Mt. Shasta

Again, sometimes things turn out different than planned...

10:45, I am Here I am at 13000ft, just above the Red Banks of Mt. Shasta by myself. It's Saturday morning I am pretty tired, and the clouds are moving in. What to do? I sit down and weigh the options... Wendy is back at the car, I hope at least. She turned around an hour in the climb atabout 8000ft, feeling nausceous. At the pace I am moving right now it will take me at least another 2 hours to the summit. I walk for about a minute and rest for two... I feel pretty weak... I guess I would go for it if one of my buddies would be with me, but looking at the weather, and considering that I won't be able to reach the summit by my set 'turn-around-time' of 12pm, I decide to turn around and go back...

How did I get there. I had planned the 'Shasta-in-a-day' attempt with Andrea and Koushik two years ago, right after climbing Mt. Whitney together. But by the time we managed to line up our schedules it was too late in the season and the conditions on the mountain were rather bad.
We postponed to last year. Again we ran into scheduling problems, especially since the low snowpack cut the season short. On a skiing trip this spring, Andrea said: "We should just pick a date for Shasta and go for it!" Well, that's what we did. This weekend was chosen... Koushik has moved to Portland since, and is uber-busy, he wasn't able to make the weekend. Andrea came back from some extended travel Wednesday night, and felt exhausted, he opted to rest during the weekend. So it was Wendy and me to give it a shot at the mountain.

We left the Bay Area Friday after noon at 4pm. Our hope was that we could beat the commute traffic. These hopes were smashed! It took us a good 2 hours to get to I 505. From there on it was smooth sailing all the way to the town of Mt. Shasta. At 10:30 we purchased our summit permits at the Bunny Flat trailhead and set up camp at a pull-out a little bit down the road.
It was a pretty cold night, but I got some quality sleep. A few minutes before 3am I was woken by a guy who stumbled through our camp looking for the trailhead...It was not a big deal, since our alarm was set for 3 anyway. It took us a while to get ready and all geared up. By 3:20 we were back at the trailhead and left from there at 3:30. We followed some footsteps up the hill, assuming that we were on the right trail... We couldn't have been more off! At some point I decide that all I wanted was gaining a shoulder, to actually get a view of the mountain, to determine our position and the directions we had to take. At 5 we reached a flat area with now trees, which allowed us a free look at Mt. Shasta. I could make out some lights on the Avalanche Gulch route! Yes, we were all set! By this time Wendy decided to turn back due to her feeling bad... Although I felt bad for her, I would have felt worse if I had turned around at this point too... So I headed towards the lights I had seen before. It seemed as if I had a straight shot to Lake Helen. But it turned out that the way we had taken, took us to far to the east, so that I had to cross to ridges to actually make it to Avalance Gulch. By 7 I had reached Lake Helen.

The next section of the climb was the hardest for me. To get from Lake Helen to the beginning of the Heart. At some point I realized that I was running on 'Empty', I simply had not eaten enough. I sat down on the snow and munched away on some dried apricots, cashews and some bars. All this was swahed down with a few swigs of Cytomax. Soon enough the food kicked in and I felt pretty good on the right side of the Heart.
Even reaching the Red Banks and making my way through the chute (this being the place where I put on my crampons for the 1st time) I felt good. But by the time I made it through the chute and half way up the hill. I was not feeling as well anymore, and realized how slowly I was moving. I also learned that the hill I was looking at was not Misery Hill, as I had hoped, but that Misery was still out of sight on top of the hill I was facing.

So here I am... Turning around...
I am back at the car by 2pm. Completely shot. My respect for mountaineers has increased tremendously! What kind of feats those guys pull off at really high altitudes is just amazing!
For me it is back to training! I need a better endurance and I need to learn how to move faster uphill. One lesson I learned is that I will take hiking poles the next time. Yes, there will be a next time, although this was one of the toughest things I have done so far.

If anyone has suggestions on how to train for mountaineering (while living at sea level) let me know!