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Published: October 1st 2008
2133 vertical meters in height and 15 km in length in 30 hours of time, that was the challenge laid out before us. Set in the idyllic mix of pastures and conifer forests of Northern California, Shasta is the second largest Cascade Volcano at 14,179 feet. According to legend, Lemurian aliens are said to live inside. I signed up for the guided trip last April, and for the last 5 months I prepared for the biggest physical challenge of my life.
I lost 9 kg (20 lbs) over the course of 6 months to lessen the load on my joints. I spent several weekends above 3000 meters, including a peak bag of Mt. Dana, leading up to the summit trip to expose myself to high altitude hiking. Mt. Shasta ranks as the 5th tallest mountain in California and is the 11th most prominent peak in the United States. The rapid and strenuous altitude gain, combined with extremes of weather and exposure makes Shasta a tough trip. I took 2 days off work, making sure I secured a tepee at Stewart Mineral Springs for the much anticipated day of rest and relaxation at possibly the best Hot Springs Resort in the
Cascades.
The History
For 10,000 years and over 10 eruptions
Native American tribes including the Shasta, Modoc, Ajumawi/Atsuwegi, and Wintu have made the Shasta area their home, speaking reverently of it through myths. In fact the name of Shasta is derived from the Native American word “Sastise”. This makes Shasta the only major mountain in the West with an official Native American name. The first sighting of Shasta by Europeans appears in the records around 1820, and the first successful summit of Mt. Shasta was in 1854. After the California Gold Rush, attempts were made to turn Shasta into a National Park but they mostly failed.
The Sierra Club purportedly gave less attention to Shasta as large areas of forest on its slopes were decimated by clear cutting, unlike other pristine areas in the Sierra Nevada and Cascades.
John Muir, in a style like no other, says it best in 1890:"The Shasta region may be reserved as a national park, with special reference to the preservation of its fine forests and game. This should by all means be done..... The Shasta region is still a fresh unspoiled wilderness, accessible and available for travelers of every kind and degree. Would it not be then a fine
thing to set it apart like the Yellowstone and Yosemite as a National Park, for the welfare and benefit of all mankind, preserving its fountains and forests and all its glad life in primeval beauty? Very little of the region can ever be more valuable for any other use--certainly not for gold nor for grain. No private right or interest need suffer, and thousands yet unborn would come from far and near and bless the country for its wise and benevolent forethought."
This is a familiar theme for
America, North and South: An exotic landscape teeming with rich cultures that is taken from the natives by force. The land that remains is considered "wilderness", mostly untouched by human hands and devoid of natives. Settlement by Europeans follows, done under the guise of ideas like 'discovery' and 'exploration'.
This is my narrative of America, my connection to
all of America through it's people and places. Pristine landscapes of ice, stone, forest and ocean that beg the question: What should we do with all the natural beauty we have been blessed with on this Earth?
The Hike
The hike was an enchanting uphill stroll through thick
Red Fir forest. The Red Fir(
Abies magnifica) forest is one of the most enchanting in California apart
from the Redwood and Sequoia Forests. Living at an elevation termed the "Snow Forest", which sometimes can receive more than 30 ft of snow, the Red Fir forms pure stands of
dense trees that alternate between magnificent giants and broken snags crushed in half by the force of the snow pack. The mature Red Fir forest has a mystique few can ignore. Even though much of the old growth forest was harvested, I could have sworn I saw more a few trees that were older than 150 years old.
Slowly we came out of the Red Fir into the white firs. Then above the white firs, things got sparse and the dominant tree line species from Yosemite to past crater Lake appeared- the
Whitebark Pine. The Whitebark Pines form stunted groves of
gnarly specimens, the only species able to survive deep snow packs and harsh winds of the Cascade Range treeline. Higher still, even the white bark pines thinned out, growing not as trees but bushes in a form called
krummholz: trees that grow into dwarfed shapes by exposure of wind and cold. Soon even these hardy conifers disappeared, as we climbed a huge 300 meter ridge to a flat perch of
rocks. Finally home at 10,000 feet this was our base camp for 2 nights. A small stream of water from a melting snow patch provided water that needed no filtration. At sunset the stream simply shut down, the ambient temperature apparently freezing the melting snow. The view was fantastic as the sun went down, from the alpenglow on Mt. Shasta's upper slopes to the hundreds of miles of high desert and Cascade forest.
That night the guides cooked a fantastic dinner of soup, creamy chicken pasta and cookies for dessert. They went over the plans-climbing concerns, route, what to expect- for the 430am start the next morning. Our lead guide Keith had climbed Shasta over 90 times and also climbed around the world from Asia to Africa, while our second guide Dane was also a guide for
Denali and
Aconcagua which are both over 6000 meters high. We were in excellent hands! The 2 guides and 4 of us clients went to bed at sunset, with my tent mates and I talking about our blistered feet from stiff mountaineering boots and expectations of the big day ahead.
The Summit
I felt good about the 430am wake up call. Having
laid out my things the night before, I got dressed, had breakfast made by the guides and we broke camp by 515am. It was completely dark, and we had our helmets, headlamps and glacier gear. The climb is really more like a steep and dangerous hike. We used our skills the guides had taught us, from food caches and hydration to strides and breathing techniques. After about 1 hour of uphill slogging later we took our first rest as the sun rose in the distance. This first hour was really magical, from hiking in total darkness with headlamps to seeing the extended alpenglow on the summit before sunrise. We gorged on water and snacks stuffed in our pockets.
Soon it was off again to the trail, up the huge ridge straddling 2 massive glaciers. An hour later and past boulders and scree we took the second break. Water, food, stretch, breath, look, rest. The sun was fully over the horizon now, the weather was warmer and the hiking was harder. A stiff breeze quickly chills you to the core as your sweat wants to turn to ice, and off we went again. The hiking became more and more challenging,
with loose volcanic rocks on sandy soil sliding away with every step. Hiking on stones which turned into rocks which turned into small boulders the higher we got. Soon, the small boulders were massive blocks of lava.
This was the worst part of the trail- it was now above 12,000 feet, and the gradient was getting steeper while the footing became looser. Instead of a slow train rise up a steep hill, the trail requires huge steps up massive blocks of lava, some teetering and sliding away beneath our feet. Good thing we had helmets! Some would tumble down the slope, others would come to a stop after a few meters. The air was thin and some were struggling. I was struggling a little, but my fitness and training from the last 6 months was paying off- I wasn't out of breath, I had no headache. My heart was beating fast, but it soon settled after a short break. My smile was from ear to ear, knowing my prayers to the gentle giant at sunset the night before were also paying off. A great early morning moleskin and tape job kept the blisters on my feet on good behavior.
We made it to rest stop #3 sometime after 11am, a rest stop at the foot of a glacier with the summit head wall, carved by the summit, in full view. It was here where we (all the clients) were evaluating how we felt to continue. While tired, I actually felt pretty good. The week before in preparation I was resting at the same altitude on top of
Mt. Dana in Yosemite, so up to this point it felt fairly normal. Other clients weren't doing so well. Anders and Chip from Virginia, where the highest elevation in the state is a scant 6000 feet above sea level, weren't sure about attempting the summit. Their boots were ripping at their feet with each step, making the pressure points raw and bloody. Chip's big toe was about to fall out. Headaches and calorie deficits might have also been taking their toll. The other client, Pat, was a local who had summited Shasta almost 15 times, so needless to say he was in great shape to continue. It was decided we would all put on the crampons and hike on the glacier to an overlook of the Hotlum Glacier. After that half would call it
a day and return to camp, and Keith, Pat and I would continue to the summit.
The overlook of the Hotlum Glacier was nothing short of spectacular. Easily the best part of the trip! Here we stood while
California's largest glacier cascaded down the slopes before us, over 1 mile of ice that sloped 3000 feet downwards!! Hotlum Glacier is the largest
glacier on Mount Shasta in terms of volume, with 37 million cubic meters of ice. One slip and it would be very difficult to self-arrest this late in the season on the solid ice. A low snow pack of last winter gave you nothing to dig into! Even if you did fall you wouldn't necessarily go all the way down- a significant number of
crevasses, ice fins and glacial erratics would swallow you, slice you and dice you long before you reached the bottom.
We separated ways, and hiked 400 feet up the glacier away from the other half of the group towards the summit. Ditching our ice axe and crampons, we went higher and higher on the boulders and loose rocks. We rounded two monuments, the Sharks Tooth and the Rabbit Ears- huge outcrops of rock over 50 feet tall
that seem like boulders from basecamp. We soon were on the north side of the summit cone, straddling the two summit hills. It was at this spot where I came to the most anticipated part of the journey for me- the bubbling sulfur springs!
Shasta is alive and well, and the vents were living proof of that. One pool of water about a gallon deep was about 90 degrees, bubbling with sulfurous gases. There was at least 25 other holes in the ground, vents for the gases that hissed out as loud as a tire releasing its pressurized gas. Deep within the giant volcano, the lava is still working its magic!! I loved that part...knowing that somewhere inside the giant lava was flowing and gasses were forming. The summit was in view over a short ridge, and the lead guide Keith said this was truly one part of the climb that looked farther and higher than it really was.
15 minutes up a hill later, we reached the summit!! What an accomplishment, the summit area was about the size of an average living room. The views were incredible, as nothing stands in your way. You could see Lassen
Peak, the jagged ridges of the Trinity Alps high country, Mt. McLaughlin to the north, Mt. Shasta City deep below and the gorgeous sister volcano Shastina. Shastina seems to be a Siamese twin of
Mt. Shasta proper, contorting its crater shaped head from the side of the sleeping beauty. In fact if Shastina (3749 m) stood alone it would be the 3rd tallest volcano in the Cascades behind Mt. Ranier (4392 m) and Mt. Shasta (4317 m).
For some reason there was a dog at the top- not a living dog, but a stuffed dog, one that had been taken to a taxidermist! So strange! Also in the summit register metal box was a rubber chicken, a
Rubik's cube and a bottle of water. Dane, our other guide, has just changed the summit register a week prior. In that time 10 people had made it to the top, but we were the only ones on the summit that day. After about 45 minutes we left, having a huge ass kicking long haul back to camp. When looking north, the
massive glaciers of Mt. Shasta spread from all directions. If you looked at the right spot, you could see a small speck of red
4000 feet below. That speck was our tent!
The downhill was brutal on the knees, but it was great pleasure knowing that with each step the air was getting thicker and the food was getting closer. What took 4 baby steps coming up was one big sliding step going down in the loose rock. We got back to the glacier and hiked down in the crampons, then Keith roped the three of us together and we continued down the big glacier because it was faster that boulder hopping on that section. We needed rope because this was one section with no ending to the ice except 2000 feet below us at the first crevasse!
We finally made it back to camp around 6pm. This means the summit day was 13 hours of climbing and hiking- 9 hours up and 4 down! Looking back I wasn't necessarily super excited on top of the summit but I felt that way the entire way. I was proud and happy about the entire adventure that began 6 months before when I signed up. My physical preparation and performance, my positive attitude and successful summit all had me grinning ear to ear. It
was the biggest sense of accomplishment Ive had in a long time, something I knew would turn my life in the right directioneven if my joints won't give me permission to climb mountains anytime soon! Although, a fairly technichal summit of one of the Palisades(home to the
Sierra Nevada's largest glaciers) next summer sure does sound enticing...
--Steve
http://www.sphaydenphotography.com Resources:
Christa
non-member comment
WOW!
Hi Steve! What an awesome accomplishment! I loved seeing the photos - it really made real to me what a difficult, impressive, and gorgeous climb you did. I really enjoyed the narrative also...one of your best! :) It was so good to see you this past month :)