Eastern Sierra Trip - August 11-20, 2018

“Have you written on your blog lately?” “No, I don’t write about everything I do, and nothing I’ve done recently has been all that character-building.” “Well, this might be character-building.” Lani and I were preparing to take on a massive alpine climb, backpacking in the night before to get an early start on the 22-pitch Sun Ribbon Arête on Temple Crag. Well within her ability, this would be twice as long as the longest route I’d done before, although the upper half was supposed to be predominately 4th to low 5th and would go more quickly than the lower portion. Most of the technical pitches go at 5.7 or below, with one crux pitch of 5.9 or 5.10a (depending on which topo you read) that Lani was going to lead.

Spoiler: I summit Bear Creek Spire.

Alta Peak - Someday I Might Summit Something

Planning a backpacking trip with someone for a third date is possibly not the best idea I’ve ever had. By far not the worst, but also not the best. I think by that point it wasn’t really a date though. The someone in question had just moved to California a month ago, and despite living on the road for a year of climbing, he had only spent time in the Valley, not the High Sierra. Therefore my concerns about snow above 8,000’ were disregarded, and we decided to climb Alta Peak in Sequoia National Park. At 11,204’, it was well above what seemed to be the 8-9k snowline for much of that portion of the Sierra, but I assumed he’d found a weather report indicating there wouldn’t be much snow where we were. My warnings were less certainty and more erring on the side of extreme caution and assuming the worst. Someday it would be nice to actually have some confidence in what I think conditions will be like for a trip.

Prologue

Prior to this trip, I could count on one hand the number of times I'd been above 10,000 feet: Lassen Peak, Cathedral Peak, and possibly Round Top, where my group failed to summit. I had some notion that higher elevations make it harder to breathe - after being teased about my "huffing and puffing" on easy trad climbs in Tuolumne - but didn't have much experience doing strenuous hiking above 10,000' and just planned on an immediate turn-around if I developed worrisome symptoms of AMS.

( --- More (xxxx words) --- )