The Winter Route

While there are several ways to the top, most of us focus on two, ‘The Winter Route’ and ‘The Summer Route.’ Of course, there are variations of each, but the main thrust is that once the snow has consolidated, sometime in the late spring, and the avalanche chutes no longer pose life-threatening danger, we have a window in time when we can ascend the ridgeline to the lookout on snow, ‘The Winter Route.’ And that’s fun. Big fun, if you like toting an ice axe and kicking steps, with or without spikes, depending.

Yes, I’m talking about the hike up to the Granite Mountain Lookout. It’s an all-season hike, except when the snow makes for prime avalanche conditions. Even with the snow at the higher elevations, it’s beautiful in the spring and summer, festooned with blooming bear grass and other wildflowers on the approach. And in the fall, the abundant mountain ash and huckleberries provide truly spectacular colors. Unfortunately, no subalpine larches are turning brilliant gold in late September / early October but the alpine meadows are rich with stunning hues of reds, oranges, and golden ochres in the late season.

The last time I ascended the ridge crest was on the 3rd of June, 2020, hiking solo. Starting at 7:30 am, the crisp morning chilled me. But soon after the first mile, I peeled off a layer since I always find it impossible not to work up a sweat in the forested section after the Pratt Lake Trail junction. It’s where the trail quickly steepens, rapidly gaining elevation over ever more boulder-strewn terrain. The trail was in good shape with negligible mud. After emerging from the verdant forest, the beautiful day featured mostly blue skies, with only the wispiest of drifting clouds, all the way from the upper meadows to the historic fire lookout.

I encountered snowfields at 4,700 feet around 9:30 am, and the last 1,000 vertical feet were entirely on snow. The snow was soft enough that microspikes were not required (I had them in my pack just in case). My poles were useful for stability on the less steep slopes but I switched to my ice axe for the ascent of the steep ridgeline and was happy with that decision. I was also wearing stiff-soled mountaineering boots which were very helpful in kicking steps on the way up and plunge stepping on the way down. Mountain boots and an ice axe provided me with a sense of confidence and security.

While there was a path in the snow, it was days old and I kicked my steps. The upper ridge featured a prominent cornice on the upper section before the lookout. I took note and avoided venturing too close to the edge. As snowmelt had begun, there was a cleft between the upper snow slopes and the granite boulders in several places along the upper ridgeline. They were sharply undercut and required cautious attention so as not to punch through to the granite boulders below.

There would be more melting in the days ahead and while I could ascend the entire ridgeline to the lookout on snow today, that would soon become impossible as the snow melted out. The ridgeline route would then become a combination of rock scrambling and snow travel. And that combination would be far less fun. I knew because I had done it in years past.

That day in early June was simply pure magic! And even though we were amid a pandemic, I hiked early and only encountered 3 people descending as I ascended and I had the lookout all to myself for a leisurely snack before heading down. As I descended, I soon passed others on their way to the top. All were smiling. It’s that kind of place.

Once the snow has departed, it’s much easier to access the lookout by traversing a high meadow below the summit ridge and ascending a rocky trail from the north. The last switchbacks up the rocky path are steep, and it’s always a relief when the lookout comes into sight. The cabin is rarely open, and I have only been in it once during maintenance work by the rangers. Open or not, it is an amazing piece of history and a wonderful place to sit and snack and enjoy the views.

For panoramic views without the snow, I invite you to look at my spherical panoramas. I have taken seven at the historic Granite Mountain fire lookout. All have vistas of the nearby peaks. The links below feature two examples that can be viewed at 360cities.net. Others may be accessed by scrolling below each image and clicking on the ‘Nearby’ tab. Be sure to click the full-screen icon as you roll over the upper right of the photo for best viewing. 

Granite Mountain Fire Lookout Cabin: https://www.360cities.net/image/granite-mountain-fire-lookout-cabin-alpine-lakes-wilderness-washington-state

Granite Mountain Cirrus Clouds: https://www.360cities.net/image/granite-mountain-cirrus-clouds-alpine-lakes-wilderness-washington-state

 

Thinking Small

‘Think Small’ The simple headline was unprecedented. Bursting onto the scene in 1959, the unusual ad campaign was probably the most famous ever created by the Doyle Dane Bernbach advertising agency. Stunning everyone, it announced and positioned the VW Beetle in a completely new way, changing the very nature of advertising during that era. No one who ever saw it forgot it. It was ‘sticky’ before that word entered the broader lexicon, more tenacious than merely memorable, it was truly unforgettable. And we talked about it.

It was akin to a messaging tsunami. Why embellish product pitches with questionable platitudes? Why not state a position based on an obvious truth and challenge your target audience to think? Even though a pre-teen, I was already obsessed with cars and the simple ad did not escape my attention. I thought it brilliant. Such restraint, and yet confident, with undeniable clarity, cutting through the clutter, standing defiantly alone. Advertising Age ranked it the best advertising campaign of the century.

And now, many years later, I recall it once again, as I have recently embraced a discipline of small, a way to progress in the art of seeing, and craft of art, for both my drawing and watercolor painting. When starting, or resuming after a long absence, the fear of failure and the daunting white of the blank page often hold one back, barriers to our learning and success. And also, the notion that we should jump right into watercolor painting with a larger format, perhaps a sheet of 22” x 30” cold press cotton paper. For anyone but a master painter, it’s a likely recipe for disappointment and an impediment to making progress with the medium. In short, a discouraging event of no small significance.

Paint small and often seems like good advice. I’ve heard that statement more than once from those who teach. And the same would apply to drawing, an essential skill that provides a foundation for more successful painting. Think about it. A tiny piece of paper, the real estate of a painting, is less precious, and less expensive. The drawing or painting is contained in a sketch-like format. It’s less formal, with a lower barrier to entry, which means that it’s easier to plunge right in. The fear factor is significantly reduced, more iterations can be churned out, and that faster production cycle makes it easier to quickly attain skill, evaluate results, and make progress.

When taking art classes in college, we usually started with a large format in our studio classes, and a 9” x 12” sketchbook, with a homework assignment to complete five sketches a day. The frequency of that assignment helped us progress, but we took shortcuts, tackling portions of subjects as a study. What would have been better? Thumbnails.

I have recently gridded out pages of my cheap sketchbook paper so that I can draw eight thumbnail sketches on a page. Yes, they’re comically tiny, but the fear factor is gone, so it’s easy to work up a form and value study quickly, in fact, several of the same subjects in short order. I hadn’t known what I was missing. It’s a freeing experience to make quick sketches, or little watercolors, in a thumbnail format. And, they tend to be more spontaneous, loose, and exuberant than larger studies. And that means that the process, and the results, are both curious and fun. And fun is a key reason why we do this.

Confidence is a key attribute for the artist in the realm of painting, as it is in rock climbing or the discipline of mixed alpine. Of course, it is an attribute attained through practice and the building of skills in your chosen medium. And anything that removes barriers and makes practice more accessible and frequent will propel one towards mastery and confidence. I have become a believer. These small studies are foundational for both skill-building and exploration of ideas before committing to a larger format. They function as a bridge between a concept and the finished work. I now realize that thumbnails are an essential part of any artist’s toolbox.

 

Granularity

Aside from acknowledging particles of sand on a beach, I had given little thought to granularity. And then, many years ago, I was startled into wakefulness by a programmer at our weekly business planning meeting. It was the first time I heard the question, “How granular do you want it?” I was working for a dot-com at the time, right before the year 2000, and most of my associates were from the tech side, where ‘granular’ was a well-used shorthand descriptor that indicated the relative depth of detail, which in their case, usually meant the description of an approach or solution that involved complex computer language, both for operating systems and applications. His question was serious.

I occupied the marketing side, where we didn’t often deal at a granular level as the concepts that inspired customer desire were often emotional, vaguer, and more ephemeral. That simple word, granular well illustrated the gap between us in our respective backgrounds and ways of thinking. He asked because he knew we’d fall asleep if he took the deep dive. He was right. We only wanted the conceptual highlights. And the assurances that we were moving forward. Unfortunately, it did not matter and was of no consequence as we soon perished as many other dot-coms from that era.

And now, I am immersed in the study and practice of the art of watercolors. And I encounter the word once more. What does it mean for this art? When confronted with ground paint pigments in a watery substrate, granularity matters again. It’s on a much smaller scale now, but important nonetheless. In the context of watercolor, it’s the physics of the heavier pigment grains settling in the rough depressions of the textured watercolor paper due to gravity and the uneven depositing of such sedimentary particles. Yet another piece of the puzzle that contributes to unexpected outcomes that painters experience in this aqueous medium. It can be semi-manageable and madly out of control, often yielding surprising results.

Dry, ground-up pigments are mixed with binders to make the paints that watercolor artists use, either in tube form or in pans. Non-granulating pigments disperse evenly with water, covering the paper smoothly, equally, or nearly so in color and texture. Granulating pigments are often heavier and have a larger particle size which leads them to more easily separate from their binder on wet paper, the granules migrating and depositing into the depressions, the valleys, on the textured surface of the watercolor paper. While granulation can occur on smooth paper, cold press, and rough paper provide the most opportunity to showcase the physics of granulation.

And once dry, the effect is visually magnified with a grainy appearance of the tiny flakes arranged in a way that can be stunningly beautiful. The effect is often sought by landscape painters and others who want to achieve a noticeably textured appearance, which can seem like visual alchemy. Some cany manufacturers have noticed that interest from artists and have created specialty paints that play to this effect. Schmincke sells a specialty range titled ‘Super Granulating.’ Daniel Smith markets their extra granulating paint in a distinct range labeled ’Primatek.’

As I play with my watercolors, exploring wet on wet skies and reflections in water, I find the results of granulation absolutely enchanting. I eagerly anticipate putting pigment to paper, wondering what will be revealed. The process is a voyage of discovery, a new world of even more dramatic visual effects. And now, finally, I can eagerly say, “Yes, let’s get granular! Real granular!” Release the magic, and let the fun begin!

The Casting Game

My wife and I read many books and have our favorites, many of which we’d like to make the journey from the printed page to a cinematic venue. And so, it’s often great fun to speculate about who might be the perfect casting choice for a character in such a book. We often spitball about who we would cast. For example, who would be right for the plucky heroine Irene in The Invisible Library? And what of Banquet of the Infinite’s Diane, who makes her entrance in a chapter titled, ‘Snow, Rock, and Rainbows?’

Vanessa Kirby, who was so expressive as the rebellious Princess Margaret in Season 1 of The Crown, could easily inhabit the role of dashing, brave, and inventive Irene. And Diane from Banquet of the Infinite? The young Australian actress, Angourie Rice who made her debut in 2016 as Holly March in The Nice Guys, with Russell Crowe and Ryan Gosling, comes to mind. Now 21 years old, her acting career is blossoming, and she bears an uncanny resemblance to the young Diane, who hikes and climbs in wild places. The perfect fit? I can’t think of anyone more appropriate.

The story of ‘Snow, Rock, and Rainbows’ is told in my mountain memoir, Banquet of the Infinite, which is available as an eBook on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Kobo.

 

The Reckoning

While not much to look at, the provincial mountain town of Index was, in our unconstrained imagination, a stripped-down version of Chamonix, the famous French commune, a mecca for alpine climbers. Located on the North Fork of The Skykomish River in the western foothills of the Cascades, the little town was not even visible from Highway 2.

There was only a sign. But once you drove into town, you could see the dramatic and easily accessible sheer rock cliffs of the Upper and Lower Town Walls. Those granite destinations hosted over forty vertical rock routes like City Park, Snow White, Japanese Gardens, and Breakfast of Champions.

Across Highway 2, the three peaks of Mt. Index - Main, Middle, and North-jutted prominently skyward. A dramatic rock palisade, clearly visible to the south of Index, their profiles were so classically alpine and visually stunning that they could make a climber’s heart flutter. The desire they created was palpable. Who among us wouldn’t want to ascend those peaks? And the loftiest of goals was the traverse, to climb not only the North Peak but to complete a series of ascents across the summits of the other two peaks, all in one push.

The plan was to climb the North Face of the North Peak, bivy at the top, and complete the traverse of the other two peaks the next day. It was a decent plan, as plans go, but the condition of the route up the North Peak was far from what we had expected. We were naive. We expected a straightforward ascent of clean solid granite with most pitches to be crack climbs. Instead, early on, we encountered long sections with significant exposure that I would later describe as a vertical bushwhack.

Scary pitches of dirty, loose rock and insubstantial vegetation offered no opportunity for roped protection. So, we climbed simultaneously and very carefully. It was both physically and mentally exhausting, as appalling conditions often are. While good rock can inspire confidence and augment your physical enjoyment, crappy pitches suck away at you, both physically and psychically.

It was only near the top, the last three pitches before the summit, that we encountered any decent rock and opportunities to place protection with confidence. We climbed those fine pitches roped, and they were a joy. Would that the balance of the climb had been so satisfying. But no, it was not. It was regrettably a Jekyll and Hyde route.

Mt. Stuart and Dragontail Peak had ruined me. Those north face routes themselves were pretty darn clean, mostly clear of vegetation and soil, and the quality of granite was superb. They were immaculate by comparison. Although there were always loose blocks in the couloirs, most of the rock was solid, and you could depend on it. That was not the case on Mt. Index. The dismal quality of the route led me to despise the climb, and by extension, the peak, even before our summit bivouac.

Beckey’s climbing guide had pointed out the dirty, loose brushy conditions but had minimized them. We did not know that, and even if we had been told about it in advance, we probably would have ignored it since we had a predetermined vision of what this climb should be, and that drove us forward. It had looked so pristine from the little town of Index. We would have been in complete denial.

And we also revered Fred Beckey. He was a legend even then. No, he hadn’t yet achieved national name recognition, but everyone who climbed in the Pacific Northwest either knew him or knew of him. He had climbed this route and so, like other acolytes, we followed in his footsteps. If Beckey had climbed it, we should climb it. Of course, that completely ignored the reality that it might be a scary and unsatisfying event. I didn’t even consider that possibility. Denny probably didn’t either.

Arriving at the top, we unroped and found the summit register, a short section of galvanized pipe with two threaded end caps. Inside was an old curled paper book and a stub of a pencil. We entered our names and smiled at each other. After the momentary thrill of the successful ascent and taking a couple of summit photos, my thoughts shifted to the traverse. I climbed down a few steps from the top to further examine the section that we’d need to downclimb to continue our traverse to the Middle Peak. I didn’t like what I saw.

I gazed at a ragged jumble of granite blocks that appeared to have been angrily tossed down into the saddle by the forces of gravity that continually erode mountains. The whole daunting mess down to and across the deeply knifed Middle-North Peak notch looked highly unstable. I wasn’t a big fan of steep loose rock this size, especially with the kind of exposure we had at that elevation. It was one thing to plunge step down a scree field near a run-out, but this looked treacherous. I couldn’t see riding one of these fractured blocks to the bottom.

Getting from the North Peak to the Middle Peak had all the appearances of a delicate and significantly risky undertaking. Maybe I was an elitist, but I already had mixed feelings about the route we had just completed and found myself rapidly losing interest in the traverse. Even though we had just bagged the North Peak, I felt no enthusiasm to continue.

“So be it,” I said to myself. “There’s nothing more to see here folks, move along.” There were other, much better climbs to spend my time on.

As the sun departed, we slipped into down jackets and half bags over thin foam pads amongst the tumble of boulders at the summit and pulled our nylon bivy sacks over us. We prepared for a sleep that would not come. It was another one of those nights on a mountain bivouac. If it were not for my anxiety about the conditions of the climbing ahead, I might have lay in wonderment looking up at the star-filled universe above us, merging with the infinite, before drifting away.

Instead, I lay awake, silently awfulizing about what could go wrong on the traverse, a continuous disaster loop playing in my overactive mind. I finally made a decision. “Fuck it!” My fun meter indicator had been dropping rapidly and was near pegging zero. I was definitely done. My new game plan was to feign sleeping in and hope that my climbing partner Denny had an interminably rough sleepless night and would agree to abandon the traverse until sometime in the indeterminant future.

“Hey, we can always come back again,” I would say. Well, I lucked out as that did happen.

This is a brief excerpt from ‘The Choices We Make,’ a mountaineering adventure story about our ascent of the North Face of the North Peak of Mt. Index. The story is told in my mountain memoir, Banquet of the Infinite, available as an eBook on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Kobo.

The Dragon's Tail

A children’s coloring book of cliffs and crags? Uh, no. Just a quick pen and wash study from a summit photo I took back in 1975. Unfortunately, the smooth Stillman & Bird sketchbook paper doesn’t allow the wash to flow seamlessly like cold press, but even so, I like it. A good experiment, nonetheless. I shall return to this subject again, and see if I can improve. Any guesses where this is? Hint: Gerber and Sink completed the first ascent only four years before we climbed it.

At the summit, we held in our view that wonderful panorama of the Enchantment Lakes Basin, the spiky Prusik Peak, Little Annapurna, and the other peaks of the Stuart Range and the distant forms of the volcanos, Mt. Rainier standing assertively above the rest. Breathtaking! Ebullient, we stood and took photos of each other at the top. Dragontail Peak was no doubt named for the jagged serpentine ridge that dominates its skyline. Not nearly as evident from below, it was prominent and dramatically striking to behold from the summit. The spires were both mythic and medieval in their physical manifestation, like weathered and broken crenellations of an ancient stone castle.

Unfortunately, we could not linger to savor our accomplishments. The original plan was to bivy at or shortly after the summit, not partway up the face. Running against the clock, we cautiously descended the steep snowfields on the backside and hiked down the tedious steep slopes of loose rock from Aasgard Pass to the lakeside boulder field. Moving as fast as was reasonable, we hopped from boulder to boulder, careful not to slip and fall into any void between them and thus suffer a potentially debilitating injury. Accessing the trail on the south side of the lake, we continued out as the sun dropped below the horizon. Dark now, we used our headlamps hiking down the sometimes steep and twisting trail back across the heavy log bridge and the final two miles out to the trailhead.

We were spent, thrashed. Grateful that I was not driving, I gave my fate over to Denny. We clambered into his old VW Beetle and bounced down the potholed forest road, and headed towards home. As we drove through the tiny hamlet of Gold Bar, my head slumped to my chest. It was after 4:00 am on Monday when Denny finally dropped me off. I was not looking forward to the day ahead. And as far as our mountaineering victory, no one at the architectural office would care one bit. Not a whit. And the recognition of that did not cheer me.

This is a brief excerpt from ‘Rolling with the Punches,’ a mountaineering adventure story about our ascent of the North Face of Dragontail Peak. The story is told in my mountain memoir, Banquet of the Infinite, now available as an eBook on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Kobo.

Photos and mountain art are by the author.

The Magic Mountain

Not long after our incident with the errant careening rock, we got our first view of the West Arête of Eldorado. Sharply silhouetted against the sky, it flowed jaggedly upward from left to right towards Eldorado’s dramatic knifepoint summit. Both the size and shape of the steep dark ridge appeared ominously forbidding. The impact upon my reptilian brain was immediate.

I was afraid. It struck me as the most fearsome-looking ridge climb that I had ever seen. Was I ready for this? Doubt swept over me like a heavy chain mail shroud, forcibly weighing me down, and I became even surer that no, I was not ready to be any part of this climb. Sure, I had climbed the North Ridge of Mount Stuart and other challenging routes, but this was different, enormous in scale, more jagged, steeper, more dangerous, and more damn scary. My mind shifted into overdrive. Excuses, excuses, what plausible reason could I possibly manufacture to avoid this climb? I felt a desperation to bail out from the ridge climb.

“You know, I’m just not feeling very up to snuff today, a bit off my game. I think I’ll sit this one out and enjoy the scenery. I like it out here. It’s quite beautiful. The three of you can rope up together and climb the ridge. That will work out nicely. A threesome. A nice rope. Yes, and I’ll stay here and meet up with you on the way out. I don’t need to climb this ridge. I’ll be fine. Go ahead and have fun. I’ll wait here.”

I blurted this out as casually as I could manage and waited for a response. I hoped for a quick agreement from the group. I didn’t have to wait long. And I didn’t get it. No one took me seriously, and they were having none of my excuses, no traction on my attempt to weenie out. The group mandate was that I was climbing the ridge with Nicolai. He would be my partner, and that was the end of my nonsense suggestion. Darn. I gulped and started trying to convince myself that it would probably be okay. I was still working on that as we crawled into our sleeping bags for the night.

We awoke early, knowing that today was the big day. We’d be climbing a lot of jagged vertical on the fearsome buttress to reach the summit. I tried to assure myself: just another day at the office, rope up, go to work, get moving up, doing what you know you can do. For some reason, I did not bring my trusty little Rollei 35 camera, which I usually carried in a zippered nylon packcloth pocket on a chest sling, so I have no photos of this climb. The images exist only in my mind. I vividly remember the very photo-worthy route, from the expansive view of the fearsome silhouette to the airy pitches along the ridge.  

Looking back, I must have left the camera behind to avoid any distraction from the task at hand. Climbing the lower sections was a work-like affair from a technical and enjoyment standpoint, and I remember little of those pitches. But the climbing around the granite gendarmes in the middle section was nothing short of spectacular. The 5.8 crux chimney traverse on thin face holds required a bit of attention, but we were all on our game. Everything flowed seamlessly as we swung leads rhythmically up.

You can’t say that about every climb, and you feel the gift of the gods when it happens. I paused during one belay, feeding out the rope to Nicolai, and gazed in awe across the magnificent terrain defined by the jagged surrounding peaks of the North Cascades.

As I sat on the warm granite, anchored to the rock by slings and the force of gravity, the shimmering peaks in the distance appeared to float weightlessly before me. In those moments, I had mentally slipped into a form of sitting meditation. My conscious insight was that my reason for doing these climbs, with all of the dirty, strenuous, and dangerous work, was not to rack up a list of summits with progressively harder difficulty ratings to make myself feel good or to tell my friends.

The real reason for the climb, the extraordinary gift of it, was to see the world from a different vantage point, a vantage point that would be gained only by hard work, requisite skill, and the ability to take risks and overcome fear. And to trust and rely on the help from my fellow climbing partners, who were in those moments my very best friends. The stunning views of and from the sharp ridge were the everlasting rewards.

And in those moments, I was infinite. The climbing that day was long and technical, challenging and immensely gratifying, and surprisingly, at the end of the day, over way too soon. The physical touch of the solid granite beneath my feet and fingertips was so reassuring, and that day we savored the rock as if we had attended a banquet. It was sublime.

What I remember most from that day was not the athleticism and challenge of the climbing, but the place and my perceptions of it. The being there was the gift. After entering the perceptual mystic and achieving what had been some of the most satisfying climbing I had yet done in the Cascades, we reached the summit. We stood at the top of the snow and ice that cascaded down the other side. We basked in the epic moment. As I surveyed the scene, I was delirious with joy. With clear skies and unlimited visibility, the views from the summit were expansive and dramatic, Wagnerian in their visual intensity!

What had I been thinking, trying to get out of this? This climb was one of the most magnificent mountain routes that I had completed to date. I was profoundly grateful that my friends had not listened to my nonsense from yesterday. Thank God. There is a unique type of closeness that you feel with your climbing partners. It’s a marriage where you trust your partner with your life. Sure, that partnership can vacillate between love, gratification, aggravation, and hate, depending on the circumstances. But there is nothing like the feeling of celebrating the completion of a successful, great athletic climb together.

It was to be my only climb with Mark Fielding, who was previously Nicolai’s mountain mentor. And I also never climbed again with the young woman who partnered with Mark on Eldorado Peak. Looking back, I do regret that I did not remember her name. I can testify that she was strong, skilled, and confident and moved with a swift gracefulness, dancing upward towards the summit.

I suppose that I was too self-involved with my anxiety around my ability and readiness to tackle the climb to be paying much attention to Mark and his climbing partner. Mark was incredibly skilled, having made many first ascents with the already mythic Fred Beckey, and any partner of Mark’s would have an unspoken, yet irrefutable, endorsement of competence. Nicolai, soon after summiting, exclaimed that the West Ridge of Eldorado Peak was the ultimate alpine climb of his mountaineering career.

At the time, I withheld that appraisal for myself since it wasn’t the beatdown I had experienced on the North Ridge of Stuart or the sensational experience of the vertical ice world of the Black Ice Couloir on the Grand Teton. But looking back, I agree with Nicolai that this climb was among the great ones for myself as well, and perhaps the highlight of my all too brief technical climbing career.

This is a brief excerpt from 'I’ll Wait Here,’ a mountaineering adventure story about our ascent of the West Arête of Eldorado Peak. The story is told in my mountain memoir, Banquet of the Infinite, now available as an eBook on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Kobo.

Mountain artworks are by the author.