friend of hers who works at the legendary Neptune's Mountaineering walked in with a friend, so the 3 of us sat and ate and drank together. Shala is going to take me on my first backcountry ski adventure next Thursday before I go home! We got to go in and see Neptune's today, which has a climbing museum with some pretty amazing old gear and some quirky gross stuff like a preserved frost-bitten toe off one of the local mountaineers. They also have a bench made entirely from ice axes, with which I fell in love with instantly and want one for my future porch for sitting in with someone special after a long day of adventuring with dogs at our feet and beers in our hands and a setting sun in front of us.

Tuesday was kind of an overview day--we wandered about downtown, got some coffee, wandered some more, saw the exquisite Shambala Center, wandered some more, then when Jamie left for work I hiked back into town and saw Blindsight and bought a couple of books I'd been wanting. Yesterday we did mostly trip errands, and spent some time lusting after stuff in the Montbell store (especially these quilted down skirts. We did get to go to the local community acu clinic and have treatments, and the acu was very nice and very cool when I told her I was a newly minted grad and wanted to work/open a CA clinic of my own someday. Plus, since the insomnia is back it really really helped me sleep the last 2 nights. I did another monster urban hike around the south/east part of town. I was fairly knackered by the time I got home, and after washing dinner down with another fantastic beer offering from New Belgium (which we are going to visit in Ft. Collins next week--yay!) I was all in. I think I woke up with drool on my face this morning.

Now, we are putting the finishing touches on our packs to be ready for when James picks us up in the morning to go to Snowmass for 3 days of backpacking. We had a great day--breakfast at Lucille's complete with beignets, sealing James' tent, an intensely beautiful hike to Mallory Cave (closed for bat nesting at the moment) in which we fortunately discovered that the soles of my boots were ready to peel themselves almost completely clear of the boots within 2 miles of hiking (guess I get my wish and don't have to hike in heavy boots after all...hope it's not TOO snowy up there...). We finished by giving ourselves sushi bellies for dinner in town and then dispersing to pack. I'm excited to take out the new pack--I wonder how it will feel after a few miles on the trail? Stay tuned...

I Finally Saw Blindsight!

So last night I hiked into town to catch Blindsight at the Boulder Theater, and words can't express how glad I am that I did--it was beyond awesome, for so many reasons. I really needed to see this right now as I'm trying to figure out just what getting off the sidelines and becoming engaged will look like in my new life as an acupuncturist. My favorite part, other than the kids playing in the ice palace near the top of the peak, of course, had to be Sabriye, the German woman who funded her own way to Tibet after being told by her country's peace corps that they couldn't place blind people in the field, and founded Braille Without Borders, a school for blind kids in Lhasa. She was simply. totally. luminous. I wish I had $20 to go see it again tonight...


The film closed with this--there was a point on the climb when one of the girls was singing this song softly along the trek, but this guy is truly awesome. He got the biggest cheers of just about anyone, I think:

Music For a Wednesday

Not the least of which has been happening this last week, but I feel like I really need these right now.

Farewell to the Angeles 2-Fer

It may or may not have been my last trip to the Angeles--I'm hoping to do an awesome x-c route linking up Iron Mountain with Mt. Baldy and maybe some others, and I still haven't done the Bridge to Nowhere and the Fish Fork Narrows. Perhaps later in June when I'm back from CO. Brock wants to do Sans G and Jac, but that can be a Farewell to the San Bernardinos.

7AM came early on Saturday after a late night for both of us. Chris confessed he was about a hair's breadth from texting me that he was bailing--he said he almost called Brock and asked him to come along but was so afraid he'd want to bail that he didn't. But he rallied, because if he hadn't I don't know what I would have done. Maybe I'd have gone, maybe I'd have done something else, I don't know.

It was a perfect day, though--bright, not too warm, not too windy. The lot at Icehouse was its usual jam-packed self, but most people don't seem to make it up even as far as the Saddle, so I wasn't too worried. We set out at our usual brisk pace, and began catching people group by group. Somewhere around the 2 mile mark we came on the first group of what must have been a huge Scouting trip--I swear we must have passed nearly 30 of these guys by the time we got to the Saddle. What we immediately noticed was how. much. stuff. they were all carrying. Not only were the packs huge but they were also hill-billied out with all kinds of stuff festooning the outsides--stuff I'd never seen on a backpack, like full-size lawn chairs, hack saws, and the like. Turns out the were heading over the Saddle to Comanche for one night only...I remember backpacking through there on my way up from Lytle Creek and about losing my shit because the little gnats kept getting into every conceivable facial orifice as I crawled up that drainage trying to catch up to my group that had left earlier that morning.

Onward we sped with our feather-light daypacks until we reached the Saddle, where a stiff cold wind was screaming through the gap. We found a spot in the lee of a tree to stop and refuel, and then on up the Cucamonga Trail to our destination. The backside section of that trail is really fun--mostly undulating sidehilling that goes fast. There was almost no one back there either...so quiet! We passed that creepy mine opening, and soon we were at the second saddle that put us onto the final ridge we would be climbing. Up, up, up...at least a mile of those switchbacks and damn we marveled how quickly they get you up or down! Before we knew it we were at the fork. Where most people went right, we went straight onto a much less-traveled trail that would take us over to Etiwanda.

Etiwanda isn't labeled on most trail maps, including the USGS quads, but it IS on the Sierra Club 100 Peaks list. It doesn't see much traffic. As we contoured around the ridgeline, we got to cross more small snowfields...snowfields that had NO tracks at all, so we knew that no one had been there at least since the last snowfall. We had a bit of uncertainty deciding which of the little bumps on the ridge was the peak, and got to do some steep x-c exploring to figure it out (it's not marked on the map, right?). The climbing register nestled in some craggy rocks gave it away. The last entry was 11/27/07. We added ours and spent a few moments looking about at the stark and fire-scarred landscape. A look over the ridge down into the valley lands to the east below showed that the fire had burned all the way up to this point, had probably burned over most of Cucamonga or at least around it and up the east side of Ontario/Big Horn.

We found the use trail going to the peak immediately, and tromped happily along the main trail until we lost it--easy to do when trails don't get used much. We kept walking through virgin snowfields and knew that we had not come this way before. We sought higher ground, and there it was...which we followed until we lost it on the backside of Cucamonga again. Except for no water it would have been an awesome place to camp...perhaps a winter "expedition" when there is snow to melt? We opted to just charge straight up onto the peak rather than try to find the trail, follow it all the way around the frontside and then take the fork back to the top. What I like about Cucamonga is that there are so many nice open sandy spots relatively protected from wind that you can stretch out in and relax before the descent. Chris started talking to a guy who had recently moved here from Kazakhstan while I made a sammich from my last bagel and some swiss cheese. After signing that register and taking some more pics, it was time to head down to the car.

The descent dropped us as quickly as it had pushed us up. Before we knew it we were at Icehouse Saddle and amazed to still find people coming up from below (it was about 2PM at this point). Around the 2 mile marker we caught up to these 2 high school kids who decided that they would rather descend in front of us than behind us, except that they weren't particularly faster than us, but not really slower either. The kid in the lead kept a fairly steady pace to keep away from us I think, but his buddy kept lagging, and Chris was having a lot of fun picking up the pace until the kid would hear footsteps behind him and start booking again, without ever looking back. It may sound stupid here, but it was pretty funny there, and I was laughing so hard I was afraid I was going to trip and fall.

It made the descent go all the more quickly, however. Soon we were at the cabins and after than we were spit out into a now pretty deserted parking lot. As always, it felt good to put on sandals and head for home. We'll see if it was good enough training for Snowmass or not...

Not that I didn't LOVE Dr. Hardy's address, but god damn--take Samantha Power's address to Pitzer's class of 2008 and imagine turning our health care delivery system on its head and the importance of Chinese medicine and Community Acupuncture to serve as alternative ways of thinking, being, doing it...